I am trying to figure out a way inside of JAMIS to track several employee benefits that are associated with specific dollar values.
For example, new hires that need to relocate to start get a relocation benefit, which is a specific dollar value that would be the same for all employees. Is there a way in JAMIS to set this up and track it? We would like to easily track how much each employee has used and ensure that they do not get reimbursed for more than what the budgeted amount was.
I’ve tried looking into accruals, but that seems to be more based off of pay rates, and we do not want this going into any GLs. I have also considered writing generic inquiries that track this, but that does not help with preventing reimbursements over the amount from going through.
Best answer by cdmartin
Do you use Purchasing (POs)?
While the employee records are not available as vendors in purchasing by default, this is probably something that could be customized or a setting that I do not immediately know (this I do not know for sure). The PO creation would give you the commitment in the system for the expense (approved budget amount) and then you can track the remaining funds on the PO fairly easily in the purchasing module. It still goes through AP when you pay an employee out, but you could setup an auto generated earning code that offsets a balance sheet account like “Tuition Reimbursement” that payroll could pull into the labor batch once you make the reimbursement. That was you can make sure everything reconciles to zero, and you still have the tracking to the PO limit.
Do you use the JAMIS Expense module? If so, would an authorization with the multiple expense authorization box checked, in the Authorization tab? That way you can set an amount and apply multiple expense reports against it.
Do you use the JAMIS Expense module? If so, would an authorization with the multiple expense authorization box checked, in the Authorization tab? That way you can set an amount and apply multiple expense reports against it.
I didn’t know about that functionality of the Expense module. We have it, but it isn’t set up. Thank you for that.
Not sure an expense report can pull into labor though? And relocation reimbursements are taxable. Unless you do something like zero out the bill and re-enter it in a labor batch?
We do something similar with annual clothing allowance or certification/exam reimbursements which we don’t run through payroll, but I don’t love the idea of having to make an authorization and run it through an expense report every time an employee buys a paid of jeans until they hit their $250 limit either… But it’s a great idea for larger nontaxable reimbursements.
I would love an earning code or accrual code that stops annually at a certain limit but I don’t believe there is any current way to do so.
Not sure an expense report can pull into labor though? And relocation reimbursements are taxable. Unless you do something like zero out the bill and re-enter it in a labor batch?
We do something similar with annual clothing allowance or certification/exam reimbursements which we don’t run through payroll, but I don’t love the idea of having to make an authorization and run it through an expense report every time an employee buys a paid of jeans until they hit their $250 limit either… But it’s a great idea for larger nontaxable reimbursements.
I would love an earning code or accrual code that stops annually at a certain limit but I don’t believe there is any current way to do so.
I think that is why currently we process the payments through Bills and Adjustments, but the payables team has to check every time they do a relocation or tuition reimbursement.
Theoretically you could do an inquiry that totals based off the appropriate earning codes and do a column for the year and a cumulative so its easy to track.
I also thought about doing business events that trigger if a Bill was entered that would go over the allowed amount so that it could be caught before getting paid. Still need to test it to see if it is possible.
My other idea, which is similar is creating either an attribute or customization to add a field to the Employees page. Then when a Bill is enter a business event could run an import scenario to add that dollar value into the new field. Then a report/business event could show the totals and if anyone is overrunning.
While the employee records are not available as vendors in purchasing by default, this is probably something that could be customized or a setting that I do not immediately know (this I do not know for sure). The PO creation would give you the commitment in the system for the expense (approved budget amount) and then you can track the remaining funds on the PO fairly easily in the purchasing module. It still goes through AP when you pay an employee out, but you could setup an auto generated earning code that offsets a balance sheet account like “Tuition Reimbursement” that payroll could pull into the labor batch once you make the reimbursement. That was you can make sure everything reconciles to zero, and you still have the tracking to the PO limit.
For a non-payroll item, the expense authorization seems like the best bet. For a payroll item, perhaps reach out to your payroll provider and see if they have a way to set a limit field since ultimately the amount needs to flow through payroll. In Jamis, perhaps a generic inquiry (with a parameter by individual if desired) showing the limit and amount paid so far (using a specific earning code and then amount available. This could even be dashboarded or favorited to make it quicker for payroll to access.
