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Procurement
Professional
Services
Frequently Asked Questions
Certified Payroll
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Q. Since the requirement for submission of Certified Payrolls is to submit it to the Department's
Contract Manager, is it acceptable for subconsultants to submit them directly to the Department's Contract Manager and NOT to the prime
consultant for whom they are working? |
A. No. Since agreements are negotiated with
the Prime Consultant and the executed agreement is only with
the Prime Consultant, the proper chain of custody for Subconsultant
certified payrolls are through the Prime Consultant to the Project/Contract
Manager.
When confidentiality concerns exist, the certified payrolls
can be placed in a sealed envelope marked " FIRM NAME CERTIFIED
PAYROLLS - TO BE OPENED BY THE BUREAU OF AUDITING". Subconsultants
can , if they chose, submit their certified payrolls to the
prime in a similar fashion. The chain of custody remains as
stated in the 1st paragraph. The envelopes will be unsealed
at the time of initial audit.
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Q. Does the Certified Payroll need to list EVERY employee of the firm, or is it sufficient to only list
those employees who will be working under the particular agreement in question? |
A. Firms should list only those employees who will be working under the particular agreement in question. There is no need
to list every employee.
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Q. If the Certified Payroll is limited to only those employees expected to work under the particular
agreement, is it still appropriate to show the Average Wage Rates by ASCE Grade that apply to ALL employees of a firm in that Grade? |
A. If the firm is undecided about which employee
will perform the work on a particular agreement, the firm can
list all its employees within an individual, negotiated ASCE
grade. The average wage rate of those employees will be used
to estimate the agreement. The firm invoices based on the wage
of the staffer that actually performed the work. Team Leaders,
who were scored by the Department during TP evaluation, must
be used.
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Q. If a firm submits a certified payroll with a new agreement, then subsequent to that, the employees
assigned to that agreement get pay raises; the firm would invoice monthly based on the higher salary. are there any final audit issues w/ this
scenario? there are now no 1/4erly wage rate documents to verify
the higher salary. |
A. The Department will utilize the Certified Payrolls only for evaluating estimated labor costs in proposals submitted
after January 1, 2005. If the employees subsequently receive pay raises, the firm is allowed to bill the higher salary rates. Pay rates billed
will be verified at the time of final audit to the actual salary rates paid as evidenced in the firm's payroll register.
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Q. Our last roster was submitted to NJDOT in August 2004. We were getting ready to submit another roster
to obtain NJDOT approval on all individuals who received pay increase and for new hires since our last roster submission in August 2004. My
fear is, if we don't submit the roster now, during future audits (which can happen after three or more years), the NJDOT auditors will disallow
any rates which have not been approved by NJDOT. Can we submit a roster now? If the answer is no, and if we are only allowed to submit a roster
with cost proposals, how will we obtain approval of rates for new employees and employees who received raises prior to submitting the certified
payroll roster? |
A. The new Department policy utilizing Certified
Payroll in lieu of Wage Rate Approvals did not become effective
until January 1, 2005. Therefore, consultant firms should have
approved wage rates on file for pay periods through December
31, 2004. If a firm had submitted their quarterly wage rate
submissions on a timely basis, they would already be covered.
The Department does NOT want to deal with retroactive approvals
several years down the road.
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Q. We have recently completed our annual salary reviews. Under the old process, the new rates would have
been submitted in our wage rate approval request for first quarter 2005. Under the new process should the new rates be submitted for the
ongoing projects that will continue in 2005 and be subject to the new rates? Our concern is that in the absence of an approval for the new
rates, new invoices may be reduced by the accounting group based on rates last approved for fourth quarter 2004. |
A. Since firms invoice and are paid for the staffer's actual wage rate, this scenario shouldn't occur.
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Q. How are new hires to be handled? |
A. A new hire's wages will be considered a Certified Payroll revision. An excel form should be filled out for the new
hire(s) only and then submitted to Professional Services. They will be handled similarly to " Retroactive Wage Rate " procedures 4 through 6.
Include all projects assigned to the "new hire".
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Q. I'm assuming we would submit an updated listing for each agreement that has a listing on file should a
rate change after the initial submittal on an agreement/task order/CAM or CAA, preferably prior to our next affected billing cycle. |
A. No, since you invoice based on the staffer's actual wage rate.
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Q. Do we have to submit a separate
wage rate listing for each open existing agreement to get
the ball rolling? |
| A. No. |
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