Brief payroll glitch raises questions among city workers

Funds were briefly deposited in some employees’ accounts

Santa Fe city employees might have thought they were seeing double when they looked at their bank statements last week.

A technical glitch during the payroll upload process caused an unspecified number of city workers to receive two paychecks of equal amounts.

But it was a short-lived windfall because the extra paycheck was immediately taken out.

“It was instantaneous,” city spokeswoman Lilia Chacon said Wednesday. “It was so fast they didn’t have time to spend it.”

Chacon didn’t know how the error occurred or who was to blame but described the snafu as a bank transaction “that made two deposits and then one withdrawal.”

“The deposit went through twice so they went back in and removed” one of them, she said. “It only affected automatic deposits [of employees] who were not banking with Wells Fargo.”

But the city’s ability to withdraw one of the two deposits from employees’ bank accounts is raising questions and concerns among workers and the union that represents the bulk of city employees.

“The employee authorizes the city [to] make direct deposit payments. In this case, the city made two direct deposit payments and then drew one back out because of their mistake. I realize this was their mistake and their reasoning to correct that, but can they draft money back out of their account?” union representative Chris Armijo wrote in an email to Stephen Curtice, an attorney for AFSCME Council 18.

In an interview, the Albuquerque-based lawyer said his research shows that nothing under the Fair Labor Standards Act prohibits the recouping of overpayments.

But Curtice said the city owed it to the union to involve it in decision-making.

“The union’s position has always been that when you’re dealing with wages, hours and all other terms and conditions of employment, you can’t just make unilateral decisions as the employer unless we’ve agreed that you can do those kind of things in the collective bargaining agreement,” he said.

Curtice also said the union is still trying to get more information about what happened and how it might affect employees on a range of topics, from taxes to garnishment issues.

“We want to make sure that no one suffers any adverse tax reporting requirements or bank fees or anything like that,” he said.

“If you got two paychecks, I think you would know that you’re not going to get to keep both of them. At the same time, you shouldn’t suffer any consequences for it.”

In an email to employees, Yvonne Encinias, the city’s payroll officer, wrote that the city was “confident” the transactions wouldn’t cause any negative financial impact to workers.

“We apologize for any confusion this may cause and appreciate your continued support and patience,” she wrote.

Encinias explained that employees who do not bank with Wells Fargo may see two additional transactions listed on their bank statement “related to the payroll deposit dated 02/28/2020; one credit and one debit.”

Encinias did not return messages seeking comment, and neither Chacon nor Mary McCoy, the city’s finance director, responded to questions sent via email.

A city employee who requested anonymity said the two deposits have been all the talk at City Hall.

“They don’t give, but they’ll take right away — that’s what they’re saying,” he said, referring to what employees are saying about the city.

Curtice noted that it’s the second time in recent months that Santa Fe city employees have dealt with a payroll error. In December, KOB-TV reported that the portion of workers’ pay that goes toward health insurance, including dental and vision, wasn’t deducted from their last paycheck of the year. The city gave workers two options: write the city a check for what was owed or have the money deducted from their paychecks. At the time, the union also argued that it should’ve been involved in the process, which Curtice contends the city failed to do again.

“We should’ve been notified, and they should’ve come to us with a plan,” he said. “We’ve got to protect our folks, make sure they’re not harmed by someone else’s screw-up.”