Payroll

8 tips for handling summer military-leave payroll issues

06/14/2011

Summer is usually when employees who belong to the National Guard and military Reserves give their two weeks of duty to Uncle Sam. Now is the time to prepare for their absence, by following these eight tips.

A perfect summer day? Doing payroll maintenance

06/10/2011

Round out your summer schedule by making time to perform these general payroll maintenance chores and early year-end tasks:

Don’t court lawsuit by allowing early clock-ins

06/10/2011

Beware if you allow employees to clock in early, but tell them not to start work before their scheduled start times. If early clock-ins are routinely unpaid, there may be a class-action lawsuit brewing.

Feds issue new tip-credit pooling rules

06/08/2011

Employers are now free under federal law to set the percentage of employee tips that can be placed in a tip pool. But Minnesota employers need to be aware of a crucial difference between federal and state laws.

Backup withholding required even after W-9s are tossed

06/03/2011

You must backup withhold on payments made to independent contractors if they don’t certify their Taxpayer Identification Numbers to you prior to payment. Contractors may make those certifications by providing you with Form W-9, which you must keep for three years. Caution: You may want to retain these forms for longer than three years. Here’s why:

Timely mailing rule applies to package damaged in transit

06/03/2011

If you mail a tax-related document on the date it’s due, you’ll be considered to have timely filed it, according to the tax code’s timely-mailing-is-timely-filing rule. The same is true if the document isn’t delivered because the post office mangled it during processing.

Another Bride, Another Groom: An SSN Problem About to Loom?

06/02/2011

June is wedding month, which means name changes for brides who take their husbands’ names and couples who hyphenate their names. Reminder: Newlyweds must get replacement Social Security cards showing their new names.

Understand your state law on pay cards, direct deposit

06/01/2011

More employers are offering to let workers collect their pay on reloadable, prepaid bank cards. But make sure you know your state law: Most states prohibit employers from mandating that workers receive pay electronically.

Is it OK for supervisors and employees to use different methods for recording work hours?

05/27/2011

Q. Our nonsupervisory, hourly employees punch in using a time clock. Our supervisors write timecards. Is this dual method acceptable or could it lead to legal trouble?

Levies and garnishments: Tough questions

05/26/2011

Question: An employee who has child support withheld from his pay declared bankruptcy. We received a bankruptcy order that requires us to withhold $330 monthly. However, the Consumer Credit Protection Act says not more than 50% of an employee’s disposable pay can be withheld for child support. The bankruptcy trustee said that the 50% limit doesn’t apply, but this seems wrong to us. Who’s correct?