2008 Woodie Awards
Letter: Payroll issues inaccurately reported
Issue date: 11/3/06 Section: Opinion
- Page 1 of 1
To the editor:
In response to your recent article titled "Student workers not paid for a month; technological glitches mean students can't get paid for their hours"(October 9, 2006 edition of The Hawk), I thought it might be helpful to clarify a few points for the record.
As a matter of good business practice, it is always our intention to pay student workers on a timely basis. We realize that students work very hard in their various assignments and that many students rely on their paychecks for living expenses. We appreciate the good work that students do and we never want to see them unnecessarily inconvenienced. However, in order for student workers to be paid, several important processes must occur - including having new student workers satisfactorily complete their payroll forms prior to working, having those documents approved and input into our payroll system, and having supervisors approve the time worked during the pay period.
At the beginning of the Fall semester this year, our Payroll Department which is part of Financial Affairs, and not HR, as incorrectly noted in the article) processed approximately 700 student workers - both returning students and new students - through our payroll system. Notwithstanding the inaccuracy in your headline, as the text of your article noted, the problems had nothing to do with information technology. Furthermore, there was no systemic problem in our payroll system. So why did the payroll delays occur? Without knowing the details of each individual case, it is hard to say for sure. However, in most cases, it was likely due to the fact that one or more of the processes referred to above did not properly occur. In some cases, student workers may not have had their time approved by their supervisors. In other cases, the payroll paperwork may have been either incomplete or not submitted on a timely basis. In cases where students received the following message on their payroll input screen, as noted on the screen sample shown in the Hawk, "your records cannot be processed at this time; please contact the Payroll Department", it would have been very helpful if students had contacted a representative in Payroll or their respective supervisor so we could have resolved the problem in a timely manner to expedite payment.
If students are currently experiencing payroll problems or encounter payroll problems in the future, I strongly encourage them to contact the Payroll Department at extensions 1227, 1291, or 1293. Alternatively, they should feel free to contact their immediate supervisor. While our payroll processes must follow a very orderly protocol, our system does provide flexibility to accommodate exceptions and our departmental supervisors are aware of how to handle such exceptions with the Payroll Department. In fact, in early September the Payroll Department sent a communication to them stipulating that "if your student or work study employee is unable to enter time, we ask that you email their hours (to the Payroll Department) and we will make sure that they are paid."
I hope this clarifies the student payroll issues you highlighted and offers suggestions for how to address them in the future. Thank you.
Louis J. Mayer '79
VP for Financial Affairs
In response to your recent article titled "Student workers not paid for a month; technological glitches mean students can't get paid for their hours"(October 9, 2006 edition of The Hawk), I thought it might be helpful to clarify a few points for the record.
As a matter of good business practice, it is always our intention to pay student workers on a timely basis. We realize that students work very hard in their various assignments and that many students rely on their paychecks for living expenses. We appreciate the good work that students do and we never want to see them unnecessarily inconvenienced. However, in order for student workers to be paid, several important processes must occur - including having new student workers satisfactorily complete their payroll forms prior to working, having those documents approved and input into our payroll system, and having supervisors approve the time worked during the pay period.
At the beginning of the Fall semester this year, our Payroll Department which is part of Financial Affairs, and not HR, as incorrectly noted in the article) processed approximately 700 student workers - both returning students and new students - through our payroll system. Notwithstanding the inaccuracy in your headline, as the text of your article noted, the problems had nothing to do with information technology. Furthermore, there was no systemic problem in our payroll system. So why did the payroll delays occur? Without knowing the details of each individual case, it is hard to say for sure. However, in most cases, it was likely due to the fact that one or more of the processes referred to above did not properly occur. In some cases, student workers may not have had their time approved by their supervisors. In other cases, the payroll paperwork may have been either incomplete or not submitted on a timely basis. In cases where students received the following message on their payroll input screen, as noted on the screen sample shown in the Hawk, "your records cannot be processed at this time; please contact the Payroll Department", it would have been very helpful if students had contacted a representative in Payroll or their respective supervisor so we could have resolved the problem in a timely manner to expedite payment.
If students are currently experiencing payroll problems or encounter payroll problems in the future, I strongly encourage them to contact the Payroll Department at extensions 1227, 1291, or 1293. Alternatively, they should feel free to contact their immediate supervisor. While our payroll processes must follow a very orderly protocol, our system does provide flexibility to accommodate exceptions and our departmental supervisors are aware of how to handle such exceptions with the Payroll Department. In fact, in early September the Payroll Department sent a communication to them stipulating that "if your student or work study employee is unable to enter time, we ask that you email their hours (to the Payroll Department) and we will make sure that they are paid."
I hope this clarifies the student payroll issues you highlighted and offers suggestions for how to address them in the future. Thank you.
Louis J. Mayer '79
VP for Financial Affairs
Be the first to comment on this story