2011 Social Security Taxes

[Bill Andrews]

I just went crazy trying to figure out where the Tax Table was attached to the Item Description and found it at the employee pay items level. Why is it there and not in the Item Description setup window. It does not seem to be the most logical place to put it.

Thank you tborgal! Found it in my system and corrected it by opening each employee's record. Seems like a convaluted way to do this. Powerchurch needs to put out a more definitive explanation as to how to fix this since all of us will face this issue on January 1.

[Zorak]

Which tax tables are used by which employees would have just converted forward from V10 or prior, if you were using Payroll before V11.

[NeilZ]

I just went crazy trying to figure out where the Tax Table was attached to the Item Description and found it at the employee pay items level. Why is it there and not in the Item Description setup window. It does not seem to be the most logical place to put it.

Thank you tborgal! Found it in my system and corrected it by opening each employee's record. Seems like a convaluted way to do this. Powerchurch needs to put out a more definitive explanation as to how to fix this since all of us will face this issue on January 1.

Actually, there's nothing convoluted about it. The new SSI rate is nothing more than a different tax table. The new table needs to be selected in the employee's pay items so that the lower rate is used.

Its the same type of operation you must do if an employee gets married, and wishes to use the Married Federal Income Tax Withholding Rates. You have to go into their employee pay items to change their FITW pay item from using the Single tax table to the Married tax table.

[NeilZ]

To implement the new Social Security withholding that starts in Jan 2011, you need to do the following:

1. From the Powerchurch menu bar, select Accounting -> Payroll -> Setup -> Maintain Tax Tables.

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2. On the Maintain Tax Tables window, click on Add.

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3. From the pop-up window that appears, select Federal: Social Security as the type of tax table to add.

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Continued next posting.

[NeilZ]

4. You'll then get a Maintain Tax Table screen with a blank description. Enter a description that will make sense to you, then for tax type, select Social Security from the pull-down selections.

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5. Enter the new Social Security withholding percentage in the Percentage box, then click the Save button at the bottom right.

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This finishes the setup of the new Social Security tax table.

[NeilZ]

Now we need to point the employee pay item to the new tax table.

1. From the Powerchurch menu bar, select Accounting -> Payroll -> Maintain List of Employees. Then select the Pay Items tab. Highlight the Employee SSI pay item. (Your name for this item may be different.) Then click on the Edit button

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2. Select the new tax table, in this case its named SSI: Employee from the drop-down selections, then click the OK button. Do this for every employee who has Social Security taxes withheld from their pay check.

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This ends this walk through of the SSI tax table changes.

[Zorak]

New Knowledge Base article posted last week:

Setting Up Social Security For 2011

[NeilZ]

New Knowledge Base article posted last week:

Setting Up Social Security For 2011

Nice, but you gotta let people know about it, which is why I advise a sticky topic

[Zorak]

You just can't please some people. The front page of the web site isn't enough?

[NeilZ]

You just can't please some people. The front page of the web site isn't enough?

Not if they're like me and they come right to the forums

[Eden Whitehead]

You just can't please some people. The front page of the web site isn't enough?

Not if they're like me and they come right to the forums

...which is exactly what I do all the time!

Eden

[Flemingtl]

Could I get a little help?
When I double click on the "920 Employee SSI" item, the only choices for "Tax Table" are "Federal Married Rate" and "Federal Single Rate". I don't have the choice of the new "SS Employee" that I just created?

[Zorak]

If using Version 11, it sounds like the tax type on your item 920 is Federal Withholding, instead of Social Security.

Go to Accounting > Payroll > Setup > Maintain Item Descriptions and look up that item. The tax type should be Social Security.

If this is correct, take a look at the tax tables themselves, then. It may be that they have the wrong tax types assigned. Go to Accounting > Payroll > Setup > Maintain Tax Tables and make sure they have the right tax types assigned.

[Flemingtl]

That did it!
THANKS!
Terry Fleming