Plain Language in the News
The U.S. House of Representatives
has reintroduced a 401(k) fee disclosure bill stating that fee information
must be written in "plain English.”
House
Reintroduces 401(k) Fee Disclosure Bill
By Money Management Executive June 12, 2009
The U.S. House of Representatives has reintroduced a 401(k) fee
disclosure bill, the fifth such bill to be considered by Congress.
The latest measure was proposed by senior Democrat Rep. Richard
Neal of Massachusetts, who sits on the U.S. House of Representatives’
Ways and Means Committee. In introducing the bill, the Congressman
emphasized that the fee information must be “quarterly, unbundled,
easily digestible and in plain English.”
It should include a fund’s risk/return characteristics, historic
rates of return alongside those of a benchmark and whether it is
subject to any conflicts of interest such as fees to a consultant
or administrator recommending or providing the fund to the 401(k)
plan.
Neal introduced a similar bill in the previous Congress, as did
House Education and Labor Committee Chairman George Miller (D-Calif.),
Rep. Robert Andrews (D-N.J.), and Sen. Tom Harkin (D-Iowa).
U.S.
federal agencies will be required to revise the job descriptions
for the 10 most common positions they hire for and rewrite them
in plain language.
OMB
releases hiring reform, budget guidelines
By Alyssa Rosenberg and Elizabeth Newell June 12, 2009
Office of Management and Budget Director Peter Orszag told agencies
in a Thursday memo to fast-track federal management reforms, including
those related to hiring, and to use the budget process to target
potential savings.
"The federal hiring process needs to be reformed," Orszag
wrote, criticizing agency efforts to implement the end-to-end hiring
roadmap announced by the Office of Personnel Management in September
2008, which directed agencies to reduce hiring time to 80 days.
"To date, there has been sporadic effort, at best, applied
to making this initial first step in our overall hiring reform a
reality."
Orszag said he and OPM Director John Berry expected agencies to
accomplish four specific goals within the next six months, and set
a Dec. 15 deadline for them to report on their efforts. First, agencies
must use the roadmap guidelines associated with the end-to-end hiring
process to create an outline of their hiring processes. Agencies
also are required to revise the job descriptions for the 10 most
common positions they hire for and rewrite them in plain language;
put in place plans to inform candidates through USAJobs about the
status of their applications throughout the entire hiring process;
and demonstrate that they have involved hiring managers in every
step of the process.
Berry previously said hiring reforms were among his top priorities,
and assigned a team at his agency to examine ways to simplify federal
hiring.
Some of Berry and Orszag's proposals reflect provisions in legislation
introduced in March by Sens. Daniel Akaka, D-Hawaii, and George
Voinovich, R-Ohio. That bill would require agencies to use plain
language in job descriptions and to evaluate the results of their
hiring efforts. But that legislation goes further than the administration's
directive, and would eliminate Knowledge, Skills and Abilities statements
from government job applications in favor of cover letters and resumes,
and create an OPM databank of candidates who would like to be considered
for a variety of federal positions.
South Africa's Consumer Protection Act will require plain language in all consumer documents
Businesses in South Africa will soon be required to use plain language when dealing with consumers. The Consumer Protection Act, which seeks to give consumers the information they need to buy intelligently, makes plain language a basic right and a business obligation.
The Act, which became law April 24, 2009, sets a timetable. By April 24, 2010, the National Consumer Commission must be established and the regulations will come into operation. Six months later, the rest of the Act will take effect.
Once established, the Commission will probably publish more guidelines for plain language, like the following:
 |
Guidelines on how to tell whether a document is in plain language |
|
Requirements for user testing |
|
Guidelines on which language -- English or Afrikaans -- to use for which types of documents. |
Sources:
Gordon, Frances. "Consumer Protection Bill signed into law -- plain language now obligatory in consumer documents." Simplified. May 11, 2009. http://www.simplified.co.za/default.aspx?link=blogs_example
"Business must communicate with consumers in language to comply with new Act." Simplified. May 26, 2009. http://www.biz-community.com/PressOffice/PressRelease.aspx?i=629&ai=36308
"Legal framework for plain language." Simplified. Examples, legal framework page. http://www.simplified.co.za/default.aspx?link=thinking_legalframework
