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Paperless in the U of W
by Anita Bingaman

Starting with the September 10th pay day, Check Advice Slips were no longer automatically printed(the slip was a record of earnings and deductions given out on each pay day.) Instead, employees, log into Employee Self Service and print an Earnings Statement, which has the official UW logo and a watermark that can be seen if the advice is held up to the light, which means that these earning statements can be used at mortgage companies and bank when proof of earnings is required.

This change has meant savings on many fronts. It has eliminated the expense of printing 25,000 check advices twice a month. It has also saved time in Payroll and the departments. The Payroll Office no longer needs to sort and insert those 25,000 pieces of paper into folders for 410 departments. It has also reduced the length of time four Payroll people need to stand in the lobby handing out the advices and the time department payroll coordinators spend collecting the advices. The departments no longer need to insert each slip into an envelope, sort by unit and then distribute. There are still 4,000 printed advices and 3,300 actual checks that have to be handled each pay cycle, but this in minimal compared to close to 35,000.

In the short time since the change we have heard positive reports from both Payroll and from the departments. Payroll’s Christa Woodhull, who has been involved in many of the USER Project rollouts, observed that, “The thing I find interesting about this change is the lack of resistance. We all know that change is difficult, but with this change not many people resisted, though I am sure a few grumbled a bit.” Cathy Stewart, in Alarm Billings-Police Department, says that she used to distribute 98 checks/advices. This would take about an hour. Now she processes 14 checks/ advices and has found that the time is more than cut in half.