Payroll Best Practices: 10 Areas You Must Handle Correctly to Ensure Compliance

Paying an employee is not simply multiplying the hourly rate by the number of hours worked to get the gross wages and deducting the taxes from these.

Employer responsibilities go beyond taxing and reporting what is paid through the paycheck under IRS and state requirements. Any payment to an employee could and should be considered taxable wages. So the payroll department must not only worry about the fringe benefits it processes such as third-party sick pay, but all of the payments made by accounts payable such as auto allowances, moving expenses, prizes and awards or gift cards given to employees. Garnishments also have to be handled properly. And the responsibility doesn’t end when the employment is terminated. It is also the employer’s responsibility to ensure that all paychecks issued to the employee have been cashed or it must relinquish those wages to the state at regular intervals.

This highly interactive seminar on payroll compliance will help attendees learn:

• Best practices to comply with the various laws and regulations in 10 strategic compliance areas that are the key targets of government audits or considered the most misinterpreted when paying employees.
• Which method to use when calculating overtime (there are two permitted under the FLSA).
• What is and is not a permissible deduction to an exempt employee’s salary under the salary basis rules and how to properly deduct for various types of garnishments to ensure compliance.
• How to handle the tax and wage/hour law requirements when an employee has been overpaid, and who must handle the taxation of third party sick pay—the employer, the employer’s agent or not the employer’s agent.
• State tax implications and requirements for withholding the proper income tax when an employee lives and works in two or more states.
• Best practices for setting up a system to track, report and remit wages considered to be abandoned.
• Key areas to examine when payments are made to employees through AP such as prizes, bonuses, awards or gift cards.
• How to handle auto allowances, which may be taxable one month but not the next.
• How to determine if the personal use of company property such as cell phones and company cars are taxable or not and how to determine the taxable wages for the personal use of a company aircraft.
• When providing meals or lodging to your employee is or is not taxable.

Upon completing this course participants will:

• Understand how to calculate overtime correctly under the Fair Labor Standards Act.
• Know when you can and cannot deduct from an exempt employee’s salary.
• Be able to determine the proper state income tax to withhold when an employee lives and works in two or more states and which state gets the unemployment insurance.
• Understand what are the rules and regulations governing the withholding for child support, federal and state tax levies, creditor garnishments, voluntary wage assignments and bankruptcies.
• Learn how to handle overpayments under both wage and hour law as well as IRS regulations and what to do if the overpayment and the repayment occur in separate tax calendar years.
• Learn the tax ramifications of third party sick pay and how whether the insurance company is the employer’s agent or not the employer’s agent affects the taxation and reporting of the wages.
• Understand what is considered abandoned wages and how to track, remit and report them properly to the correct state agency.
• Comprehend the basic taxation and calculations concerning the personal use of company property including cars, airplanes, cell phones, tablets and housing.
• Have a basic understanding of when meals and lodging provided by the employer are taxable wages to the employee and when they are not.
• Be able to determine when an auto allowance paid to an employee is taxable income.
• Understand the basic tax rules concerning items paid out of accounts payable such as prizes, awards, bonuses, educational assistance payments and relocation benefits as well as the definition of de minimis.

Vicki M. Lambert, CPP is President and Academic Director of The Payroll Advisor™ a firm specializing in the training of payroll professionals. With over three decades of hands-on experience in all facets of payroll functions as well as over 20 years as a trainer and author, Ms. Lambert is a sought-after and respected voice in the practice and management of payroll issues. She has conducted open market training seminars on payroll issues across the United States as well as serving as an in-house trainer for businesses such as Sun Microsystems, Fox Studios, Disney, County of Riverside and the City of Hesperia.

Ms. Lambert currently produces and presents payroll related audio seminars, webinars and webcasts for clients, APA chapters and business groups throughout the country. She is an adjunct faculty member at Brandman University in Southern California and is the creator and instructor for their Practical Payroll Online program, which is approved for recertification hours by the APA.

For Registration - http://www.complianceonline.com/strategies-for-payroll-best-practices-seminar-training-80160SEM-prdsm?channel=speedycourse