HUMAN RESOURCES MISTAKE - But I'm paying for it??

Question

This is my story..

I have been at my current job for 10 months. I had a probationary period in which I was eligible to enroll in a benefits package after 90 days. I did. I received my benefits cards and everything was good..until yesterday...

The new payroll guy pulled me to the side and said HR asked him to do an audit on the benefits plan. He found that this whole time they were not deducting my portion from my checks. I get direct deposit so it's rare that I even look at my check stubs. All-in-all, he said that our HR manager told him to deduct half of what I owe from my next check, which is this Friday. He then said that he won't do it because he is not sure as to how much I owe exactly, but it will be deducted from future checks.

My question is, can they do that? It is not my fault that my payments were not being deducted, but an employer error 100%. They are trying to make me pay for their mistake to cover their tails! I need to know if they can do this because I am the youngest employee at this company and I feel that I am being taken advantage of.

Please help!

Answer 1

I am an HR/benefits person.  And YES, they can and they have to.  Most likely you benefits premiums come out before taxes, which is a good thing because it reduces your taxable income and you pay less taxes.  Now, to keep the benefit plan "qualified" so that they can do the pretax thing they have to make sure you pay your premiums.  If they were to ignore this and they were audited by the IRS they could get in some big trouble.  So you are not being taken advantage of and yes they can do this.

My only suggestion would be to see if they could do this over 4 checks instead of 2.  But they don't have to do that, they could take it all from one if they wanted to.

Answer 2

Yes, yes they can!

"as a norm", one always knows about what their check will be. Even with direct deposit,I check my account to make sure the check is there. With saying that, I would have noticed that they did not deduct and I would have went to them....... if you owe- you pay!

Answer 3

you need to look at your paycheck every week - I'm sure if they shorted you money you would have let them know about it - you are also supposed to inform payroll when they give you too much

Answer 4

You owe the money. Pay up. Sorry. That is life.

Yes, they made a mistake. You could have caught it if you had looked at your pay stub. Tough.

Move on. Don't poison your relationship with the company over this unless you are ready to look for a new job.

Answer 5

you owe them, so pay :)