Payroll Firm error

kkoehler

We have a payroll service. After I've given all wage and deduction information we confirm totals. In December, I had two employees that were given cash advances of 900.00 each. Advances are not common and normally not that much. I always just deduct those as miscellaneous. These two particular employees quit. It just so happened that their gross wage was just over the amount of deduction. When I received my payroll I glanced it over and gave it out as usual. I did not check deductions being that we confirmed totals. A few days later when I posted the payroll I noticed my two 900.00 deductions were not taken. I immediately called my payroll service to find out what happened. They said that fica had to be taken out and that made their pay less than the deduction of 900.00. MInd you one was only $3 bucks and the other about $15. I questioned why they didn't take all of the deduction that they could instead of ignoring the deduction. They said I should have checked it and they made no error. I feel they should have notified me and told me I wasn't going to receive my deduction. They said their system doesn't flag such items and pretty much that I was on my own. I spoke with a supervisor next and she was just as helpful as the other person. Ha. Is there something I can do about this? My employer is out $1800.

HRCalico

I'm not sure you have any recourse at this point to recoup the money since it already has been paid. I am not that familiar with advances (except that I am violently opposed to them for reasons that include the ones you state). I know there is the law that you can't deduct over the amount that would put an employee under the minimum wage, but if you do an advance I don't know how that factors in.

I doubt it will yield any results, but I might call the former employees, remind them of the deduction, and ask them to pay the money back. No, I don't really think that will work, but you could get lucky.

I don't do much with payroll, so I can't give specific suggestions here, but is there any way you can come up with a system to remind yourself to check for oddities in your payroll when you check it? Such as, when you agreed to give the deductions, make a note in your calendar for the day (or approximate day) that you'll do your check. I use my Microsoft Outlook calendar and reminders for everything.

Finally, if you want to feel a little better about things, read over my post on How do you handle your mistakes? in the employment law section. We all screw up, and usually we learn a pretty good lesson from the big ones.

kkoehler

Thanks for your input. I did remember my deductions. It was my payroll service that didn't take them out after we confirmed totals with those deductions. They didn't take them because the net was a few dollars less than the deduction. My beef is that no one told me that my deduction would not be taken.

HRCalico

Oh, no, I understood from your first post that you remembered them! I just read it as when you looked it over, you didn't double check that the deductions were taken. Is there a place where you can look when you check it to see if they were taken, or do you just get the totals? I haven't worked with a payroll service, so I'm unfamiliar with the process. I understand that you want them to deduct as much as they can if they can't deduct the full amount, but it is a matter of getting the payroll company to do that, and I'm no help there. Sorry.

kkoehler

Oh, okay. Yes I did fail to double check. I did bad and assumed (we know what that is) that the deductions were taken since the totals matched. I have learned a very valuable lesson. Thanks for your reply.