Summer Payroll maintenance: It’s time to tidy up!
Summer is the perfect time to perform simple payroll maintenance tasks. Here are some items you can check off your to-do list.
√ Confirm that all monthly, quarterly and annual balances are accumulating properly; pay attention to adjustments.
√ Scan the computer you use to make tax deposits for viruses and sweep them out. Review and winnow the number of employees who have access to this computer.
√ Ask your corporate tax department whether payroll taxes are accumulating properly. Ask corporate to provide you with more timely information, if necessary.
√ Review your communications’ techniques with employees; if you’re still getting too many questions, it may be time to adapt your methods to the media employees actually use.
√ Inquire whether the company paid off an employee’s child support obligation and tax that amount; you may treat the payment as supplemental wages.
√ Work with Accounts Payable to create a system for processing employee payments made outside the payroll system (e.g., business expense or moving expense reimbursements).
√ Reject and return to the sender child support withholding orders that aren’t on OMB-approved forms.
√ Review cellphone reimbursement policies for reasonableness. If something seems out of kilter, ask to see several months of employees’ bills and adjust your reimbursement accordingly.
√ Ensure that the company’s policy regarding paying accrued vacation to terminating employees is enforced consistently and complies with state law.
√ Check T&E policies for reimbursing employees’ local lodging expenses. Reminder: You may reimburse employees’ local lodging expenses if there’s a bona fide reason to require them to stay overnight at a local hotel (e.g., to participate in training activities).
√ Check that employees aren’t working through meal breaks, that employees who can’t take meal breaks notify their supervisors and pay employees who work through their meal breaks.
√ Audit your lock-in letter procedure to ensure that employees receive their copies within 10 days, and that the payroll software postpones any increase in withholding for 45 days or the date indicated in the IRS’ letter.
