Workday Questions

Position Restrictions should be thought of as default position criteria. There is a costing allocation and salary associated with each position and when the position becomes vacant the salary encumbrance will be put on the default account listed for the salary on the position’s Position Restriction. It is important that this information be reviewed when a position becomes vacant to ensure changes should not be made. NOTE: This is especially important for positions that are being vacated for the first time since moving to Workday as the default costing allocation will be whatever accounts were assigned on to the PIN on 11/30/2017. 

Worker Position is a costing allocation and salary associated with the worker and will determine where and how much encumbrance will be placed on departmental accounts. If a costing allocation is not submitted when onboarding a worker the salary will not encumber and any payroll will post to the Workday suspense account and have to be moved via PCT after the fact. If you are moving a worker to a cost share account or contract/grant account you will need to process an “Assign Costing Allocation” at the Worker Position level. 

Worker Position Earning is a costing allocation and amount associated with allowances (Cell Phone, Department Head Stipends, Interim Pay, etc...) and will determine where and how much encumbrance will be placed on departmental accounts. If an “Assign Costing Allocation” is not submitted on the worker costing for the Earning type (Cell Phone, Department Head Stipends, Interim Pay, etc…) when a “Request Compensation Change” adding an allowance is complete then the allowance payment will not encumber and will post to the Workday suspense account and have to be moved via PCT after the fact.

Workday assumes all positions are 100%. The budget office suggests that departments reduce the default compensation on the positions restriction to the intended salary. For example, position restrictions have a position’s compensation at $30,000 at 100% FTE but the worker is only 50% effort. A “Request Default Compensation Change” should be processed at the position level from $30,000 to $15,000. When a worker is hired, in the worker restrictions, the department should put the worker at 50% effort at a salary of $30,000 to ensure their FTE is only reported at 50% effort and they are paid $15,000.

When a position is terminated (vacated) Workday uses the costing allocation and default compensation outlined in the Position Restrictions. Departments will need to process an “Edit Position Restrictions” to match the salary and costing allocation of the last worker. Position Restrictions and Worker Restrictions do not feed to one another.

In Workday if you close a position it can never be re-activated and the encumbrance will be released in FAMIS at the end of the month. Use caution when choosing this action. A job aid for “Close Position” can be found by visiting “Workday Help” in your Single Sign On (SSO) menu, choosing “Use Workday” in the bottom right, and then select “All Job Aids”.

Position Restrictions and Worker Restrictions do not feed to one another which includes both costing allocations and salary. Additionally, Worker Restrictions do not feed from one worker to another as Workday treats each worker and position separately.

You can find the costing allocation for the position by running a “All Position Restrictions Costing Allocation” report found in Workday. This will return only positions within your organizational structure. If you do not see the position you were expecting contact HR as you may need your access updated. In most cases this report will show where your new worker should be paid. Note: those paid on research accounts may be an exception as accounts vary over time.

If there is an end date on a worker’s costing allocation, example 1, any payroll paid after the End Date will post to suspense and a PCT will have to be process. In addition, the worker will not be encumbered on an account and they will not appear in any salary reports during the budgeting process for the following year. An end date on a costing allocation does not mean the worker won’t get paid. Example 2 provides how a costing allocation should look. A job aid for “Assign Costing Allocations” can be found by visiting “Workday Help” in your Single Sign On (SSO) menu, choosing “Use Workday” in the bottom right, and then select “All Job Aids

There is no automated budget check. Workday will only make sure the account is valid - not that there are available funds. It is the department’s responsibility to make sure there is adequate funding before processing an “Assign Costing Allocation”.

A business process will run each night and an encumbrance will post in FAMIS the next business day after the business process has been fully approved.

Student Worker and Temporary/Casual workers will not have their salaries encumbered in FAMIS. Departments can setup Wage Encumbrances in FAMIS using instructions available under “Useful Resources” on the budget webpage. Additionally, vacant Adjunct and Graduate Assistants will not encumber. When workers are placed in those positions then an encumbrance will be established in FAMIS.

According to FAMIS for filled biweekly positions the auto-adjust program uses the last paid date to calculate the encumbrance for the remaining of the year. For vacant positions, rather than using the last paid date, use the date the auto-adjustment program run at the end of the month. The program assumes that since the position is still vacant in Workday there will be no salary associated with this position between the last biweekly paid date and the auto-adjustment program run date.

A “Request Compensation Change” business process will need to be done on the vacated position at the position restriction level decreasing the salary, in the comments include which position you plan on increasing. Once approved you will need to route two “Request Compensation Change” business processes for both the position AND worker for the increase. In the notes include which position the increase is coming from. A job aid for “Request Compensation Change” can be found by visiting “Workday Help” in your Single Sign On (SSO) menu, choosing “Use Workday” in the bottom right, and then select “All Job Aids”.

Reclassifying an existing position is the process by which an existing position is given a new title and salary. A reclassification may be to a higher, lower, or lateral title. The title and salary change associated with reclassification may be effective no earlier than the beginning of the pay period in which it is approved. Reclassifying a position in Workday involves different processes depending on whether the position is vacant or filled. For a filled position, the business process “Edit Position Restrictions” must be initiated to change the position description, followed by the “Change Job” business process to update the worker’s title and salary and an “Assign Costing Allocation”. Be sure if your worker has an additional job that the correct position is selected. Ideally a department will “Edit Position Restrictions” as well at this point so updates won’t have to be done when the worker terminates the position. For a vacant position, only the “Edit Position Restrictions” business process is required. A job aid for “Edit Position Restrictions” and “Change Job” can be found by visiting “Workday Help” in your Single Sign On (SSO) menu, choosing “Use Workday” in the bottom right, and then select “All Job Aids”.

A worker will post to the suspense account if they are not assigned a costing allocation.

For the department head stepping down you will need to process a compensation change (reason type “other”) and in the Allowance section remove the “Department Head Stipend”. You will also need to process a Change Title to change the faculty member’s title, be sure both actions have the same effective date. For the new department head, you will need to process a Compensation Change (reason type “other”) and in the Allowance section add the “Department Head Stipend” and do not choose an end date. You will also need to process a Change Title to change the faculty member’s title, be sure both actions have the same effective date and that they are not overlapping with the outgoing department head. Additionally, you will need to process an “Assign Costing Allocation” on the worker costing for the Earning type “Department Head Stipend”. This will ensure the stipend processes on the correct account and does not post to the suspense account.

Creating a new position is the process by which a new job is created which must be done before it is advertised. If you are wanting to fill an existing vacant position a Hire Employee business process should be processed instead. Budgeted staff positions must be complete with a position description and established salary. Creating a position in Workday requires the initiation of the "Create Position" business process, regardless of the position type (staff, temporary/casual, etc.). A job aid for “Create Position” can be found by visiting “Workday Help” in your Single Sign On (SSO) menu, choosing “Use Workday” in the bottom right, and then select “All Job Aids”.

NOTE: During these processes you will assign a default compensation and costing allocation for the position restrictions, not the worker. When the Hire business process begins, the Assign Costing Allocation business process will be initiated again, but this time for the worker themselves. Please do not skip either step of assigning cost allocation to the position or to the worker when hired. The Supervisory Organization is responsible for ensuring appropriate approvals and budget authority prior to creating a new position (including any additional approvals required beyond what is configured in Workday).

Updating a worker's position description entails making minor changes to their job that are not sufficient to warrant a new title. Updating a position description in Workday requires the initiation of the “Edit Position Restrictions” business process. Note: Be sure if your worker has an additional job that the correct position is selected. A job aid for “Edit Position Restrictions” can be found by visiting “Workday Help” in your Single Sign On (SSO) menu, choosing “Use Workday” in the bottom right, and then select “All Job Aids”.