3 Major Reasons for Employees To Read Their Pay Stubs Carefully

Presented by Paystrubmakr.com      By John Wolf and Tom Cullen CPA

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Have you been overlooking an important detail of your working life?

Well, the excitement of getting a new job can easily make anyone forget to check their paystubs thoroughly. But this is surely not a good deal. Wondering why?

Do you know about the McKenzie v. FedEx case? Yes, the same where FedEx was sued for inaccuracies in its pay stubs. Actually, it wasn’t McKenzie alone being affected, but there were more than 14,000 employees who suffered from a similar loss. In this case, FedEx has to settle paying $8.25 million for penalties.

Of course, mistakes are part of life. But when it is about your paycheck, certainly, you don’t want any mistakes to occur. So, here are some reasons why employees must read their paychecks cautiously;

It helps to keep surprise taxes at bay

Your check stub must include your name, pay rates, Social Security number, and paid time off balance. All these are essential for you in one way or the other.

For instance, if your Social Security number is incorrect, it simply implies that the taxes filed by your employer with the Federal or State governments are also wrong. So, what if your withholding has been applied to someone else’s account?

You don’t need to wait until the end of the year to tally up the amount of taxes paid by you. Keep checking your pay stubs for whether the taxes tally up with the balance in your salary or not. Along with this, keep a closer eye on how much tax you pay, to avoid those unpleasant tax surprises.

A proper tally up for hours worked and overtime

Receiving a fixed salary? Or being paid on an hourly basis? In both cases, it is essential for you to check for the number of hours you have worked for. Actually, it is a must to keep track wisely to ensure the amount stated in your check stubs is always correct. Of course, this is more critical for the employees being paid hourly wages. For them, the amount that they receive must tally with the number of working hours.

You cannot take the risk of a few hours being calculated incorrectly. The reason being, it might accumulate to a huge amount over time. Keeping a close eye on the pay stub will help you when an employer does not provide appropriate payment as per the hours, as you are eligible to press legal charges.

A closer look at the benefits and deductions

Are you aware of the employee benefits?

There is one big brand, which has been serving as an example for providing great employee benefits, yes, it is Google.

Chances are that your employer might not be offering great amenities as the search engine giant does. However, there are some certain things which would add benefit to your life. It can include your health insurance, your dental checkups, and so on.

But how will you know that? Simply, it is your check stubs that let you evaluate all your benefit deductions correctly. In case, you don’t find any benefit deductions, you haven’t been properly enrolled for the benefits plan. So, now you can communicate with your employer regarding the same.

Lastly, you need to remember that discrepancy in check stubs are common. As human errors are unavoidable, it is the employee’s responsibility to ensure whether his check stubs are properly accounted for or not. Be careful, be wise!