President's Report Masthead
September 30, 2012

Human Resources heats up in the summer months

Human Resources experiences its busiest time of the year during the summer months, maintaining approximately 5,000 employee records for faculty/staff and student payrolls.
 
Summer hiring begins for Summer Sessions 1, 2 and 3, and Physical Facilities alone hires approximately 150 temporary hourly employees each summer to maintain the grounds and clean and paint. All hourly employees require submission of hours every pay period on time records which are then processed individually. As the summer progresses, Human Resources processes August/September hire and rehire transactions for all of the GA/TAs, adjuncts, student assistant and federal work-study employees who were separated from the payroll in May.  Additionally, new tenure-track faculty and new professional staff are placed on the payroll while processing routine transactions for renewals and performance programs/evaluations.

HR was in full swing in August as it began processing transactions to separate the approximately 200-plus summer temporary employees. Office traffic builds because all new employees must physically come to Human Resources to complete an I-9, tax forms and direct deposit, all which require additional systems processing. Separate processing is also required for employees who are eligible for employee benefits. All of the transactions require processing in multiple systems. The software currently used by HR for employment/payroll/benefits transactions includes: SUNY HR (employment and payroll transactions); SUNY Time and Attendance; PayServ (paychecks, direct deposits, tax forms, etc.); NYBEAS (benefits); NYSTEP (Civil Service transactions); Workers’ Compensation; Oracle. Information processed in SUNY HR rolls to Banner, which produces a B number which is then maintained in SUNY HR.

For the single busiest pay period of the year, payroll approved 1,651 payroll and employment transactions that were entered into the SUNY Human Resources system. This figure represents the actual pay transaction that was entered into the system and not any related transactions such as position request forms and new-hire paperwork. All told, Human Resources processes tens of thousands of transactions annually including personnel transactions such as hires, rehires and renewals, associated benefit transactions, payroll processing including tax forms, direct deposits, hourly employee payments, overtime, time records, performance programs and evaluations, and related correspondence confirming these transactions.