Purpose

The purpose of this bulletin is to inform City University of New York (CUNY) agencies of the implementation of the New York State Paid Family Leave.

Affected Employees

As of March 11, 2021, employees in the following bargaining units will be affected:

Background

In 2016 the Governor signed into law a comprehensive Paid Family Leave policy. The law provides for a deduction from employee wages to fund the program. Paid Family Leave coverage is funded by employee payroll deductions. State employees who are represented by a union may be covered if Paid Family Leave is collectively bargained.

The New York State Department of Financial Services has announced that the 2021 premium rate and the maximum weekly employee contribution for coverage will be 0.511% (0.00511) of an employee’s weekly wage, up to the statewide average weekly wage. Based on the 2021 average weekly wage amount, the maximum employee premium deduction for Paid Family Leave will be $385.34 per year. The corresponding maximum deduction is as follows:

Effective Dates

Paid Family Leave deduction will begin to be taken from employees in the March 25, 2021 paycheck.

Eligibility Criteria

All employees in the CUNY bargaining units listed in the Affected Employees section of this bulletin are required to be covered by the NY Paid Family Leave program.

OSC Actions

OSC has created a status field on the State Tax Data page labeled FLI (Family Leave Insurance) Status to identify employees who will have the new tax deduction taken.

The FLI Status field will be set to ‘Subject’ for all employees in the eligible bargaining units.

For all other employees, the FLI Status field will be set to ‘Not Applicable.’

OSC will deduct Paid Family Leave from employees’ paychecks using the current rate of 0.00511, not to exceed the maximum deduction of $385.34 annually.

OSC Actions-Earnings

OSC has created Action/Reason codes to be used to identify employees who have received approval to use the NY Paid Family Leave benefit.

• LOA/PFL- Leave of Absence/Paid Family Leave
• RFL/PFL- Return from Leave/Paid Family Leave

Agency Actions

CUNY has advised that agencies must make CUNY represented employees in the above bargaining units aware of the option to waive PFL if they will not meet the service requirements for the NY Paid Family Leave program,

AND

Verify any waivers received from the employee and retain the form in the employee’s record. (The waiver form can be found at: https://paidfamilyleave.ny.gov/pfl-waiver-form),

AND

Update the employee’s FLI Status field to ‘Exempt’ so that premiums will not be deducted. See PFL Job Aid 9.2 for instructions.

To process waivers in time to affect the first paycheck from which deductions will be taken, agencies must update the Employee Tax Data Page by March 15, 2021 for the Institution paycheck of March 25, 2021.

Agencies are responsible for tracking continued eligibility for PFL waivers, and upon determining that an employee is no longer eligible for a waiver, the agency must advise the employee that the waiver will be revoked.

Agency Actions-Earnings

CUNY agencies are responsible for using the correct Leave of Absence Reason code in PayServ.

If an employee has initially been placed on a Leave of Absence with an incorrect reason code, the agency must correct the Action/Reason code to PFL as soon as they are notified that the leave of absence is due to Paid Family Leave.

If there are no subsequent rows in the employee’s job history, the agency must enter the following transactions on Job Data:

• The appropriate Rein Leave transaction
• Leave of Absence - LOA/PFL

If there are subsequent rows, the agency must submit a Job Action Request DTA/Cor Hist and enter the reason in the status reason box on the page.

If an employee is no longer receiving the Paid Family Leave Benefit, the proper Return from Leave code RFL/PFL must be submitted.

If a leave of absence transaction is submitted retroactively, refer to Payroll Bulletins No. 470 and No. 1038 for information regarding overpayments and their recovery.

The use of NY Paid Family Leave will not affect an employee’s anniversary date or increment code. However, this benefit is not eligible for Retirement service credit.

Control-D Reports

Control-D report NTAX511 (Paid Family Leave) has been created to provide agencies with a list of all employees with the NY Paid Family Leave deduction and the amount taken.

Tax Information

The Paid Family Leave deduction will appear as an after-tax deduction on the employee paycheck and will be reported on the employee Form W-2 for the current tax year.

Payroll Register and Employee’s Paycheck/Advice

The Paid Family Leave deduction will be displayed on the Payroll Register. The deduction description (NY Paid Family Leave), the amount deducted and the year to date deduction total appear on the employee’s paycheck stub or direct deposit advice statement. Agencies will be able to view the deduction for PFL in PayServ on the “Review Paycheck” page under Taxes.

Questions

Questions regarding Paid Family Leave or the payroll deduction should be directed to the University Benefits Office at (646) 664-2420 or [email protected].

Questions regarding this bulletin may be directed to the Tax and Compliance mailbox.