Gearing Up for Year-End

 

With 2011 coming to a close, your Payment Solution Services Team is gearing up for another successful and fast-paced year-end processing. Once again, our Year-End Team is intently focused on driving us forward by communicating important messages as well as providing critical updates to you.

There is no shortage of activity during year-end. Last year we processed over 11.5 million year-end related documents, printed over 10.8 million employee copies, and posted more than 6.3 million W-2s online. It is this activity that gives us the experience and edge in the industry.

Year-end processing is inevitable. The most important steps you can take to prepare for it is to know what tools are available to you. Our Payment Solution Services Team is here to make your life easier. Whether you choose to send your information directly to ADP Payment Solution Services or quarterly through our TAXServices partners, here are a few reminders of what we can do for you. Year-End services available to you:

Print Services

• Print and distribution of W-2, 1099, and Canadian year-end statements

Electronic W-2s

• Employees can securely access W-2 images online as well as opt to electronically receive their W-2s by suppressing print functionality 
• Employees can seamlessly access their online information using their own user information with our single sign-on functionality 
• ADP provides W-2 import capabilities for various tax partners, such as TurboTax ,etc. This allows you to pull in your own W-2 content and directly process those W-2s

W-2c Manager

The W-2c features enable the administrator to easily manage W-2c's in a secure environment, from W-2c creation through print, distribution, and posting to tax filing. This is an affordable, single-vendor solution requiring no client interface creation or maintenance because it uses your existing administration tools. Here are a few of the features included:

• Creating W-2c's with or without existing W-2s
• Creating W-2c's with Box 13 mass changes at the FEIN level
• Printing W-2c's through a local printer or printed and mailed through Payment Solution Services
• Transmitting W-2c's to ADP for Amendment processing
• Posting W-2c's for employees' online viewing and printing

You must be a single-feed, TAXServices client with Payment Solution Services processing the original W-2s. The original W-2 must be posted to iPay/W-2 Services within the US only.

Call Center Services

• We offer a toll-free support line that is available for your employees 24 hours a day, 7 days a week. Employees can request additional copies of original W-2s as well as expedited delivery.

Year-End Documents Handled by ADP Include: 

• Territory W-2s (Guam, Virgin Islands) and Puerto Rico W-2s
• 1099 documents (1099Misc and 1099R)  

Employer Copy Resources

• Domestic W-2s
• A CD Rom is provided that includes images of the employees' W-2s for every production file processed
• Employer state/local paper copies are available for domestic W-2s (Direct-Feed clients)
• EFW-2 file format is available for SSA filing (Federal format only)

If you are currently a client and have questions, do not hesitate to call your Account Manager for further support. If you are not currently taking advantage of these services and are interested in hearing more, please e-mail our Product Support Specialist, Jon Spinger at Jon.Springer@adp.com. Let us take the sting out of Year-End processing and start your New Year off right. 

The typical UI hearing is a fact-finding process. It is more relaxed in its procedural features than other hearings and is without strict adherence to the technical rules of evidence. However, within this process, the UI laws and rules regarding standard-of-proof and the burden-of-proof are essential to an employer winning the unemployment case.

Burden-of-proof, in the context of a UI claim or hearing, rests either upon the claimant to prove good cause for voluntarily leaving employment, or with the employer to prove that a discharge was for misconduct. The often misunderstood aspect of burden-of-proof is that it never shifts. Once the work separation issue is determined (quit or discharge) the burden of proving good cause or misconduct "lands" flat with either the claimant or the employer. It does not "bounce" back and forth as evidence and testimony are presented at the UI hearing. 

Burden-of-proof involves two concepts: the burden of producing evidence (sometimes referred to as the burden of going forward with evidence) and the burden-of-persuasion. The burden of producing evidence resides initially with the party who has the obligation to establish a particular element of the UI case. With a discharge separation issue, the employer has the burden of proving the claimant was discharged for work-connected misconduct.  

The employer must produce evidence that the claimant, who, for example, was discharged for violation of the attendance policy, knew or should have known the policy. Evidence such as the claimant's signed statement acknowledging receipt of the policy, or documented written and verbal warning that the claimant had violated the attendance policy fulfills the obligation of producing evidence. It would then fall upon the claimant to produce contrary evidence to refute the employer's evidence. If the claimant fails to do so, the administrative law judge or hearing referee would be bound to find for the employer on this element of the issue of misconduct. Keep in mind that while the burden-of-proof does not shift, the burden of producing evidence on a specific element may "bounce" from one party to the other.

The burden-of-persuasion is simply the obligation to convince the "decider" of the issue. If a party has satisfied his or her burden of producing evidence of an asserted fact, the administrative law judge or hearing referee must then determine whether or not that party has persuaded him or her on that fact. If not, the fact must be found against the party asserting it. Furthermore, a party may have the burden of persuading the hearing referee "beyond a reasonable doubt," "by clear and convincing evidence," or "by a preponderance of the evidence." The latter is the standard applied in virtually all UI hearings. It requires that the party who bears the burden-of-proof to persuade by "the greater weight" or "fifty-one percent" of the evidence.

As a reminder, ADP will be closed December 26, 2011, and January 2, 2012, in observance of the holidays.

Review your payroll processing schedule, pay dates, and funding methods accordingly. Please reach out to your Account Manager with any questions you may have.

As we head into year-end, it is important to remember several key deadlines: 

December 31, 2011

Deadline for employees to make their paperless suppression selection on the ADP iPay/W-2 Services Website (the selection would carry over to the subsequent tax year).

January 6, 2012

Testing period closes. CD ROMs will not be generated for test files this year; however, PDF files will be available for clients to download from the PSS Year-End Website.

January 13, 2012

Deadline to approve production files.

January 24, 2012

Deadline to guarantee distribution by January 31.