Texas Certified Payroll Requirements

Texas trips up more contractors than states with stricter rules, and the reason is counterintuitive: there is no statewide wage determination and no state certified-payroll portal. That absence gets misread as "Texas doesn't have prevailing wage." It does. The obligation is real, the penalty is specific, and the rate you owe is set by whichever public body hired you — not by Austin.

Who's covered: Government Code Chapter 2258

Texas prevailing wage comes from Title 10, Chapter 2258 of the Texas Government Code, a state-level "little Davis-Bacon" law that requires payment of the general prevailing wage for each craft or type of work needed on a public work contract. It applies to public works construction funded wholly or partly by state or local public funds.

The detail that matters most: Texas sets no dollar threshold. Unlike the federal Davis-Bacon Act, which kicks in above $2,000, and unlike states such as Pennsylvania with a $25,000 floor, the Texas statute has no minimum contract value. A small repair contract for a school district can carry the same prevailing wage obligation as a multimillion-dollar municipal build. Do not assume a job is too small to be covered.

The Texas twist: your rate comes from the public body

In most prevailing-wage states, a labor department publishes rate schedules by county and trade. Texas does not work that way. Under Chapter 2258, each political subdivision determines its own prevailing wage rates for its own projects. The city, county, school district, transit authority, or state agency awarding the contract decides the rates that apply to it.

In practice, many Texas public bodies adopt the federal Davis-Bacon determination for the locality rather than conducting their own survey. That is a common approach, not a legal guarantee — so never assume it. The operative rates are the ones named in your contract documents. If the rate schedule isn't attached to your bid package, ask for it in writing before you price the work, because there is no state database you can look it up in afterward.

What you file, and to whom

Because Texas runs no central portal, your submission requirement comes from the contract and from the awarding public body. Many Texas agencies and primes ask for a weekly certified payroll on Form WH-347 or an equivalent report carrying the same information and a signed statement of compliance — the federal form is widely used in Texas simply because it is the recognized standard, not because state law names it.

Chapter 2258 does impose a record-keeping duty directly: contractors and subcontractors must keep copies of weekly payrolls available for review for three years from the date the contract is completed. Note the clock — three years from completion, not from the week the work was performed. On a long project, your earliest payroll records have to survive considerably longer than three years.

The penalty: $60 per worker, per day

Texas attaches a specific statutory penalty to underpayment: $60 for each worker, for each calendar day the worker is paid less than the required prevailing rate. That accrues per person per day, which is why an unnoticed classification or fringe error scales alarmingly. A five-worker crew misclassified for a four-week stretch is 28 calendar days — the penalty alone runs to five figures, entirely separate from the back wages you still owe.

This is the practical argument for catching rate and fringe problems in week one rather than during a payment dispute months later.

Common Texas mistakes

• Assuming Texas has no prevailing wage. The absence of a state portal and a statewide rate schedule is not the absence of a law. Chapter 2258 applies to state and local public works.
• Waiting for a threshold that doesn't exist. There is no minimum contract value. Small jobs are covered.
• Reusing another jurisdiction's rates.Rates are set by the awarding public body. The schedule from last year's county job does not carry over to this year's city job.
• Pricing the bid before seeing the rate schedule. With no central lookup, an unattached schedule is a real risk — get it in writing pre-bid.
• Purging records at three years from the work. The clock runs from contract completion.
• Shorting the fringe. The obligation is the full package. Cash wages plus bona-fide benefit contributions must meet the required total, and shortfalls become back wages on every hour.

Federal overlap

Plenty of Texas work — highway projects, transit, airport, and federally assisted housing — carries federal funding, which brings the Davis-Bacon Act and its weekly WH-347obligation alongside the state law. When both apply, workers are owed the higher of the applicable rates for their classification, and you may owe submissions under both regimes. Your contract documents name the funding sources; read them, and ask the public body or prime if the picture isn't clear.

How Certiwage helps

Certiwage builds a clean weekly WH-347from your crew's hours and rates, applies the Davis-Bacon overtime formula correctly (1.5× the base rate plus straight-time fringe), and runs a fringe shortfall check against the required package before you sign — the check that matters most in a state where underpayment costs $60 per worker per day. Because Texas has no mandated state format, the WH-347 that Certiwage produces is the report most Texas awarding bodies and primes expect, but you should confirm the required format with yours.

Certiwage is a document-preparation tool, not legal advice, and is not affiliated with any Texas public body or the U.S. Department of Labor. Confirm your project's rates and submission requirements with the awarding agency. You can compare how other states handle it in our California, Pennsylvania, and Ohio guides.

The fastest way to see your numbers checked is to run one week through the free WH-347 builder — no signup, and the fringe and overtime math is verified for you.