Payroll - Procedure 23820

Procedure 23820: Timekeeping System

Contacts and revision dates:

Table of Contents

1. Purpose and Scope
2. Systems and Roles
3. Pay Periods and Payroll Cycles
4. Hiring and Setup
5. Time Recording
6. Approval Process
7. Payroll Interface for hourly wage employee (BTE to PHAHOUR)
8. Interface from BTE to L&HWS for salaried non-exempt employees
9. Verification and Reconciliation
10. Retroactive Pay and Adjustments
11. Segregation of Duties
12. Records Retention

Purpose and Scope

Per the Fair Labor Standards Act and university policies 4298 Wage Employee Time Worked Records and 4320 - Guidelines for the Fair Labor Standards Act all non-exempt employees are required to maintain a record of hours worked. This procedure defines the official process for recording, approving, and reconciling hours worked by Virginia Tech employees using Banner Time Entry (BTE). It applies to all wage and salaried non-exempt employees who record time worked using BTE and establishes controls to ensure accurate and timely pay in accordance with payroll schedules. The hours are allocated to the actual day the time is worked.

Systems and Roles

Pay Periods and Payroll Cycles

The standard workweek runs from midnight on Saturday to the following Friday at 11:59 pm. The standard workweek is applicable for all employees with the exception of police officers. 

Hiring and Setup

• HR or the hiring department initiates NOAEPAF to establish the appointment in Banner HR.
• Employee data and default earnings populate NBAJOBS
• Approval Queues - Wage approval queues in BTE are established automatically at midnight on the first day of employment with the assigned supervisor. If the approver should anyone other than the supervisor, departments should reach out to payroll to update the approval queue. Salary employee approval queues in BTE will be manually set up by Payroll. Departments need to send the approval queue information which should include the employee’s VT ID, position, suffix and approver’s VT ID to timekeeping@vt.edu.

Time Recording

• Employees record time worked in Banner Time Entry (BTE) each day.
• All missed or edited punches must include comments and be resolved promptly.
• Employees must submit their completed timesheet by 11:59 PM on the first business day after the pay period ends.

Approval Process

• Wage employees: one-level approval by supervisor or designated approver/superuser.
• Salaried non-exempt employees: one-level approval by supervisor or designated approver/superuser. The approved salary hours will be fed from BTE into the Leave system.
• Approvers verify completeness, accuracy, and policy compliance.
• A proxy approver should be established if the primary approver is unavailable.
• Approvers or superusers must ensure all timesheets are in the Approved column before the approval deadline.

Payroll Interface for hourly wage employees (BTE to PHAHOUR)

• Approved hours for wage employee only are transferred from BTE to PHAHOUR after the BTE approval deadline date listed on the payroll processing schedule. Departments should verify the appropriate BTE hours have transferred to PHAHOUR (see section 5).
• Once a timesheet is in Completed status, no edits are permitted in BTE.
• Any changes made directly in PHAHOUR require written justification sent to timekeeping@vt.edu for audit purpose.
• Hours not paid in the correct period will be handled as retroactive hours (see Section 6).

Interface from BTE to L&HWS for salaried non-exempt employees

The system of record for salary non-exempt employees (SNE) is the Leave and Hours Worked System (L&HWS). The time worked that is recorded in BTE by salaried non-exempt employees will be exported into the L&HW system each pay period to populate the total time worked each day. The time worked records in BTE are not rounded; however, the time worked data exported from BTE to the L&HWS will be rounded to the nearest quarter hour increment. Overtime for salaried non-exempt employees is calculated in the leave system and accrued as compensatory leave equivalent to the time and one-half

Verification and Reconciliation

• The Payroll Office notifies departments when the BTE export is complete.
• Departments should:
  • Run the Time Card Entry Verification Report (Banner) on the day after the BTE approval deadline.
  • Compare results of the time card entry verification report with the Reconcile Hours Report (MicroStrategy).
  • Departments should run The Work Study Balance from Legacy web reports, to check the balance of all work-study employee awards.
  • Any discrepancies should be corrected and documented immediately.  Please email timekeeping@vt.edu with the corrected information.
• Any discrepancies should be corrected and documented immediately.  Please email timekeeping@vt.edu with the corrected information.
• Rounding variances of ±0.05 hours are acceptable.
• Departments must review the PZRTED reconciliation report within five (5) business days once it has been received from the Payroll office.  Reports are sent via email link once payroll processing has been completed for each pay period.
• There should be at least one departmental contact per organization for the PZRTED report. If no contact is set up, Payroll will reach out to establish a contact.
• Please reference Policy 4298 for more information

Retroactive Pay and Adjustments

Objective: minimize retro pay by ensuring timely time entry and approvals.

• All retro request forms must include an explanation of delay and corrective actions. Payroll may return incomplete submissions.

Segregation of Duties

Records Retention

Departments must retain the following for each pay period:

• Signed Reconciliation Report (PZRTED).
• Copies of supporting documentation (Timecard Entry Verification and MicroStrategy reports).
• Documentation for all manual or retro adjustments.

Figure 1: Timekeeping to Payroll Flow (Hire through Paycheck)

(Flowchart placeholder – see accompanying diagram)

Flowchart

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