Payroll error in my favor!

[Dave1982]

So, at my company, on your "anniversary" (ie, when you reach 1 year of service, 2, 3, etc) you get vacation pay. This pay is equal to what you'd get for an "average week of work" at your current pay rate. So it I worked an average of 30 hours per week in the past year, I'd get 30 hours of pay. That way I can take a week off during the year and not "lose" any money overall.

Well, when I checked my accounts, I noticed a larger than expected amount had been direct deposited.

So today I picked up my pay stub for the vacation pay and discovered that I'd been paid 46.29 hours of vacation time!

In other words, at least 15 hours MORE than I should have gotten!!

Now I did check, and found that they do pay out two weeks vacation pay to associates with at least 5 years of service, but I'm only at 3 years. I'm not sure what my average actually is, so it could be that 46.29 hours is double that, but I think I did work closer to 30 hours on average.

And you know what the best part is?

I told my manager about it, and he didn't seem to care!

So I guess I got some free money!

So who wants to go out for some drinks?

[bainsidhe]

Although I'm happy for you, I advise ou to be cautious. Lovely large companies such as yours is not know for sudden spurts of generousity and they will likely want that windfall back. Perhaps not today, tomorrow, or even soon. But if you aren't owed it, they'll figure it out sooner or later. I'm sorry to sound so negative.

But if they don't figure it out, you were honest and I could use a cold one

[Dave1982]

You're right, of course. I'll discuss this with my operations manager next time I see him. Beyond that, the only thing I can do is call HR, but I'll see what my OpsMan says first.

[CrazedClerkthe2nd]

If your company is corporate owned, watch out.

Your manager likely didn't care because payroll errors like that aren't his concern, that would be an issue for corporate HR to sort out (since it involved vacation time).

Don't be surprised if they catch the error and yank back the extra from you. Don't think its yours just because it's there. It's like if a bank deposits an extra $10000 in your account and you spend it all, you WILL be on the hook for that money.

[Yfandes]

Yeah, sorry - every time Ive been overpaid they wanted it back. If it was a largish amount they kindly pulled it out of my check in increments over a period of time instead of one big wad

One of my poor CW's got overpaid like $40 a month (unnoticed by her, or she thought it was a raise) for almost a year. Then all of a sudden they were pulling $80 a month at a time when she could least afford it. I felt really badly for her.

[PepperElf]

if you think they might ask for it back.....

put the extra money into savings and make interest on it.

i knew a guy who had that happen to him in the navy.
he saw he got over paid, put the money into savings, and when they were going to take it out of his paycheck he presented a check to disbursing.

they did NOT like it because it meant more paperwork for them but... they couldn't tell him "no" either.

[Dave1982]

It was direct deposited into my savings account.

My operations manager put in a ticket about this issue today. Hopefully I'll know soon what's up.

[Dave1982]

You know, I'd think that any issue regarding payroll would be resolved quickly. After all, if someone is underpaid, the company can land in all sorts of hot water. And we all know how much the bean counters love to reign in excess payroll, so if - as in this case - someone is OVERpaid, I'd think they'd scramble to fix it as well.

But they can't seem to distinguish their asses from their elbows right now. Apparently the operations manager took no less than three phone calls from payroll on this issue, and they just can't figure ANYTHING out. He said "they can't understand basic logic, even when I explain it to them." It seems they're spending their time trying to figure out HOW this happened, rather than answering the damn question of WHAT to do about it and leaving the HOW to later.

[Geek King]

Well, the "how" is actually important. They are trying to see if there is a good reason to have paid you at that rate. After all, you could be mistaken that it was the wrong amount. That would be a nice mistake, right?

As you said, underpaying someone is bad juju. The accountants are just trying to cover themselves. Just keep notes on when you contacted people about the issue, and when they contact you, and you should come out of this just fine. If you put the money in an interest bearing account, patience even literally pays off for you.

[Dave1982]

Good point. I'm going to inquire yet again today to see if payroll has gotten back to my Operations Manager about this.

Oh, and the money was direct deposited into my savings account, so yes, I'm getting interest on it, if nothing else.

[Dave1982]

Me and my big mouth....

Disappointingly (but unsurprisingly), payroll declared that due to a "system error" I was indeed overpaid on my vacation pay, and they want it back. OpsMan put in a follow up ticket requesting they do it via 4 hour deductions over the next few weeks, rather than take it as a single lump sum.

Damn. Yeah, I know it was the right thing to report it, but I'd have liked to keep the money....

[Bandit]

Damn. Yeah, I know it was the right thing to report it, but I'd have liked to keep the money....

I know your pain. One year, our version of the IRS put $10,000 in my bank account by error. I knew I was getting a tax refund, but WOW.

It both sucked and blew goats when it went away.

B

[Bella_Vixen]

OT, but Bandit, I your location!

[Dave1982]

Well, it's been six months.....and they have yet to actually make any deductions.

At this point, I consider the matter closed. I tried bringing this up with my general manager and he laughed and told me to keep my mouth shut about it. I've done my part here. I brought the overpayment to their attention, and tried to bring their failure to correct it to their attention, and yet they did nothing. If my GM doesn't want me to take any further action.....then I won't.

I'd re-open the discussion on going out for drinks, but I ended up sending a huge chunk of money off to pay down my student loans. The payroll error amounted to roughly 1.5 payments worth.

[casey13]

Be cautious. It might be caught if they audit the books or someone reads the ticket later on. I'd give it at least a year before I'd celebrate.