Memo to the Vice President of Finance:

To confirm our previous conversation, I would like to be included in the next round of discussions with the Union. As the Payroll Manager, my presence in the meetings could help our organization successfully meet the terms agreed to with the Union.

In the last contract, there was an agreement to provide retroactive pay increases for all hourly personnel. The calculations for retroactive pay had to be made manually based on each persons straight time pay vs. overtime pay. Our agreement with the Payroll Service requires us to submit payroll three days before the pay date to allow adequate time. My payroll clerk had only three days from when we were given the contract to the paydate, requiring an "all-nighter" to get the payroll submitted on time. Had we known the proposed pay rates, we could have had the calculations in place before the contract was signed, allowing immediate implementation of the retroactive pay.

Similarly, in the last contract we changed the employee portion of the amount paid for insurance coverage. If a change is made in this contract as well, we will need to recalculate the contribution for each person who had company insurance. The payroll department needs time to implement any changes in deductions three days before the pay date.

Also, please keep in mind that due to the decline of sales resulting from the COVID-19 pandemic, our cash situation is weak right now. We are having difficulty meeting each biweekly payroll. If I do not know the projected additional payroll amount in advance, we may not have enough funds to cover the retro pay. In such a situation, we could negotiate paying the retro pay over several pay periods instead of having to meet the entire amount in one paycheck. If I participate in the negotiations, I could make the cashflow calculations and provide the necessary information to our team.