The Accounting Office and Computing & Communications are pleased to announce the addition of Direct Salary Adjustment Reversals in the Payroll Certification system, with the goal of enhancing the user experience and reducing manual entries for PIWRS Coordinators.

What are Directly Salary Adjustments?

Adjustments to the salaries reflected on Payroll Certification report can be entered by the PIWRS Coordinator prior to the PI certifying the fund. Adjustments should be entered when the salaries listed on the Payroll Certification report are not reasonable based on the work performed. For example, an employee’s salary should have be reflected on the Payroll Certification, but the fund source was not updated in PPS (understatement of salary expense); or an employee began work on another sponsored project, but the new fund source was not updated in PPS (overstatement of salary expense). Adjustments should be limited to material amounts. When an adjustment to an employee’s salary appearing on the Payroll Certification is necessary, the PIWRS Coordinator can enter the adjustment by clicking on the “edit” link next to the employee’s name.

Rationale for Direct Salary Adjustment Reversals on Payroll Certifications

If an award is not ending and a Direct Salary Adjustment is required, there is a high probability the salary adjustment will require a reversal to avoid an overstatement/understatement of salaries in the next certification period. As such, the Payroll Certification System will be enhanced as follows:

• Addition of a check a box in the Direct Salary Adjustment entry allowing the user to indicate a reversal is required in the next certification period.
• Ability to annotate the month and year the PPS entry will be processed.
• New E-mail notification sent to all PIWRS Coordinators within the related Accountability Structure as a reminder to coordinate the associated payroll entry with the unit’s PPS Preparer.

These enhancements will be deployed in the Payroll Certification System on 1/21/2014.

Direct Salary Adjustments and Reversals Considerations

• Direct Salary Adjustments should be infrequent and limited to material dollar amounts. Adjustments are most often related to pending payroll cost transfers and occasionally associated with Late Pay (LX) or Reduced Pay (RX).
• Since PPS will NOT prevent duplicate entries of cost transfers into the same payroll cycle, it is recommended that the PIWRS coordinator who entered the Direct Cost Salary Adjustment on the Payroll Certification be responsible for coordinating the PPS entry.
• Any payroll cost transfers to and from Federal Contracts and Grants MUST be approved by the PI.
• All cost transfers must include an explanation of “how the error occurred” (Please refer to Business & Finance Bulletin A-47 for additional guidance).
• The department is responsible for retaining documentation supporting cost transfers for audit purposes.
• The Payroll Personnel System (PPS) inhibits cost transfer TO a contract and grant fund that is more than 120 days old. If a correction is required, the costs should be transferred to an unrestricted fund.
• Please refer to the Online Payroll Time Reporting System Procedures on payroll cost transfers for additional instructions.

Additional information regarding Direct Salary Adjustment Reversals can be found on the PIWRS support site at: http://cnc.ucr.edu/piwrs/coord_annual_cert.html#Reversal.

Please note: A PIWRS/Payroll Certification Users Group meeting is being planned to demonstrate various PIWRS and Payroll Certification functionality and features; a separate announcement will be made with additional details.

Questions and comments can be sent to piwrsfeedback@ucr.edu.