Who tells a business about new regulations?

Mostly, nobody.

There is no agency whose job is to tell you that a rule affecting your

business has changed. Regulators publish in the register and the publication

itself is the legal notice. You are presumed to have read it. That

presumption does not change according to whether anyone told you.

Who might tell you, and what each one misses

Your trade association. The best free option if one exists for your

industry. They watch the rules that affect their members, and they are often

first to know about a proposal worth objecting to. They will not cover the

rules that apply to you as an employer, a landlord, a vehicle operator or a

handler of chemicals, because those are not their subject.

Your accountant or lawyer. They will tell you about the things they are

engaged to watch. An accountant follows tax and payroll. They are not

monitoring your state's cosmetology board or the fire marshal's amendments,

and they are not being paid to.

Your insurer or franchisor. Sometimes, and usually only where their

exposure overlaps yours.

The agency itself. Many run a mailing list. It sends every notice the

agency issues, not the ones relevant to you, and it covers that agency alone.

A restaurant is regulated by the health department, the labor department, the

fire marshal, the alcohol board and OSHA, which is five lists.

A licensing renewal notice. This arrives after a rule changed, not before,

and only if the change touched your licence.

Cross-cutting rules are the ones most likely to be missed. Wage and hour,

workplace safety, paid leave, posting requirements: they apply to almost every

employer, which means no single trade association owns them, and they change

often.

The other common gap is the second thing your business does. A jewellery shop

with a piercer is regulated as a retailer and as a body art establishment. A

brewery with a kitchen is regulated as both. The association covers one of

them.

Your state's register is public and free. Search for "[state] administrative

comment deadline and the compliance date. For one state and one industry this

is an afternoon a month.

Regulatory Update reads the registers for you, works out which changes apply

to your business from a description you write in a sentence or two, and emails

you the clause that changed with the deadline on your calendar. $5 a month.