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Payroll

Brother, can you spare $3,400: Can Payroll help close tax gap?

05/01/2012

$3,400: That’s how much the tax gap—the difference between what’s owed and what’s paid—costs every single taxpayer in extra taxes. And the figure is only growing. Proposals to close the tax gap were raised at a recent congressional hearing.

Moving your business? Be sure to tell the IRS

05/01/2012
Not ­getting your tax notices forwarded to your new address can be a deadly oversight. To separate out notifications from individuals and businesses, the IRS has created new Form 8822-B.

Fee for service: Who pays?

04/30/2012
Q. Some of our Illinois employees have taken out payday loans and now expect the Payroll department to set up a payroll deduction to repay the loans … We’d like to discourage this behavior by charging these employees a fee for servicing these loans. Can we?

Case dismissed: Employer withholding under tax levy stands

04/28/2012
A federal appeals court has ruled that an employee whose wages were subject to a federal tax levy can’t sue his employer for violations of his Fourth and Fifth Amendment rights or for theft of money under state law.

Love’s labor lost: When newlyweds forget Social Security

04/27/2012
Employees who get married but forget to update their Social Security cards with their married names will lose out, because the Social Security Administration won’t be able to credit their earnings to their benefits accounts. Remind newlyweds to get replacement Social Security cards showing their new names.

Deposits can’t be directed to payroll or corporate accounts

04/27/2012
The IRS keeps track of your company’s tax liabilities as separate modules in its Business Master File. If, say, your corporate income tax module is short, the IRS can offset that shortfall with an overdeposit from your payroll module. Worse: The IRS can make these offsets without telling you.

Throw a bucket of ice water on summer payroll problems

04/27/2012
As you gear up for employees’ summer vacation requests, remember that the FLSA has a lot to say about working hours, calculating overtime when employees take a day off during the week, and uniform policies. Here’s help navigating these choppy waters.

After accident in company car, can we recover insurance deductible using payroll deductions?

04/24/2012

Q. We have a fleet of company cars. If an employee is at fault in an accident, is it legal for us to require reimbursement for the $500 deductible by reducing his pay over a period of three or four pay cycles?

May is direct deposit month

04/24/2012
To encourage employees to sign up for checkless paydays, the federal government declared May direct deposit month. As government declarations go, it’s been a success—most employees do have their pay deposited directly into their bank accounts. Most isn’t all, however.

Picnic payroll problems … more bothersome than ants

04/23/2012
Forget the overdone hamburgers and warm soda. Payroll problems can arise even around the most hallowed of institutions, the annual company picnic.