DCAR Newsletter - November 2014

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PeopleSoft Upgrade Scheduled for Thanksgiving Weekend – Early Shutdown on Nov. 26

Don't Forget

Due to the timing of the upgrade processes, the PeopleSoft financial system will be shutting down to agency financial users at 10 a.m. on Wednesday, Nov. 26.  All transactions that must be processed prior to Dec. 1 in the financial system need to be completed prior to the shutdown.  Included in this newsletter are specific instructions related to Accounts Payable, Payroll and Deposits.

Please plan ahead and get your transactions in  as early as possible.  Barring unforeseen circumstances, the system is expected to be operating again by noon on Dec. 1.


PAYROLL

Updated OMES Form PWC, Request for Payroll Warrant/Direct Deposit Cancellation

The OMES Form PWC has been updated with a new fax number, (405) 522-2186. Please note this change and begin sending PWC requests to the new number.  The updated form and instructions can be found on the OMES Website.

Faxes sent to the old number may not be processed in a timely manner which could cause amounts not to be returned to the state. Agencies are responsible for collecting any amounts that cannot be retrieved through the PWC process in accordance with 74 O.S. § 840 - 2.19, Subsection D.

If you should have questions concerning this change, please contact Lisa Raihl at (405) 521-3258 or lisa.raihl@omes.ok.gov, Jean Hayes at (405) 522-6300 or jean.hayes@omes.ok.gov, or Beth Brox at (405) 522-1099 or beth.brox@omes.ok.gov.

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Employee Direct Deposit Verification of Bank Routing Number

Agencies are reminded that employee bank deposit slips should NOT be used to get the bank routing/transit number for setting up direct deposit information. A voided check from the employee is the most reliable method. If the employee does not have a voided check or wants to deposit into another type of account, have the employee call the bank directly to get the routing/transit number. A bank routing/transit number should never start with the digit “5.” This indicates a branch of the bank and will cause the direct deposit to fail and not leave the state. A direct deposit that fails will not leave OST to be paid and additional processing by the agency will be required to pay the employee.

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Taxability of Gift Cards, Certificates, Coupons

Giving gifts to employees is restricted and should only be given as part of a formal employee recognition program. See 74 O.S. § 4121 and 4122. Furthermore, any gift cards, certificates or coupons given to employees are to be included in the employee’s taxable income.

These items are considered by the Internal Revenue Service to be cash or a cash equivalent and do not meet the requirements to be excludable as a de minimis fringe benefit.

Even when an employer provides gift cards, certificates, or coupons to purchase a turkey, ham or other nominal value property, these are considered wages and are subject to income and employment taxes. This is true even when the card restricts the items purchased, the time to use the coupon and any unused portion is forfeited. Cash equivalents do not meet the de minimis fringe benefit requirements.

Process the taxable amount through payroll using the gift card amount using the TRC Code of “GIFT,” which will show as earnings code “GFT.” The amount will be included as taxable income and will be taxed on the paycheck.

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W-2 Reporting of Employer-Sponsored Group Health Insurance

Beginning in 2012, the IRS mandated Box 12 reporting for the cost of employer-provided health coverage. The W-2 must show the amount in Box 12 with Code DD. 

To correctly report the cost of health coverage, all payments made for health insurance must process through the payroll system.  Failure to process through payroll will result in incorrect reporting on the W-2.  For help establishing the appropriate deduction codes, state agencies should contact the OMES HelpDesk.  Assistance will be provided by the EBD HCM Payroll team. For institutions of education, please ensure payroll file information contains the total cost of health insurance (employer and employee share).

As a reminder, this reporting to employees is for their information only. The amount reported is not taxable and is only intended to inform them of the cost of their health care coverage. 

For questions or more information, please contact Lisa Raihl at (405) 521-3258 or lisa.raihl@omes.ok.gov, or Jean Hayes at (405) 522-6300 or jean.hayes@omes.ok.gov.

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Refunds of Taxes for Overpayments to Employees (Form 94)

Agencies need to review all outstanding employee overpayments and collect required amounts from employees. After collection, please submit OMES Form 94P as applicable. Agencies will be entitled to receive refunds for all forms submitted by Friday, Dec. 19, 2014. After this date, refunds cannot be returned to the agencies; however, agencies are still required to submit the form after this date for employee wage corrections. Corrections due to overpayments will still be posted to the employee’s 2014 W-2 for requests submitted through Wednesday, Jan. 7, 2015.

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Deceased Employee Payroll Processing and Reporting

The OMES Form DER, Deceased Employee Reporting, is required to be completed by agencies when an employee dies and payments are made after the date of death. The form is on the OMES website under DCAR Forms. Once completed, please send the form to OMES/DCAR payroll, attention Lisa Raihl or Jean Hayes. Please have all forms completed and submitted no later than Wednesday Jan. 7, 2015, so that 2014 year-end reporting will be correct.

For procedures on processing payroll after the death of employee, the HCM how-to document titled "Payroll Processing for Death of an Employee" is on the EBS website under HCM’s Module News for "How-to Documents." 

NOTE: Please remember to update the date of death on the HR Personal Data Record, update Job Data for a termination with the reason code ‘SO4’ (deceased), and terminate the employee’s direct deposit (Banks will return direct deposits for deceased customers.  A return of an item will cause a delay to the individual receiving the payment).

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Outstanding Wages Beneficiary Designation Option

40 O.S. § 165.3a, allows employers to provide employees the option of designating a beneficiary for wages and benefits payable upon an employee’s death.  There is no requirement for an employer to allow employees to select beneficiaries, but agencies may want to consider adopting a policy which allows employees to designate a beneficiary.  Providing the option to employees would relieve stress and anxiety after the death of the employee on the family members, etc.  Also, agencies would have clear guidance on who is to receive final wage payments and avoid any potential difficulties in determining who gets the payment(s). 

This statute does not include any longevity payment that may be due as of the date of death of an employee.  74 O.S. § 840-2.18, subsection H.2, authorizes any longevity payment to be paid to the decedent’s surviving spouse, or if there is no surviving spouse, to the decedent’s estate. 

For more information or sample forms and instructions, please contact Lisa Raihl at (405) 521-3258, lisa.raihl@omes.ok.gov or Jean Hayes at (405) 522-6300, jean.hayes@omes.ok.gov. 

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Agency Address Verification

Please verify the correct agency address is being used in the HCM payroll system. The agency address can be found on the Employee’s Earnings Statement. If the address is not correct for the agency, this will need to be corrected before year end processing of tax forms. Please contact the OMES Help Desk to have the agency’s address updated in the payroll system.

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State HCM System Use of Employee Addresses on W-2s

Please instruct employees to update their address if there has been a change during 2014.  As a reminder, in the PeopleSoft HCM system, the W-2 process loads the employee’s mailing address for IRS Form W-2 reporting.  If there is no value in the mailing address field, then the employee’s home address will be used on the W-2.  If there is a value in the mailing address field that is not to be used on the Form W-2, it will need to be updated or inactivated.

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Employee Benefits Department - PeopleSoft Deduction/Trailer Codes

For state EBD insurance purposes in calendar year 2015, please distribute this listing to Payroll and Human Resource Directors (to view the table click the link). Questions may be directed to Lisa Raihl at (405) 521-3258, lisa.raihl@omes.ok.gov or Jean Hayes at (405) 522-6300, jean.hayes@omes.ok.gov.

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Payroll Processing During the Upgrade – All Agencies

The PeopleSoft HCM system is not being upgraded at this time and will be available throughout the holiday weekend.  However, the payroll processes that must connect with the PeopleSoft financial system will not function, and the processes will run to “No Success” when the database links are disconnected for the upgrade.  These processes include the budget checking report and the Run GL Process (PAYGL02).  All payroll claim submission documents, including payroll fund transfers (P9) for Higher Education agencies, must be received by OMES Transaction Processing by 11:30 a.m. on Wednesday, Nov. 26, to be processed prior to the shutdown of the financial system.

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ACCOUNTING

Information for Cost Effectiveness Evaluation Now Past Due

State law requires OMES to evaluate the cost for each state agency’s financial services including but not limited to procurement, payroll, accounts receivable and accounts payable.  Agencies are scored and then ranked, and it is OMES’ responsibility to evaluate the 10 agencies with the lowest rankings and contract with those agencies to provide financial services on a shared-service basis.  The information from agencies to perform this evaluation was due on Oct. 17.  A few agencies have not yet provided this information.  Please make this a priority and get this information to your OMES budget representative immediately.  Any agency who has not submitted the proper information by Nov. 12, 2014, will receive a score of zero and will automatically be considered to be one of the ten agencies with the lowest rankings.

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Accounts Payable Preparation for Upgrade – All Agencies

The 9.2 Upgrade is scheduled for Thanksgiving weekend. In order to experience a seamless transition in accounts payable, OMES requests accounts payable users diligently review vouchers with exceptions throughout November and make the necessary corrections timely to process all payables so that vouchers post as of Nov. 26, 2014.

Vouchers with Exceptions
Vouchers, other than OMES inter-unit vouchers, must be posted at the time of the conversion. Run the Matching, Document Tolerance, Budget Checking and Vouchers in Recycle Status reports to monitor and correct purchase order and/or vouchers so that all vouchers will process. Vouchers remaining in an unposted status as of the conversion date will be deleted.

Staging Tables
All payroll withholding vouchers need to be built as of the conversion date. Run the OCP_Payroll_Vchr_Stage_Validatio query now and just prior to the conversion date to obtain a list of payroll withholding vouchers in the staging tables. Run the voucher build process to clear the staging tables. OMES will build any vouchers remaining in the tables on Nov. 26, 2014, prior to the Accounts Payable cutoff time.

Accounts Payable Cutoff
Accounts Payable users will be able to transmit or enter vouchers and make any final voucher corrections until 10 a.m.  Wednesday, Nov. 26, 2014. System access will be removed at that time. OMES will complete pay cycles after this cutoff and will also identify unposted vouchers and delete them.

Accounts Payable Delta Training
OMES will conduct Accounts Payable 9.2 Delta Training in the Concourse Theater on Tuesday, Nov. 18, 2014, from 1:30 to 4 p.m. and Wednesday, Nov. 19, 2014, from 9 to 11:30 a.m. In addition, Accounts Payable WorkCenters will be introduced. We encourage users with AP Claim Entry, AP Reviewer and AP Report Requestor roles to attend one of these sessions. There is no registration for the delta training.

A handout will be provided in an OMES Alert announcement that will be sent prior to the training to users who have subscribed to PeopleSoft Financials – Accounts Payable. In order to receive the alert notifications, you must subscribe.
Here are the steps to subscribe:

  1. Go to www.ok.gov/cio
  2. Under Online Tools/Services, click OMES-Alerts (Notifications)
  3. Enter the information it requests – select e-mail in the dropdown.
  4. When the list of possible groups comes up – select anything that is marked PeopleSoft financials.

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DEPOSITS

Deposits Preparation for Upgrade – All Agencies

The 9.2 Upgrade is scheduled for Thanksgiving weekend. In order to experience a seamless transition in accounts receivable (deposits), OMES requests accounts receivable users review deposits not completed throughout November and make the necessary corrections timely to process all deposits so that transactions will complete posting by 10 a.m. Nov. 26, 2014.  Specific instructions are given below for different types of deposits.

Journal Direct Deposits

Cleanup of old deposits has been monitored this year and you should not see a significant number of deposits which need attention.  You can run the query OCP_AR_RECONCILE_DEPOSITS  using date parameters of 07/01/2014 through the current date to see the status of your deposits.  Please review any deposits that do not have a journal ID in column T.  You will need to access those deposits online to ensure that they have the complete box checked and a valid budget status.  Deposits without a journal ID can be found in one of three places depending on the deposit’s status:  1) Accounts Receivable>Payments>Online Payments> Regular Deposits, 2) Accounts Receivable>Payments>Direct Journal Payments>Create Accounting Entries, and 3) Accounts Receivable>Payments>Direct Journal Payments> Modify Accounting Entries.

Searching in either of the first two navigations should return no results.  If deposits appear under these two navigations, they need to be finalized or deleted.  Many of the deposits that need attention would show in the third navigation.

Item Deposits (for agencies that have implemented Accounts Receivable)

Item deposits that are in Regular Deposits or Express Deposits screens need to be completed.  Deposit worksheets should be completed and put to batch standard or deleted.

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Agency Deposits – Payment Into General Revenue Fund

The 19400 General Revenue Fund cash balance has been certified.  Please use class fund 19500 for agency deposits to General Revenue.

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Notices of Deposit for Higher Education Accounts Payable Payments

Effective Dec. 31 OST will no longer generate Notices of Deposit (NODs) for Higher Education direct deposit payments sent through AP. Vendors can be set up to receive email remittance information on direct deposit payments which eliminates the need for NOD creation. If the discontinuation of NODs presents problems for your agency please contact Diedra O’Neil at (405) 522-4256 or Diedra.oneil@treasurer.ok.gov to discuss your concerns and potential solutions.

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Volume 25, Number 5
Fiscal Year-2015
November 6, 2014


In This Issue ...


TRAINING

Certified Government Financial Manager Course

Due to popular demand, the Oklahoma City Chapter is once again offering the Certified Government Financial Manager courses here in Oklahoma City.  The courses will be offered March 4-11, 2015.  The training offers 48 hours of CPE and the cost will be $1,150 to $1,500 which makes it very affordable CPE.  For more information contact Riley Shaull at riley.shaull@trs.ok.gov

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Contacts

Accounting:
Jennie Pratt, CPA, CGFM
(405) 521-6160 jennie.pratt@omes.ok.gov

General Ledger:
Dan Thomason, CPA
(405) 522-4992 dan.thomason@omes.ok.gov 

Payroll:
Lisa Raihl, CPA
(405) 521-3258 lisa.raihl@omes.ok.gov 

Transaction Processing:
Steve Wilson
(405) 521-4679
steve.wilson@omes.ok.gov 

Payroll Processing:
Elsa Kunnel
(405) 521-6178
elsa.kunnel@omes.ok.gov 

AP Manager:
Patricia Garcia, CPA, CGFM
(405) 522-6855
patricia.garcia@omes.ok.gov 

Vendor Maintenance:
Victoria Baker
(405) 522-3093
victoria.baker@omes.ok.gov 

OMES Service Desk
(PeopleSoft questions)
(405) 521-2444
helpdesk@omes.ok.gov 

Financial Reporting Unit:
Matt Clarkson, CPA
(405) 521-2759
matt.clarkson@omes.ok.gov

ARRA:
Steve Funck, CPA, CGFM
(405) 521-3231
steve.funck@omes.ok.gov 

ABS:
Steve Funck, CPA, CGFM
(405) 521-3231
steve.funck@omes.ok.gov