Municipal Software CHIPS 17 Release Updates

The CHIPS v17 Release is loaded with new features, improvements, and refinements.  These changes have come from the Annual Survey, technology advances and requests submitted throughout the year.  Our goal in updating CHIPS is to keep the product technically state-of-the-art, more efficient, and more pleasing to use. Below are highlights of the major changes and new features found in CHIPS v17.

1.      Taxes.  New taxes for County, Local and School taxes have been added to the system.  To accommodate these new taxes, the following changes have been made:

• Tax Codes and Tables have been changed to now have options for County, Local and School Taxes.  These new tax types work the same way as the existing City Tax Code.
• Deduction/Earning Codes.  Modifications were made to applicable Deductions and Earnings to handle the new County, Local and School Tax codes.
• Departments have been changed to have fields for the County, Local and School Tax Liability Accounts.
• Fields have been added to Employee Maintenance to assign County, Local and School Taxes. Fields have also been added to the Year To Date and History screens.
• A County Tax Report has been added.  This report is similar to the City Tax Report but it lists County Tax information.  The Detail option lists County Total Gross Pay and County Totals Tax Paid for each employee within the entered ranges. There is also a Summary option that gives totals for each County Tax Code.  This new program is located off of the Reports Menu.  There is also an Excel option for users with the Data Dictionary module.
• A Local Tax Report has been added.  This report is similar to the City Tax Report but it lists Local Tax information.  The Detail option lists Local Total Gross Pay and Local Totals Tax Paid for each employee within the entered ranges. There is also a Summary option that gives totals for each Local Tax Code.  This new program is located off of the Reports Menu.  There is also an Excel option for users with the Data Dictionary module.
• A School Tax Report has been added.  This report is similar to the City Tax Report but it lists School Tax information.  The Detail option lists School Total Gross Pay and School Totals Tax Paid for each employee within the entered ranges.  There is also a Summary option that gives totals for each School Tax Code.  This new program is located off of the Reports Menu.  There is also an Excel option for users with the Data Dictionary module.
• The SWT Report has been renamed the State Tax Report.
• The CWT Report has been renamed the City Tax Report.
• Fields have been added to Time Payroll for overriding the County, Local and School taxes.
• Fields have been added to Manual Payroll for County, Local and School taxes.
• The following reports have been modified to now have the County, Local and School tax information:  Consolidated Payroll Register, History Report, Manual Payroll Edit List, Payroll Register, Quarterly Report, Year End Report and Yearly Report.
• Checkboxes have been added to System Controls for the options to Require County Tax Codes, Require Local Tax Codes and Require School Tax Codes in Employee Maintenance.
• We have removed the abbreviations of FWT, SWT, OST and CWT that are shown on screens and reports throughout the system and they are now Federal Tax, State Tax, Other State Tax and City Tax.  In some locations where space is limited Other State Tax may be shortened to Other ST Tax.
• The W-2 Print programs have been modified to now include the additional County, Local and School taxes if applicable.

2.      Web Services.  The Web Services module has been completely redesigned.  The details are below:

• Web Services has been completely redesigned.  Payroll administrators will no longer enter employee’s user names, passwords, and security questions/answers into CHIPS. The employee will now be the only person who has access to their username, password, and security questions/answers.  Employees who are currently included in the Web Services database will automatically have a registered account created for them during the conversion to CHIPS 17.0 which will be placed on the new CHIPS Payroll Online Services site the next time the Web Services database is generated and transferred.  The automatically generated account will use the employee’s existing user name, password, and security questions/answers that were in CHIPS 16.0.  Once the employee logs into the new CHPS Payroll Online Services site, they have the ability to change their username, password, or security questions/answers if they want.  During the conversion to CHIPS 17 all existing employee Web Services user names, passwords, and security questions/answers will be removed from CHIPS. Web Services has also been changed to allow for the availability of up to 5 complete years of history including pay stubs and W2 forms for an employee.  The payroll administrator can decide how many years of history to make available to employees.  This is setup in CHIPS on the Web Services Preference screen that is accessed from the Web Services Preferences button on the Preferences tab in System Controls. The years of history will default to 5 years during the conversion to CHIPS 17.  The payroll administrator can set the available years of history to as low as 2 years of history or as high as 5 years of history.  CHIPS Payroll Online Services has also been changed to now automatically log an employee out after 20 minutes of inactivity where it was previously 10 minutes of inactivity.  The passwords on the CHIPS^® Payroll Online Services site are also now case sensitive.
• CHIPS^®Payroll Online Services is now hosted on chipspayroll.com instead of drfrey.biz.  The entire CHIPS Payroll Online Services site has been redesigned to use a responsive design so the site will display well whether it is being accessed from a desktop computer, laptop computer, tablet, or smartphone.  The company login portal site is now located at https://www.chipspayroll.com/payroll/login.html.  The Company ID for your existing web services site will continue to work on the new CHIPS Payroll Online Services site.  After entering your organization’s Company ID, you will be taken to your organization’s new employee login page.  The URL for web pages that aren’t dynamically generated for your organization will no longer use your CHIPS Identification Number as part of the URL.  That portion of the URL is now replaced with an organization specific ID which is a variation of your organizations name and the state in which it is located.
• From your organization’s CHIPS Payroll Online Services employee login page, an employee will be able to login with their Username and Password, or they will be able to request a username email reminder if they have forgotten their Username, or they will be able to request a password reset email if they have forgotten their password, or they will be able to register for an account if they have not already registered.  If the employee has forgotten their username, they can click on the “Forgot your username?” link which will then prompt them to enter their employee number which is required to locate the correct registered account for the employee and once the registered account is located the employee will need to provide the correct answers to their security questions before a username reminder email can be sent to the employee’s email account. An email account must be setup on their employee record in CHIPS for an employee to be able to receive the username reminder email.  If the employee has forgotten their password, they can click on the “Forgot your password?” link which will then prompt them to enter their username which is required to locate the correct registered account and once the registered account is located the employee will need to provide the correct answers to their security questions before a temporary password can be generated for the employee and a password reset email can be sent to the employee’s email account.  An email account must be setup on their employee record in CHIPS for an employee to be able to receive the password reset email. Once the employee receives the password reset email, the employee can return to the employee login page and use their username and temporary password to login to CHIPS Payroll Online Services.  When the employee logs in with the temporary password, the employee will be required to immediately setup a new password.  If the employee does not have a registered account, they can click on the “Register here” link to begin the registration process.  The employee must have their Company Access Code, Employee Number, the last four digits of their Social Security Number, and the ZIP Code for their residential address which will provide the uniquely identifiable information for the employee that is necessary to begin the registration process. An employee must be setup to be included in the web services database in CHIPS and must have been included in the latest database generation and transfer in order for the employee to be able to register an account on CHIPS Payroll Online Services.  To complete the registration, the employee will need to enter a username, password, and setup their security questions/answers.  The Company Access Code for your organization will need to be provided to employees as well as the employee number from their employee record in CHIPS in order to register an account on CHIPS Payroll Online Services.  The Company Access Code can be found in CHIPS on the Web Services Preference screen that is accessed from the Web Services Preferences button on the Preferences tab in System Controls.
• Once an employee logs into CHIPS Payroll Online Services with a registered account, they will be presented with their Employee Dashboard.  The History tab of the Employee Dashboard will be initially displayed.  The History tab provides a summary of the selected payroll year.  The selected payroll year will default to the most recent year for which an employee has history.  If an employee does not have any history, the payroll year will default to the current payroll year that CHIPS was in at the time the Web Services database was last generated.  The employee can select which payroll year they want to view the history summary for by choosing an available year from the Payroll Year field.  The history summary is separated in up to five sections: Pay, Earnings, Deductions, Taxes, and Net Pay.  The Pay section of the history summary is always available and will show a breakdown of hours and gross pay amount for each pay type for which the employee had activity in the selected payroll year.  The Pay section concludes with a Total Pay line which shows the total hours and gross pay amount for the selected payroll year. The Earnings section of the history summary comes after the Pay section and is only available if the employee had other earnings in the selected payroll year.  Other earnings could consist of earnings that are considered employee compensation such as bonuses, or earnings that are considered taxable benefits such as group term life insurance.  Each earning that the employee had in the selected payroll year will be listed and separated into either a taxable benefit category or employee compensation category.  The Earnings section concludes with a Total Earnings line which shows the total amounts of all taxable benefits and employee compensation for the selected payroll year.  The Deductions section of the history summary comes next and is only available if the employee had deductions in the selected payroll year.  Each deduction that the employee had in the selected payroll year will be listed and separated into the employee amount of the deduction if applicable and the employer amount of the deduction if applicable.  The Deductions section concludes with a Total Deductions line which shows the total amounts of all employer deductions and employee deductions for the selected payroll year.  The Taxes section of the history summary comes next and is always available.  Each tax that the employee had in the selected payroll year will be listed and separated into the employee amount of the tax and the employer amount of the tax if applicable.  The Taxes section concludes with a Total Taxes line which shows the total amounts of all employer taxes and employee taxes for the selected payroll year.  The final section which is always available is the Net Pay section which is a total line showing the employee’s total net pay for the selected payroll year.
• The employee can select the Pay Stubs tab from the Employee Dashboard to view a summary of all their pay stubs that are available for the selected pay stub payroll year and they have the option to view each available pay stub in PDF format.  The selected pay stub payroll year will default to the most recent year for which an employee has pay stub history.  If an employee does not have any pay stub history, the payroll year will default to the current payroll year that CHIPS was in at the time the Web Services database was last generated.  The employee can select which payroll year they want to view the available pay stubs for by choosing an available year from the Payroll Year field.
• The employee can select the Tax Documents tab from the Employee Dashboard to view all of their available W2 forms and their most recent 1095 form if they have a 1095 form available.  The W2 forms and 1095 form if applicable are able to be viewed in PDF format.
• The employee can select the Employee Information tab from the Employee Dashboard to view their employee settings and account information. The employee will be able to see their Username, Department, Employee Number, Email Address, and Filing Status on the Employee Information tab.  They will also be able to see their security questions and also have the option to view the answers to their security questions.  The Employee Information tab also has options for the employee to change their Username, Password, and Security Questions.  If the CHIPS payroll administrator views the Employee Information from the Access Web Services option in Employee Maintenance, the payroll administrator will not see the employee’s Username or security questions/answers and will not have the ability to change the Username, Password, or Security Questions.  The employee’s Username will show as asterisks for the payroll administrator if the employee has a registered account and if the employee has not registered an account, nothing will show for the Username for the payroll administrator.

3.      Web Services Require Password Reset.  There is a new Require Password Reset menu item on the Web Services menu that is on the Payroll menu. The Require Password Reset will allow the CHIPS user to select a single employee to require a password reset be done for their CHIPS Payroll Online Services registered account. The CHIPS user must verify the employee is the correct employee to require the password reset by typing “YES” to continue processing the password reset.  Once the CHIPS user has verified the employee is correct, the employee’s CHIPS Payroll Online Services registered account will be updated to require a password reset the next time the employee logs into the CHIPS Payroll Online Services site.  Note that an employee will need to have an email account defined in CHIPS for an employee to be able to perform a password reset.

4.      Web Services Remove Registered Account.  There is a new Remove Registered Account menu item on the Web Services menu that is on the Payroll menu.  The Remove Registered Account will allow the CHIPS user to select a single employee to have their registered account removed from the CHIPS Payroll Online Services site.  The CHIPS user must verify the employee is the correct employee to have their registered account removed by typing “YES” to continue processing the registered account removal.  Once the CHIPS user has verified the employee is correct, the employee’s CHIPS Payroll Online Services registered account will be removed.  The employee would then need to reregister on the CHIPS Payroll Online Services site.

5.      Generate Web Services Database.  Generate Web Services Database has two new options:  “Require All Employees to Reset Their Web Services Password” and “Remove All Registered Accounts From Web Services”.  If either of these new options is selected, the CHIPS user will need to type “YES” to verify that they want to continue to generate with the selected option.  When the “Require All Employees to Reset Their Web Services Password” option is selected, once the database is generated and transferred, all CHIPS Payroll Online Services registered accounts will be updated to require a password reset the next time the employee logs into the CHIPS Payroll Online Services site.  Note that an employee will need to have an email account defined in CHIPS for an employee to be able to perform a password reset.  When the “Remove All Registered Accounts From Web Services” is selected, once the database is generated and transferred, all CHIPS Payroll Online Services registered accounts will be removed and all employees will need to reregister on the CHIPS Payroll Online Services site.

6.      Employee Maintenance.  There have been a couple changes to Employee Maintenance.  They are as follows:

• A new Payroll Taxes tab has been added to Employee Maintenance.  This new tab, located next to the Payroll tab, contains the FICA Exempt Status, EIC Certificates and all of the Tax information.  This information was removed from the Payroll tab.
• There is now the ability to set the default Workers Comp Classification code to be used when adding an Employee.  The default class code is defined in System Controls on the Controls tab.
• The Web Services User Name, Password, and Security Questions/Answers have been removed from the General tab.  The CHIPS user no longer has access to an employee’s web services login credentials.

7.      User Defined Pay Types.  Changes were made to User Defined Pay Types to now have a Covid-19 area.  In this area is a checkbox to indicate that the pay type is used for Covid-19 Pay and a box for the W-2 Box 14 Description.  If an employee uses one of these user defined pay types, and a Box 14 Description is entered, when the W-2 is printed, box 14 will print the description along with the total payment amount for that pay type.  If an employee uses multiple pay types that are Covid-19 pay, they will get multiple pages of the form W-2.

8.      Employee Deduction/Earning Report.  Deduction Frequency options have been added to the report options for the Employee Deduction/Earning Report.  The program will compare the employee’s deduction frequency against the checkboxes on the screen to determine if they should be included on the report.

9.      Employee Web Services Report.  The employee’s web services user name has been removed from the report since it is no longer stored in CHIPS.  The report has been changed to be a one line report instead of a two line report.

10.  Employee Reports.  The option to “Return to this Options Screen After the Report Finishes Processing” has been added to the following Employee Reports:  Employee Full Report, Employee Brief Report, Emergency Contact Report, Employee Skills Report, Employee Notes Report, Employee Change Report, Pay Rate History Report, Employee Dependent Report, Employee Web Services Report and the Employee Deduction/Earning Report.

11.  Tax Codes and Tables.  There have been a couple of changes to Tax Codes and Tables, they are as follows:

• There is now the ability to assign a Check Description that will print on Checks for State, Other State, City, County, Local and School Taxes.  During the 17 conversion, the following default check descriptions will be assigned: “STATE TAX”, “OTHER ST TAX”, “CITY TAX”, “COUNTY TAX”, “LOCAL TAX” and “SCHOOL TAX”.
• There is now the ability to assign the W2 Locality name that prints on the Form W2.  This is a six character field that prints in the Locality Name field on bottom of the W2. Prior to this change it would just print the first 6 characters of the tax code description.  During the conversion, it will move the first 6 characters of the description to the new field.  For the Other State Tax, it will default to “OST”.  This change applies to Other State Tax, City Tax, County Tax, Local Tax and School Tax.

12.  Time Payroll.  A new “Exclude Additional Taxes” option has been added to the Time Payroll screen. When this box is checked, any additional tax amounts or percentages will not be taken out for this payroll.  This would be useful when a user is processing a special payroll (such as Operation Pull Over or Event Pay) where the user would be able to exclude these extra taxes for this specific employee payroll transaction.

13.  Check/Direct Deposit Print.  For users who print a Watermark on the Checks/Direct Deposits, there is now an option to center this image on the page.  The options for centering the image are in System Controls next to the fields that specify the watermark image.

14.  Hours Distribution Report.  For Time Payroll transactions, we now include the total amount distributed for hours based distributions.

15.  W-2 Magnetic Media/E-Filing.  Changes have been made to the state records in the magnetic media file for users in Indiana, Ohio and Mississippi that are required to report this information.

16.  Bulk Withholding Invoices.  The Deduction/Tax Code range has been broken out into a Deduction Code Range and a Tax Code Range with the checkboxes to include the deductions or tax codes. With there now being two different ranges, there is now the ability to search for deduction and tax codes.

17.  Withholding Invoices Report. The Deduction/Tax Code range has been broken out into a Deduction Code Range and a Tax Code Range with the checkboxes to include the deductions or tax codes. With there now being two different ranges, there is now the ability to search for deduction and tax codes.

18.  Fund Search.  When performing a Fund Search, there is now a Description search option.

19.  G/L Account Search.  The G/L Account Search has been changed so that the “Inactive” checkbox is now unchecked by default.

20.  Vendor Search.  The Vendor Search has been changed so that the “Inactive” checkbox is now unchecked by default.

We at FREY Municipal Software would like to thank everyone who responded to the CHIPS survey and the beta testing of the product.  The ideas and suggestions that we receive from our users is the driving force behind the changes that are implemented into CHIPS.