Medical Insurance Deductions – Adjustment Payment

The University has discovered an error with the UC Berkeley HR and Payroll systems that resulted in, on average, a reduction in take home pay of $630 (cumulative for 2009 through 2012) per affected person. We sincerely apologize for any inconvenience this might have caused our affected employees.

We will provide affected individuals with a check for the full amount by which their medical insurance deductions were over-withheld, plus 7%. We are providing the 7% in an effort to compensate these individuals for our mistake.

On October 18th, affected employees will receive a one-time payment through their normal payment method. (This payment will be separate from their regular paychecks.) Former employees who were affected will receive a check at the latest address we have for them in the HR system. All appropriate taxes and other withholdings will be deducted, and this payment will be reported on individuals' Form W-2 for 2012.

Background

An October 2009 update to UC Berkeley's 30+ year-old payroll system introduced a programming error that caused the system to calculate some employees' medical benefits contributions inaccurately. This problem initially affected only a few dozen people making it difficult to identify. In total, approximately 1,300 people were affected by this error.

Our HR and Payroll systems are outdated, and they have made us vulnerable to this type of error. By 2014, UC Berkeley will replace the existing system with a new HR and Payroll system called UCPath, which is being created for use by the entire UC system. In the meantime, please be assured that we have fixed the error and have put procedures in place to ensure that similar errors would be immediately identified and corrected.

More Information & Questions

Affected individuals who have questions regarding the letter or the medical insurance deductions adjustment payment they will receive on October 18th are advised to read the FAQ, located in the Benefits section of this website. If you have additional questions, you can request a follow-up or call the UC Berkeley Benefits Helpdesk at (510) 664-4520. For more information regarding UCPath, please visit http://ucpath.universityofcalifornia.edu/.