Course Description
People quit, get fired, or laid-off all the time, regardless of the state of the economy.
But it is the HR and Payroll Departments that usually bears the brunt of having to not only pay the outgoing employee, but have to deal with severance and benefits packages, final paychecks, and comply with the variety of compliance regulations such as COBRA and the new Stimulus Act.
In addition, payroll personnel are forced to deal with tax issues they may not have encountered previously. For instance, federal and state laws have numerous requirements that must be met from both a legal and a tax standpoint. Failure on your part to properly do this can result in heavy penalties.
Thus, it is important for payroll personnel to understand and properly comply with their obligations to properly pay – and abide by the plethora of laws affecting – terminated employees.
Learning Objectives: By attending this audio conference you will learn:
- The timetable for how quickly your employees have to be paid in each state where you have workers
- The payroll tax consequences of payments made to an employee as part of a severance or layoff
- The difference between providing wage continuation versus lump sum severance
- Whether severance can be used when determining the benefits an employee will receive from the Unemployment Office
- How Supplemental Unemployment Benefit Plans be used to decrease the costs associated with severance payments
- How wage continuation and lump sum severance payments affect unemployment insurance benefits.
- Whether severance is taxable or non-taxable
- How the new Stimulus Act effects the provision of COBRA to those employees that have been terminated
- How to identify any areas of concern prior to an external audit or an audit by another group within your company
- How a review can help you detect internal control issues
...and as always, this session will be interactive, so we'll be able to answer your questions on this topic throughout the presentation!
About Your SpeakerMindy Harada, CPP, is an employment tax specialist who has over 17 years of employment tax experience as an independent consultant, an employee with one of the Big 4 firms, and as a payroll tax auditor. Ms. Harada previously was the west coast practice leader for the Employment Tax Practice at Deloitte Tax LLP.
Ms. Harada is a frequent presenter on various employment tax topics at APA events and for several payroll service providers on a national basis. She has presented before the Society of CPAs and has also spoken at several Payroll Conferences throughout the country.
PHR / SPHR Credits!This program has been approved for 1.5 recertification credit hours through the HR Certification Institute. For more information about certification or recertification, please visit the HR Certification Institute website at www.hrci.org. The use of this seal is not an endorsement by HRCI of the quality of the program. It means that this program has met HRCI's criteria to be pre-approved for recertification credit.