October 2022 - Our team has grown and other news!

AST expansion is proceeding apace. We are delighted to introduce you to new members in our HR/Payroll, Foreign National Services, and Payments and Procurement groups. 

• Susan Miller, as many of you know, joined Ivy’s group working on academic personnel actions. 
• Veronica Zambrano joined AST in the summer as a temp worker and, happily, joined the HR/Payroll group on a permanent basis in early September.   
• Jessey Lara joined us in May, also as a temp. She started a permanent position working with Jack on foreign national visas on October 24.   
• Brandy Lawrence, too, started with us on October 24 as part of the Foreign National Services group, meaning that Jack at long last has a full team tackling the College’s visas. Hooray! 
• Wilhelm (Will) Zuercher joined us on October 19 from UW Transportation Services and is now working on reimbursements and payments. 
• Katie Seidel, like Jessey and Brandy, started on October 24. She previously worked in the College of Education and, along with Will, joins Cara, Lauren, and Jason processing payments and procurement actions. 

We are confident that you will enjoy working with these wonderful additions to our merry band. Join us in a hearty welcome to them all!

We, of course, are not yet done assembling the full team that will be working with all College units on Workday Finance transactions. We have open requisitions for four more Payment/Procurement specialists and, in January, we will have positions open for our new Accounting Services Group that will manage the journal entries, month-end close, FECs/GCCRs, and grant close activities. Finally, we have openings in Ivy’s HR/Payroll group, including the Assistant Director position recently vacated by our much-missed colleague Felix Velasco.   

If you know potential candidates for any of these positions, please encourage them to check UWHR’s jobs website for more information.

PAYMENTS AND PROCUREMENT

Update on using DocuSign for Payment to Individuals (P2I)

After using and tweaking and then using it some more, we are happy to report we have a DocuSign Powerform template to send to payees for collecting personal identifying information in a secure manner! We have seen a dramatic increase in timely responses, which results in paying the individual faster. What changes for you? Not much, aside from knowing that we are using DocuSign instead of the telephone. 

The process:

• When working with honoraria (or any other P2I payee), let them know AST will be reaching out to them via email (c/o teamcas@uw.edu) requesting completion of the questionnaire. 
• The email contains a link to a DocuSign Powerform, which allows us to collect personal information in a secure manner. 
• Once received, AST processes the payment. If the payee is a foreign national, there are additional documentation requirements which we will facilitate. 

Want to see the Powerform? Go ahead and take it for a spin! Simply enter information as a test (just don't push "finish," which will create a ticket for us). 

For non-AST CAS departments who are interested in using this form, we are happy to share. If you have a DocuSign account for your department, contact Cara Ball at ballc2@uw.edu and she will download the template for you to upload into your instance and tweak. 

$75 Receipt Policy

AST has updated and posted our policy on receipts for $75 or less. Please note, this is not a blanket waiver policy; rather, it is meant to assist both the requestor and AST when the expense and risk are both low and allows everyone to move forward in the reimbursement process. For some transactions, policies specifically require a receipt, regardless of the dollar amount, and this policy will not override the more particular one.

The policy can be applied when the following criteria are met: 

• The dollar amount of expense is $75 or less AND
• A reasonable effort is made to obtain a vendor receipt and
• Information is available regarding the expense: what was purchases, pricing information, and business purpose is documented. 

FOREIGN NATIONAL SERVICES

Don't forget: H-1B processing takes 8+ months!

The U.S. Department of Labor is now taking 8+ months to issue prevailing wage determinations for H-1Bs. Because the UW needs a prevailing wage determination to sponsor an H-1B for any position not subject to a collective bargaining agreement, this means that many H visa are now requiring 9+ months to process, even when paying the USCIS premium processing fee. 

When making an offer to an H-1B employee, be sure to:

• Contact ISO (by email or by submitting an H visa request) at least 9 months in advance of the start date for H-1B employees.
• Extend offers with start dates 9 or months in the future. 

If you have questions about this process, please reach out to our Foreign National Services Supervisor, Jack Hamrick, at hamrickj@uw.edu.

AST PAYROLL UNITS

I-9 resources for new employees

Thank you for helping spread the word to your new employees about our Autumn Drop0in I-9 Verification Hours! We look forward to hosting drop-in hours for verifying I-9s at the start of each quarter, thanks to the success we saw with offering this service. Stay tuned for the Winter Quarter drop-in schedule in the coming months.

Since hiring is a year-round business, we encourage you to continue sharing the following with your newly hired employees:

• I-9 Journey Map: This ISC resource helps guide new-to-the-university employees through the process of filling out Section 1 of their Form I-9 in Workday
• I-9 Verification Appointment Link: Your employees should schedule an appointment to complete their I-9 document verification in the Dean's office within 3 business days of their first day of work.

Send questions about the I-9 process to teamcas-i9@uw.edu.

As always, please contact an of us or email teamcas@uw.edu with any questions or concerns.

Thank you again for partnering with us in this work!

AST Leadership

Heidi Tilghman
Ivy Mason-Sharrah
Cara Ball
Amy Cox