In the beginning, there was the printed paycheck. Monthly, and later twice a month, departmental clerks picked up the checks and schlepped them back to their offices while employees waited, toes tapping with anticipation, to rush their checks to the bank.
Then came computers, and in 1984, direct deposit of paychecks became available at the UW. But even as numbers of direct deposit participants grew, some departmental clerk still had to pick up those check-sized papers and deliver them to employees one by one.
The vast majority of 91探花employees now are on the direct deposit plan. The University currently pays about 37,000 people on each payday, payroll officials say, with about 32,000 direct deposit advice statements and about 5,000 actual checks for those holdouts who want their money the old-fashioned way. And that鈥檚 a lot of paper.
But now the 91探花is taking the next step and making payroll virtually paperless. Starting with the Sept. 10 payroll, direct deposit advices will be available to employees only through the Employee Self-Service Web site — under . Employees can print out their advice statements from the site instead of receiving them on paper. That is, unless employees specifically request to keep getting the paper advices sent to them each payday, as before.
Linda Braziel, director of the 91探花payroll office, says the change is an efficiency measure that will save time and effort, and thus money.
鈥淎 lot of the people I know and hear of get this nine-and-a-half-cent piece of paper every two weeks and put it in their desk drawer,鈥� Braziel said. 鈥淚 tell people we are spending about $70,000 a year printing these forms, and from what I hear, they either don鈥檛 get used or are used once or twice a year.鈥�
She said whether they are direct deposit advices or paper checks, in some departments, 鈥渓iterally, one or two people may spend all day stuffing these advices into envelopes and passing them out to people and putting them in their mailboxes. A lot of people doing a lot of work that we鈥檙e thinking is not necessary in most cases.鈥�
Braziel said this change will not affect those employees who receive actual paper checks each payday 鈥� but she added that 鈥渨e are encouraging people to get off checks and use direct deposit.鈥�
If employees do nothing, their direct deposit advice statements will automatically convert to e-mail delivery with the Sept. 10 payroll. Those wishing to continue receiving their paper advice statements each payday can choose that in two ways:
- Enter the Employee Self-Service area of the 鈥淢y UW鈥� site () and click on the 鈥減rintable earnings statement鈥� area in the upper-right-hand corner of the page. That will take you to another page where you can check a box with your choice. You鈥檒l be taken to another page that explains the new process, and if you still want paper advice statements, click 鈥渟ubmit.鈥�
- Ask the payroll coordinator of your office to enter your choice into the OPUS (Online Payroll Update System).
Braziel said feedback over the coming change has been mostly good. 鈥淚鈥檓 hearing a very positive reaction 鈥� by far the majority of people are enthusiastic about this.鈥� She said many employees hadn鈥檛 known that the information was there on the ESS site all along. Another plus, she said, is that both the money and the information tend to arrive one to two days before payday.
Still, there are some holdouts who don鈥檛 wish to be carried along on the waves of technology, Braziel said, and others have expressed concern about people with disabilities who can鈥檛 easily use computers. For them, she said, the paper advice statements are always available.
Braziel said she and her staff got to thinking about what a visual representation would be of the effort saved by the new policy.
鈥淲hat we came up with was, if all these checks and advices were laid end to end, they would stretch from Seattle to Portland, or Vancouver, B.C.鈥�