Payroll Announcements

Office of Controller – Payroll

EWU Payroll – 2024 Form W-2 Electronic Consent:

Eastern Washington University offers our employees the option to have Form W-2 (Employee’s Wage & Tax Statement) electronically furnished as an alternative to receiving a paper form.

Benefits of receiving an electronic Form W-2:

Earlier access to the Form W-2 than paper copies
Employee can print multiple copies of their Form W-2
No lost, stolen, delayed or misplaced W-2’s in the mail
Worldwide access from any internet connection via EagleNet
Cost savings for the university by eliminating printing and mailing costs
Once consent is given, it remains in effect until the employee changes the election. This can be done on EagleNet

Signing up to receive your annual W-2 electronically can be done on EagleNET in five simple steps:

From the Employees tile, select Employee Dashboard
Under Pay Information, select Taxes
Select Electronic Regulatory Consent
Check the box to consent to receive W-2 electronically
Then click Submit.

If your preference is to receive your W-2 electronically, we ask that you complete the above consent by December 31, 2024. If you do not elect to receive your W-2 electronically, it is your responsibility to ensure your permanent address is correct in EagleNet. Paper W-2’s will be postmarked no later than January 31, 2025.

All W-2 forms will be made available online, via EagleNET, by January 31, 2025.

Please contact the Payroll Office with any questions. 509-359-2325

Starting with your July 10, 2023 pay, the Washington Cares Long-Term Care Insurance payroll deduction, that was put on hold in early 2022, will begin. This deduction will be 0.58% of your gross wages.

If you had previously applied for exemption from this deduction because you had private long term care insurance in place by November 1, 2021, then you are still exempt. If you have given the Payroll Office a copy of your exemption letter, that you received from ESD, then you do not need to do anything, and we will exempt you from this deduction. If you have not provided your exemption letter to the Payroll Office, please do so on or before July 1.

In the 2022 legislative session some additional exemption pathways were created. If any of these pathways apply, you will need to apply to ESD to receive an exemption letter to turn into the Payroll Office. We will deduct the WA Cares deduction starting July 10th until the ESD exemption letter is received. If you currently live out of state, and your work location is in Washington state, you will need to apply for the exemption. If you live and work out of state, you are not subject to this deduction.

At this time the following employees can choose to apply for an exemption :

Employees whose permanent home address is not in Washington (Conditional exemption – Notify ESD and EWU Payroll, within 90 days, if your address changes to Washington State and your work location is here in Washington State)
Employees working in the U.S. temporarily with a nonimmigrant visa (Conditional exemption – Notify ESD and EWU Payroll, within 90 days, if your immigrant status changes)

Nonimmigrant visas are: H-1B, F-1, J-1, CW-1, E-1, E-2, E-2C, E-3, H-1C, H-2A, H-2B, H-3, I, L-1A, L-1B, O-1, O-2, P-1A, P-1B, P-2, P-3, Q-1, R-1, TN, and M-1

Employees who are married to or in a domestic partnership with an active-duty military member (Conditional exemption – Notify ESD and EWU Payroll, within 90 days, if your circumstance changes)
Veterans with a 70% service-connected disability rating or higher (Permanent exemption)

If you qualify for an exemption, we encourage you to submit your application to ESD as soon as possible. ESD will process all WA Cares Fund exemption applications submitted on or before June 1, 2023, before premium collection takes effect in July. ESD will continue to process applications received after June 1 as quickly as possible. Exemption applications approved on or after July 1 will not be effective until October 1, 2023, at the earliest.

Here is information on the WA Cares Insurance:

How to file for an exemption can be found here: https://wacaresfund.wa.gov/apply-for-an-exemption/

Washington Cares Flyer: https://wacaresfund.wa.gov/wp-content/uploads/2023/03/WA-Cares-Toolkit-Paycheck-Insert.pdf

Questions regarding Washington Cares: https://wacaresfund.wa.gov/contact-us/

Please share this information with your student employees or others that do not have regular access to email.

Questions regarding where/how to turn in exemption forms contact the Payroll Office at: Payroll@ewu.edu or call our office 509-359-2325.

January 3, 2022

From: EWU Payroll Office

To: EWU Employees

Topic: Washington State Long Term Care Premium

The Washington State CARES program went into effect as of January 1, 2022. Although Governor Inslee directed the Employment Security Department to not collect premiums from employers until the close of the quarter, as an employer EWU is legally required to collect employee premiums effective January 1, 2022.

The University has been instructed by the Office of Financial Management (OFM) to collect premiums as previously directed. Employees will see this deduction beginning on their January 10, 2022 paycheck. Employees will pay 0.58% earned into the Washington Cares Fund, which equals 58 cents per $100 earned.

In response to questions about the recent announcement from the governor and Legislature, OFM provided additional clarification regarding collection of the WA Cares premium as follows.

Legislative leaders have indicated an intent to make modifications to the WA Cares program set up in the law, including a delay in premium collection. Until such time that the law changes, the legal requirement for employers is to collect employee premiums starting January 1, 2022. The governor does not have the power to change this legal requirement on his own; it will require legislative action to change the underlying law.

The governor directed the Employment Security Department to not collect any premiums from employers until the close of the quarter to give the Legislature time to work on these projected modifications. Each employer in the state is responsible for determining its appropriate approach based on this information.

The state of Washington, as an employer, intends to follow the law as enacted. The state will return any premiums collected from eligible state employees, in accordance with any changes made in the upcoming legislative session. The newly revised law is expected to impact all employees and employers equally so that all employees are ultimately treated the same.

If you would like further information about this new program, please review the WA Cares Fund web page at https://wacaresfund.wa.gov.

To:          Supervisors
From:     Tim Davenport, Controller
Date:      April 10, 2020
Re:          Disposition of Earned Compensatory Time

We are quickly approaching the end of the fiscal year which means it is time to finalize the disposition of earned compensatory time. All compensatory time must be taken (used) or cashed out by the end of the current fiscal year, June 30, 2020. Current compensatory leave balances and estimated costs are reflected on the April Leave Balance Report, which will be emailed to unit vice presidents. VPs will then receive updated balance reports monthly through June. Leave balances are also available using EagleNET SSB by selecting each employee timesheet.

Employees affected by this cash out will receive payment on their July 10, 2020 paycheck. Any earned compensatory time not taken by June 30, 2020 will be cashed out and the amount charged to the applicable Banner Index codes for June 2020.

Please review with your employees their compensatory time balances and recognize the budget impact if the compensatory time is not taken by June 30, 2020. Per the current collective bargaining agreements and exempt employee policy, supervisors cannot schedule their employee’s compensatory time off. It is the employee’s election to schedule the time off (with supervisor approval) or receive the cash out of the compensatory time balances. The comp time cash out rate is one and one-half hours for each hour of straight time worked.

Thank you for your attention to the compensatory time earned in your area. Please direct any questions about compensatory time to the Human Resources Office at 359-2381.

Memo: Disposition of Earned Compensatory Time

Eastern Washington University

Payroll Direct Deposit Request Submissions

Payroll setup can be found at the following link: Direct Deposit form (click to view).

In order to submit Direct Deposit forms for Payroll setup, you must include with the form a scanned copy of your voided check or an ACH authorization form from your bank in PDF format. This is necessary for security purposes, and to be sure accurate banking information is submitted. Because banking information is sensitive, it cannot be submitted over unsecured platforms such as email. A secured delivery method must be used.

We have set up a OneDrive Folder for a secure method of transmitting this sensitive information.

Click on the following link to submit your direct deposit form for Payroll setup, along with a voided check or ACH authorization form from your bank.

You will see a message saying “Felicijan, Tammy (EWU Assoc. Controller) is requesting files for Direct Deposit Submissions” and a “select files” box. Click the box and select your files for submission. Enter your first and last name. Click upload. You will see a message that says your upload was successful.

This submission is only for Payroll Direct Deposits. Financial Aid Direct Deposits should go to the Financial Aid office.

2020 W-4 Memorandum