Withholding orders available electronically – in most states

Instead of waiting for child support orders to arrive in the mail, now you can receive them electronically the day after your state child support agency generates them. That’s assuming your state agency met an Oct. 1, 2015 deadline imposed by a recent law.   

According to Public Law 113-183, states must give employers the option of receiving electronic income withholding orders (e-IWO).

Most states are ready to go with e-IWOs, according to the latest count by the federal Office of Child Support Enforcement (OCSE).

But 13 states aren’t yet compliant with the 2014 law.

Those states are Alaska, Kansas, Louisiana, Minnesota, Mississippi, Montana, Nevada, New Hampshire, New Mexico, Rhode Island, South Carolina, Vermont and Wyoming.

Quick and accurate

In addition to saving time, Payroll practitioners can increase accuracy by signing up for the e-IWO program, says OCSE.

For most employers, choosing the e-IWO No Programming Option will make the most sense. With that, orders come to you as PDF files.

After you receive an e-IWO on your server, you’ll have a quick and accurate way to acknowledge receipt of the child support order. If your acknowledgment contains any critical errors, OCSE will return it to you before sending it to your state.

Plus, you can contact your state electronically to keep up with other responsibilities. For example:

1. Are you planning to issue any lump-sum payments: severance, commissions, awards and so on?

You can relay the details about the date, amount and type of the payment by filling out an electronic form.

2. Did your company terminate someone’s employment?

The form includes a section for notifying the state of that as well.

Cite: OCSE, http://tinyurl.com/eiwo495