[US] City of Austin employees will see paycheque deductions after $1.4M payroll error

In the US, the City of Austin, Texas, has sent terms and conditions to employees that some say they are not comfortable agreeing to, following a nearly $1.4 million payroll error in which the city accidentally overpaid government employees, Fox 7 Austin reports.

The error has impacted hundreds of city employees, who will now be required to repay all the money.

The City of Austin reportedly deposited a total of $1.4 million in overpayments into employees’ bank accounts last month.

The city claims that a simple mistake triggered the glitch. A box was accidentally left blank, and this caused the system to override existing information used to determine whether a job is exempt or nonexempt from overtime once the spreadsheet was uploaded to Workday. 

As a result, the system treated each week in the two-week pay period separately, leading to some employees getting nearly double their normal pay on March 13. 

The HR team reportedly caught the error early and was able to notify impacted employees on March 12, before their paycheques reached banks.

The city began working on a repayment plan to allow affected workers to return the overpaid funds over a set period. Two weeks later, HR informed affected employees that the money would be deducted from their paycheques over their choice of one to four pay periods. Those overpaid by more than $5,000 were given the option to write a cheque.

On April 6, the city reportedly instructed those workers to sign an agreement selecting how they would return the money and gave them a deadline of April 10 to do so.

The city said it needed time to process and schedule the deductions before the first impacted paycheck goes out on May 8. As of the April 10 deadline, of the 675 impacted employees, 67 had reportedly not yet signed. As of this week, that number was fewer than 40.

Source: Fox 7 Austin

In the US, the City of Austin, Texas, has sent terms and conditions to employees that some say they are not comfortable agreeing to, following a nearly $1.4 million payroll error in which the city accidentally overpaid government employees, Fox 7 Austin reports.

The error has impacted hundreds of city employees, who will now be required to repay all the money.

The City of Austin reportedly deposited a total of $1.4 million in overpayments into employees’ bank accounts last month.

The city claims that a simple mistake triggered the glitch. A box was accidentally left blank, and this caused the system to override existing information used to determine whether a job is exempt or nonexempt from overtime once the spreadsheet was uploaded to Workday. 

As a result, the system treated each week in the two-week pay period separately, leading to some employees getting nearly double their normal pay on March 13. 

The HR team reportedly caught the error early and was able to notify impacted employees on March 12, before their paycheques reached banks.

The city began working on a repayment plan to allow affected workers to return the overpaid funds over a set period. Two weeks later, HR informed affected employees that the money would be deducted from their paycheques over their choice of one to four pay periods. Those overpaid by more than $5,000 were given the option to write a cheque.

On April 6, the city reportedly instructed those workers to sign an agreement selecting how they would return the money and gave them a deadline of April 10 to do so.

The city said it needed time to process and schedule the deductions before the first impacted paycheck goes out on May 8. As of the April 10 deadline, of the 675 impacted employees, 67 had reportedly not yet signed. As of this week, that number was fewer than 40.

Source: Fox 7 Austin