Latest glitches impact longevity pay, health care deductions

July 26, 2007 - State officials have issued a warning about the discovery of problems with longevity pay on some employees' July 20 paycheck.

If your longevity pay was not included in your rate, please contact your agency payroll officer to request an adjustment to reimburse you for the shortfall.

The Department of Administrative Services also informed OCSEA that employees who changed health care plans or coverage during open enrollment may experience a problem with the deduction amount on the June 8 and June 22 pay checks.

Refunds were provided in the July 20 paycheck to make the correction, and the Aug. 3 paycheck reportedly will include the correct deductions from June. See below for more details

The Union Benefits Trust warns that if the longevity pay is incorrectly calculated or missing, it may impact deductions for life insurance, too.

Today's announcement regarding the longevity pay glitch is as follows:

The 3.5% pay raise should appear in your check on pay day July 20th. OAKS has advised that longevity pay for some employees was dropped from the hourly rate during the calculation of the new pay rates. Longevity pay is not shown as a separate item on the pay stub.

However, you can verify that you have received the correct rate of pay by multiplying your hourly rate of pay from your previous (July 6) pay stub by 1.035 and comparing it to the hourly rate on your July 20th pay stub.

If you receive a step increase this pay, include the increase in your hourly step rate when making this calculation.

The hourly rate you calculate should be within .01 (one cent) of the rate on your July 20th pay stub (OAKS is experiencing some rounding errors).

The DAS notice also contained the following information on health care deductions:

This information applies only to employees who changed health care plans (i.e. from Ohio Med to United Health Care, or vice versa) or coverage (i.e. Single to Family or Family to Single) during open enrollment.

Health care deductions are taken from employee pay checks a month in advance. For example, the amounts deducted in June pay for an employee's coverage in July.

The amounts deducted on pay day June 8 and June 22 were erroneously based on the new rate for your old plan.

OAKS has elected to correct this by issuing a refund of the amounts deducted from your pay during June, in your check on pay day July 20th.

The refund amount will be less than the sum of the two June health insurance deductions because the refund does not include a small amount paid for mental health coverage.

Your health care, dental, vision and mental health coverage will not be disrupted due to this error.

To the best of my knowledge, on pay day August 3rd, OAKS plans to deduct the correct amount for the month of June from your pay.

This will be in addition to the regular biweekly deduction for health care coverage.

Resources

Check paystub for OAKS problems with deductions (July 20, 2007)  

OCSEA Toolbox - OAKS Concerns

State of Ohio's OAKS Website

OAKS Alert