In January 1996 when Payroll Services completed the conversion from the Unisys to the IBM mainframe, we lost the ability to control a critical screen edit within the payroll system.

Due to the placement of the social security number field (immediately following the employee number field) on the 160 screen we used to have the ability to prohibit the data entry of the employee number field on screen 160. (Payroll staff that may have been interrupted or distracted in the course of entering an employee number in the system to create a transaction for another of their employees, when in effect they were on the social security number field and had changed the social security number of the employee record currently on the screen). Although it may have been a little more cumbersome it did drastically reduce the social security number errors we had.

Recently it has come to our attention that social security number errors are on the rise. In-as-much as these numbers should rarely (if ever) be changed, we will be adding a new edit to the payroll system effective 9/10/99. As of this date, whenever the system determines that the social security number field has been changed, it will provide you with a warning requiring you type wok in the action field of the 160 screen before it will accept the transaction. This will give you an opportunity to correct these errors before they actually occur, by typing END in the action field (this will delete the erroneous transaction).

If you are entering transactions for a new employee it will be necessary to type ADDW in the action field. Agencies are never to type just ADD in the action field when entering new employee to system. Doing so will cause entire transactions to be missing or incomplete transactions to be drawn down.

Questions regarding this memo should be directed to your payroll auditor. Questions regarding social security numbers that may have been changed in error should be referred to Nancy Ribes at (860) 702-3448.

GR/ALN:vp

Effective 09/10/99, social security number changes on screen 160 will require you type wok in the action field before transaction is accepted. Refer to PSD memo dated 09/10/99 for complete information. This memo may be found on the OSC home page.

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