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Texas Payroll/Personnel Resource

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General Provisions
General Responsibilities of State Agencies, Their Officers and Employees

Introduction

As employers, state agencies and institutions of higher education are required to perform functions and attain a reasonable level of expertise in dealing with their employees.

This document lists the responsibilities of the agencies and institutions of higher education as well as the Texas Comptroller of Public Accounts (Comptroller’s office).

It also includes the requirements for officers and employees of state agencies and institutions of higher education related to personnel and payroll functions.

Agency and Institution of Higher Education Responsibility

The chief administrative officer of a state agency or institution of higher education is responsible for ensuring the agency’s officers and employees understand and comply with the following requirements.

The chief administrative officer’s failure to fulfill this responsibility does not relieve officers and employees from their obligation to comply.

State Agency Officers’ and Employees’ Responsibilities

The officers and employees of a state agency and institution of higher education have these responsibilities:

  • To be knowledgeable about state and federal laws and rules concerning salary actions and other human resources actions.
  • To ensure the agency’s or institution’s personnel and human resources actions comply with state of Texas and federal laws and rules.
  • To be knowledgeable about state and federal laws and rules concerning payroll expenditures.
  • To ensure the agency’s or institution’s payroll expenditures comply with state of Texas and federal laws and rules.
  • To determine the agency’s legal authority for making each payment resulting from a payroll document before that document is submitted to the Comptroller’s office.
  • To ensure the agency maintains necessary documentation for proving each payment resulting from a payroll document is legal, proper and fiscally responsible.
  • To ensure each payroll document complies with the processing requirements of the Uniform Statewide Payroll/Personnel System (USPS), if the agency uses USPS.
  • To ensure each payroll document complies with the processing requirements of the Standardized Payroll/Personnel Reporting System (SPRS), if the agency reports to SPRS.
  • To ensure each payroll document complies with the processing requirements of the Centralized Accounting and Payroll/Personnel System (CAPPS), if the agency uses CAPPS.
  • To ensure each payroll voucher or document complies with the processing requirements of the Uniform Statewide Accounting System (USAS), if the institution submits directly to USAS or if the institution seeks reimbursement through a reimbursement payroll.
  • To ensure the required information is either entered into USPS or CAPPS, or reported to SPRS or the Human Resource Information System (HRIS) by the agency or institution.

Comptroller’s Office Responsibility

Audits

The Comptroller’s office is responsible for conducting audits of agency and institution payroll and personnel data to ensure compliance with state law.

However, the responsibility of the Comptroller’s office to audit a state agency’s or institution’s payroll documents does not relieve the entity’s officers and employees from the preceding requirements. Therefore, those officers and employees may not rely on the Comptroller’s audit to prevent a questionable or invalid payment from being made or to discover or reverse an invalid payment after it has occurred.

Statewide financial systems

The Comptroller’s office is responsible for maintaining and updating the state’s financial systems to be in compliance with state and federal rules and laws.

However, the processing of a payroll document through Comptroller’s office financial systems does not provide absolute assurance the salary actions that led to the payment were legal, according to state law. Neither does the successful processing of a payroll document through Comptroller’s office financial systems ensure the payment is in compliance with all state and federal laws.