According to Wikipedia, “A garnishment is a means of collecting a monetary judgment against a defendant by ordering a third party (the garnishee) to pay the money, otherwise owed to the defendant, directly to the plaintiff. Wage garnishment, the most common type of garnishment, is the process of deducting money from an employee’s monetary compensation (including salary), sometimes as a result of a court order.”

Calculating wage garnishment withholdings and making payments can be complex, and processing them incorrectly can result in legal repercussions. Here are some ways your business can use payroll software to help ensure deductions are made accurately and on time.

• Set up and track garnishment calculations. Set up garnishment calculations to compute automatically when payroll is processed, and you are assured a consistently accurate dollar amount is being withheld, keeping both employee and creditor happy.
• Specify a minimum net pay. Many garnishment court orders require that an amount be deducted from the pay, yet the employee pay should not go below a specified amount. Set this up in your payroll software, and you can be confident the proper garnishment is taken out, and that the employee gets their minimum amount.
• Set up a garnishment priority. When an employee has more than one garnishment, you need to know which garnishment takes priority. Setting up a priority system within your software allows you to automatically deduct the garnishment in the correct order, so that the proper amount is deducted for each creditor.
• Specify the priority of other deductions. A garnishment may be set up to allow the employee to contribute money to other areas before the garnishment is taken, such as a 401(k) contribution. In this case, setting up a rule within your system to handle this will make certain that the garnishment is taken only after the other deductions are taken.

Using these methods of tracking wage garnishment keeps your information accurate, and also makes it much easier to calculate payments. Keeping track of employee payroll wage garnishments can be overwhelming. Use your payroll software to make the job of tracking and paying wage garnishments much easier, and also to stay in compliance.

If you are in charge of managing a payroll system and/or are actually doing the payroll processing, then you should be aware of the newest features available that can simplify the entire payroll process. Newer features now available within leading payroll programs can have a drastic impact on a payroll manager′s workload, and can also improve accuracy.

1. Direct Deposit

   Direct deposit is a tool that allows you to transfer pay electronically to employee bank accounts. More and more employers are offering direct deposit as an option, or even paying employees only via direct deposit because of simplified processing and money saved. Since direct deposit advices can be printed on plain paper, the employer saves money on the cost of the check stock, printer ink, envelopes, and the manual labor of putting them all together. Transferring pay electronically via direct deposit can shave off hours every week of a payroll processor′s workload.

2. Advanced Earning Matrix

   If you have employees working at different pay rates for different shifts, departments, locations, profit centers and more, payroll data entry can become complex and cumbersome quickly, since your list of pay codes becomes so long. With an advanced earning matrix, you set up parameters for each of the variables needed within a grid for each employee. Paying employees becomes a snap with the ability to simply choose employee parameters from that grid to enter pay rates. All earnings and deductions are then calculated accordingly when time is entered, solving the very difficult problem of finding the right pay code within a sea of other available codes.

3. Electronic Tax Filing

   If you manage payroll, you are aware that employers are required to file quarterly and yearly taxes. It wasn′t so long ago when W-2 forms were filled out by typing in triplicate on a manual typewriter! Nowadays some programs offer the ability to print the tax forms on plain paper, saving on the cost of purchasing the tax forms, and also the time associated with printing them. To take the simplification a step further, some payroll companies also allow you the option of filing the tax forms electronically online, which eliminates several steps including the steps of printing, collating, stuffing, and mailing the forms. File tax forms electronically can sound daunting, but an average of 98% of customers who try online tax filing continue doing so year after year because it makes their job so much easier.

4. Custom Checks, Stubs and Payroll Reports

   Your business is unique. Perhaps you want your employees′ vacation to show on the check stub, or you want their employee number to print out on their check. Maybe you want a column of information to show on your payroll register report. If you use a payroll system that allows you to modify and save your version of checks, stubs and payroll reports, you will always be able to see and show others information in the way that is most useful. It will also cut down on copy and pasting into Excel and making manual edits.

5. Electronic Time Clock

   Reading hand-written time sheets can be a difficult chore with the challenge of various handwriting types, and the re-entry of that data into a system can also result in human error. By implementing an electronic time clock, you can save yourself the time and also eliminate re-entry errors by pulling the data that was entered electronically by the employee into the payroll system. Many payroll software programs offer standard import utilities, so that you can set up and pull in the data you choose from the electronic time clock, making the job of entering payroll a much easier and faster task.

Many farmers spend thousands of dollars to improve production, but hesitate to spend money on tools that can help them improve their financial management. In fact, managing farm finances offers the best possibility for adding profits and ongoing profitability to an agricultural operation. Consider these reasons why financial management is crucial to the success of your agriculture operation.

GOALS: You cannot meet a goal if you don′t set one. Setting goals is a crucial aspect of maintaining a business. Whether your goal is to grow by a certain percentage over a certain period of time, retire early, or simply keep your operation running successfully, any of these goals are more easily achieved when a plan is there to back up the goal. Then, once your goal has been set, progress toward your goal must be constantly checked and evaluated. Your financial management tools can help you manage your progress, by using reports within your system.

SMART DECISIONS: Smart decisions lead to more profits. Using the information on reports within your financial management system can help you make the best decisions possible: ones that are based on real numbers and facts rather than feelings and assumptions.

Maybe you’ve finally decided to take the plunge and start to do e-mail marketing, but you’ve heard about regulations and wonder where to learn more? E-mail marketing is a great way to stay in touch with customers or prospects when done correctly, but there are definitely rules and regulations a business must follow! Read all about the Federal Trade Commission’s CAN-SPAM Act and its requirements by clicking the link below.

http://www.ftc.gov/bcp/edu/pubs/business/ecommerce/bus61.shtm

Be sure to read the details and regulations about e-mailing marketing before starting your first campaign. If you do not comply with these rules, you might just be sorry later on.

The task of managing payroll benefits can quickly become difficult once your number of employees starts to grow. What may have previously been handled in a starter or free payroll software application can often be easily handled in advanced payroll software. Here are some ways payroll software can help you track payroll benefits and be more confident in your data.

Predefined Benefit Deduction Codes

Some payroll systems come with a variety of standard predefined codes for tracking benefits. These ‘deduction codes’ make it easy for you to set up new employees and keep track of important information without reinventing the wheel, in order to simply track the right payroll benefits for your employees. Most payroll systems will include deduction codes for widely used benefits such as 401K, vacation pay, sick pay, and so on.

Benefit Deduction Code Customization

As your company grows, you may find that the standard predefined codes included in your payroll software are not able to handle every need when tracking payroll benefits. In this case, it is crucial to have a system that allows you to customize and use your own deduction codes. Not all payroll systems allow for this; however if you anticipate growth and unique benefit tracking, be sure your system does offer custom code setup.

Scheduled Benefit Deductions

Some benefit deductions may not be taken out of every single employee check. In these cases, it is useful to schedule benefit deductions, for example, on the first and third payroll of each month, and so on. By scheduling these benefit deductions; you can be confident that the correct amount is deducted at the correct time.

Retirement Plan Limits

Eliminate guesswork and worry when tracking retirement pay! As an employer, you may have a limit for your 401K contribution, your employee may have a limit, and of course the government has a limit as to how much can be contributed. The ability to set up plan limits within your software can tame the nightmare associated with 401K tracking. Once the limits you set up are reached, the amount will no longer be deducted, keeping all the involved parties happy.

Effective Dates

Are you worried that you will forget to activate an employee’s benefits after a probationary period or some other type of waiting period? Set up effective dates in your payroll system, so that benefits will automatically take effect on the specified date. This can take away the constant worry about forgetting to start an employee’s benefits from taking effect.

Take advantage of every tool at your disposal in your payroll system to ensure your payroll benefits are managed properly, and take the worry that payroll benefits are being missed or calculated incorrectly.