About This Course:
Amazingly, departing employees don't always collect all wages owed to them. Unfortunately, as a payroll professional, that becomes your problem!
Each state has specific laws and requirements on how employers must report, remit, and document amounts for checks that are uncashed by employees. As you can imagine, escheat or unclaimed wages can become a large compliance issues for employers.
And now, many states are turning an ever vigilant eye towards unclaimed wages as a source of revenue that can be easily tapped with existing laws. All they have to do is to crackdown on enforcement - and they are doing just that!
Though non-compliance may be simply a matter of the company not being aware of their reporting responsibilities, it won't stop the huge fines and penalties for failing to report unclaimed wages.
Failure to comply with state regulations could now result in audit assessments, significant interest accumulations, and criminal penalties. And organizations with corporate headquarters in one state and employees in other states could be liable for penalties in all states that they have employees. Do you know your obligations?
What You'll Learn:This training session will review the laws of all 50 states with regards to unclaimed wages. By attending this audio conference you will learn:
- The definitions of unclaimed properties and escheat law
- The difference between tangible and intangible property that can go unclaimed
- State-by-state reporting and remitting requirements
- State-by-state review of dormancy period laws and due diligence requirements
- The difference between reporting and remitting
- Payroll Department's role and responsibilities for unclaimed property
- What types companies are at higher risk of an audit
- Record retention requirements by state
- Best practices for unclaimed paychecks
Top FAQs
Yes. Employers can be fined or penalized if they don't return the check, even if the person can't be found. In these situations, employers are legally bound by state law to return any uncashed paychecks to the state where the person last worked.
In addition to ensuring that employees are paid correctly and on time, "Payroll" has numerous time and reporting requirements. The primary payroll areas include paychecks, reporting, operations, and management.
Payroll is much more than just handing out paychecks, and includes a variety of responsibilities such as handling garnishments, travel pay, multi-state taxation, unclaimed paychecks, and much more in a timely and accurate fashion.
Generally speaking, unclaimed paychecks, employers are required to hand over the amount of the check to their state. This process, called "escheatment", requires abandoned or unclaimed personal property to be submitted to the state after a certain time period (depending upon the state, "unclaimed" means from one to five years).
In business since the mid-1990's, we have over 25 years of experience delivering high-quality training content via seminar, webinar, online, and other formats. Each of our courses are delivered by an industry expert who will share his or her years of experience to help you be in compliance, smarter, and more productive, and almost all offer SHRM and HRCI credits.
While many payroll-related regulations are federally-governed, there also are many state requirements, including those for handling garnishment, final paychecks, and unclaimed paychecks. Each state's requirements differ in the details, so be sure to check your state's requirements by clicking the applicable link(s) at the bottom of this page.
Unclaimed paychecks are subject to escheat laws as unclaimed property. As such, the laws of the state where the employee last worked apply. As such, employers should return any uncashed paychecks to the state where the person last worked.
Even if a check is abandoned, the employer has no right to void the check. The funds from an uncashed payroll check should never be returned to the company's payroll checking account. Employers must keep the funds available to pay the employee or to submit to the state.
Payroll Administrators must be able to:
- Properly "classify" workers
- Apply the various exemptions
- Calculate gross pay and properly make deductions
- Correctly identify, pay, and withhold taxes for employees
- Administer deferred compensation, cafeteria plan, sick pay, and other compensation
- Handle stock options, expense reimbursements, relocation, and other "expenses"
- Follow the proper policies, procedures, and documentation requirements for garnishments and levies
- Properly complete and file all required reporting requirements
- Correctly complete year-end requirements and establish year-beginning requirements
- Implement and maintain fraud, audit, disaster recovery, and record retention processes and procedures
Yes. Unclaimed paychecks are subject to escheat laws as unclaimed property. The laws of the state where the employee last worked apply. Employers that have a paycheck for a former employee or employee which has not been claimed for a period of time must follow the same state reporting timeline as for other property.
Continuing Education Credits:
Click the 'Credits' tab above for information on PHR/SPHR, PDCs, and other CE credits offered by taking this course.
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