W-2 Form Updates for 2017

Here are the changes to the W-2 Form:

• A new box 12 Code FF has been added to report the total amount of permitted benefits under a qualified small employer health reimbursement arrangement (QSEHRA).

• If you are participating in the W-2 Verification Code Initiative, enter the appropriate verification code in box 9. Otherwise, leave box 9 blank.

Federal Tax Tables for 2018

The following updated amounts have been implemented for 2018 federal taxes:

• Social Security Limit: $128,400 (updated 11/29/2017)

• 401(k) Deferral Limit: $18,500

• 401(k) Wage Limit: $275,000

• Exemption Amount: $4,150

Federal Electronic Filing for 2017

Record Changes

A new box 12 Code FF money field, Permitted Benefits Under a Qualified Small Employer Health Reimbursement Arrangement (Code FF), has been added to the following: 

• RW Employee Record in positions 474-484

• RT Total Record in positions 400-414

For more information, see https://www.ssa.gov/employer/efw/17efw2.pdf.

Other Changes

For tax year 2017, AccuWage Online is available to test your EFW2/EFW2C wage files. AccuWage Download is no longer available. Log in to Business Services Online (BSO) to access AccuWage Online.

State Electronic Filing for 2017

Record Changes

A new box 12 Code FF money field, Permitted Benefits Under a Qualified Small Employer Health Reimbursement Arrangement (Code FF), has been added to the following:

• RW Employee Record in positions 474-484

• RT Total Record in positions 400-414

For more information, see https://www.ssa.gov/employer/efw/17efw2.pdf.

The following is a list of states that use the standard EFW2 format:

• Arkansas

• Arizona

• Colorado

• Connecticut

• District of Columbia

• Delaware

• Georgia

• Idaho

• Illinois

• Indiana

• Kansas

• Kentucky

• Louisiana

• Maryland 

• Maine

• Massachusetts

• Michigan

• Minnesota

• Missouri

• Mississippi

• Montana

• North Carolina

• North Dakota

• Nebraska

• New Jersey

• New Mexico

• Ohio

• Oregon

• Pennsylvania 

• Puerto Rico

• Rhode Island

• South Carolina

• Utah

• Virginia

• Vermont

• Wisconsin

• West Virginia

Other Changes

For tax year 2017, AccuWage Online is available to test your EFW2/EFW2C wage files. AccuWage Download is no longer available. Log in to Business Services Online (BSO) to access AccuWage Online.

California 2018 Tax Update

The changes for California include the following:

• The annual standard deduction increases from $4,129 to $4,236.

• The low income exemption table has been updated for all filing statuses.

• The withholding tax rate table has been updated for all filing statuses.

• The annual exemption allowance for one increases from $122.10 to $125.40.

District of Columbia 2018 Tax Update

The withholding allowance increases from $1,775 to $4,150.

For more information, see https://otr.cfo.dc.gov/sites/default/files/dc/sites/otr/publication/attachments/2018_FR-230_12.8.17.pdf.

Illinois 2017 Form IL-941 Updates

Step 4 of Form IL-941 (Illinois Withholding Income Tax Return) now requires information on payroll withholding dates and amounts. The exact amounts shall be recorded on the dates when compensation was paid to the employees.

See the following for more information:

• http://tax.illinois.gov/TaxForms/Withholding/IL-941.pdf

• http://www.tax.illinois.gov/taxforms/Withholding/IL-941-instr.pdf

To accommodate these updates, a new report, State Form 941 Worksheet, has been added to the Reporting application. This report is a copy of the Form 941 Worksheet, but includes a withholding code criteria section as seen in the State/Local Income Tax Worksheet. For this report, the withholding code type is limited to State only, and the Select Posting Run functionality is not available.

Maine 2018 Tax Update

The changes for Maine include the following:

• The withholding tables for Single and Married have been updated.

• Phase out of standard deduction has been factored in the Percentage Method Calculation.

For more information, see http://www.maine.gov/revenue/forms/with/2018/18_WH_Tab&Instructions_rev.pdf.

Maryland 2018 Tax Update

The tax rate in Cecil County increases from 2.8% to to 3%.

Michigan 2017 W-2 Electronic Filing

The following fields have been added to the RS State Record for 2017:

Location	RS Field	Specification
298-304	Fill with Blanks	Blanks
305-307	City of Detroit Code	'170'
308	Tax Type Code	'C'
309-319	City Taxable Wages	City of Detroit taxable wages amount
320-330	City Tax Withheld	City of Detroit tax withheld amount
331-512	Blank	Blanks

For more information, see http://www.michigan.gov/documents/447_web_fill_102204_106911_7.pdf.

Minnesota 2018 Tax Update

The changes for Minnesota include the following:

• The withholding tables for Single and Married have been updated.

• The withholding allowance increases from $4,050 to $4,150.

For more information, see http://www.revenue.state.mn.us/Forms_and_Instructions/wh_tables_18.pdf.

Missouri 2017 W-2 Electronic Filing

Beginning with tax year 2017, employers with 250 or more employees must submit the Form MO W-3 and accompanying Form W-2s electronically by January 31, 2018. The same file specifications will be used for filing forms electronically with the Social Security Administration.

Below are the other changes for Missouri state electronic filing starting tax year 2017.

Before Tax Year 2017	Beginning Tax Year 2017
No file naming convention	Use the following file name format: TYccyyW2_businessname_missouriIDnumber_currentdate.txt For example, ABC Company with a Missouri id of 21123456 submits a file on December 18, 2017: TY2017W2_ABCCompany_21123456_12182017.txt
Required records: RE - Employer Record RS - State Record	Required records: RA - Submitter Record (Same record layout as SSA Publication No. 42-007 EFW2 Tax Year 2017) RE - Employer Record (State provides layout, but it is materially the same as EFW2) RW - Employee Wage Record (Same record layout as SSA Publication No. 42-007 EFW2 Tax Year 2017) RS - State Record (custom) RT - Total Record (Same record layout as SSA Publication No. 42-007 EFW2 Tax Year 2017) RV - State Total Record (custom)
RA Record is optional.	RA Record is required and should follow the SSA Publication No. 42-007 EFW2 Tax Year 2017.
RE Record is required.	RE Record is still required. No change.
RW Record is optional.	RW Record is required and should follow the SSA Publication No. 42-007 EFW2 Tax Year 2017.
RO Record is optional.	RO Record is not included.
RS Record is required.	RS Record is required, and custom format is updated. Several fields are now required. Date and time stamp have been added.
RT Record is optional.	RT Record is required and should follow the SSA Publication No. 42-007 EFW2 Tax Year 2017.
RU Record is optional.	RU Record is not included.
RV Record is optional.	RV Record is required with custom format. Date and time stamp have been added.
RF Record is optional.	RF Record is not included.

For more information on Missouri employer reporting of W-2s guidelines, see http://dor.mo.gov/business/withhold/documents/MissouriAnnualW-2FilingGuidelines_010.pdf.

New York State and New York City 2018 Tax Update

The withholding tax tables for Married and Single have been updated. For more details, see the following:

• New York State: https://www.tax.ny.gov/pdf/publications/withholding/nys50_t_nys_118.pdf

• New York City: https://www.tax.ny.gov/pdf/publications/withholding/nys50_t_nyc_118.pdf

South Carolina 2018 Tax Update

The changes for South Carolina include the following:

• The standard deduction maximum amount for one or more exemptions increases from $2,860 to $3,150.

• The personal exemption amount for one increases from $2,370 to $2,440.

• The withholding table has been updated.

For more information, see https://dor.sc.gov/software-developers/WithholdingSD/WH1603F.pdf.

The DPS List View displays fields for a record in columns in a grid rather than on separate tabs. For DPS 1.1.5, the default List View in the hubs and Chart of Accounts was updated to include the ability to sort all columns.

Defect 872663: When you ran Gains/Losses and Revaluation processing and other DPS processing, such as Billing, at the same time, you experienced slow performance.

Defect 870379: If you selected a project with the Dormant status in Project Review, you received this Framework Exception error: "ExecuteReader: CommandText property has not been initialized."

Defect 872807: When you selected a project in Project Review, you received this Framework Exception error: "Index was outside the bounds of the array."

Defect 863879: On the Activate Organizations form during the Activation process, if you enabled organizations, set up levels and level values, added some level value combinations, and then went back to the Level Values tab and returned to the Combinations tab, you could no longer add new combinations. A blank row displayed for selecting the values but your selections did not display in the fields.

Defect 870387: This defect applies if you have multiple companies in DPS, you use cash-basis accounting, and you do not use multiple currencies. You received the following error in Intercompany Billing: "FrameworkException—Debits and credits do not match for reference <xxxxx> in file ICBill Reclass <date>." A cash-basis entry was created in the IC Bill Reclass journal entry file that incorrectly had a different reference number than its offsetting entry.

Defect 870594: On the Charges tab of the Credit Card Statement Reconciliation form, if you selected the Include the Missing Charges from Prior Statements check box, the Posted Amount and Transaction Status fields in the grid were incorrectly blank for posted charges from prior statements.

Defect 872678: When using the List View in the Activities hub, using the filter option on any of the columns resulted in an error.

Defect 870399: In the Contacts Hub, if you hide the Firm Name and try to create a new contact, you get an error message that you cannot update the Firm Description.  But if you put this field on a Hidden tab, nothing happens when you select Save

Defect 864977: When the Enable Lead Qualification option was selected in Settings, the Qualified Status field in the Contacts hub was set to the wrong default status. This resulted in an error if you attempted to create or edit a contact record.

Defect 868037: This defect applies if you have multiple companies in DPS. The drop-down list in the Labor Posting Type field on the Accounting tab in the Employees hub incorrectly included labor posting types that were set up for all companies in DPS. The list should have included only the labor posting types that were set up for the company that was associated with the organization specified for an employee in the Organization field in the Summary pane of the Employees hub.

Defect 871820: If you unchecked the Approved for use in processing check box for a vendor firm in the Firms hub, making that vendor unavailable for use in accounting transactions, and later checked that check box again, the vendor remained unavailable for use in accounting transactions.

Defect 865873: When a new contact was added to the grid on the Contacts tab of the Firms hub, the contact's email address did not display in the grid when the record was saved.

Defect 865020: A duplicate hierarchy dialog box displayed after you selected to edit, add, and save another level to the Firm Hierarchy.

Defect 847144: In the Firms hub, when a firm was associated with another firm (for example, included on the Firms grid on the Associations tab), you could not associate that firm as follows:

*As a parent or child firm in the Firm Hierarchy dialog box.
*As a parent in the Firm hub's Parent field.

Defect 874072: Even though a connection was established with the Kona application and one or more employee records was synchronized with Kona, you could not create a Kona conversation on the Collaboration tab in Opportunities if you were logged in as one of the synchronized employees.

Defect 866426: The Estimated Start Date did not display on the Activities tab in the Opportunities hub even though the date did display in the Overview Milestone timeline.

Defect 853999: When a CRM-only user's security role allowed full access rights to Settings > Labels and Lists all DPS applications, the application did not allow the role to make changes to Lists and displayed an error message upon attempting to save.

Defect 870407: When an opportunity's Stage was changed to Closed, the existing closed dates were incorrectly updated to the current date.

Defect 865001: The application that was specified in the Open This Application field on the My Preferences > Startup tab did not load when you logged into DPS.

Defect 865120: This defect applies if you have multiple companies in DPS and expense report approvals are configured so that some employees from one company (for example, company A) have rights to approve expense reports for employees in another company (for example, in company B). In the Employees hub, the approvers have Staff selected as their expense administration level on the Time & Expense tab, and company A was entered as their home company on the summary pane.  When approvers from company A tried to access and approve the company B expense reports while logged in to company B, they received a message informing them that they did not have group-level access rights to the expense reports. They should have been able to access and approve the expense reports.

Defect 874058: The Total Payment and Total Due amounts on an expense report were incorrect if you copied a row in the expense report grid to add a new expense item to the expense report, and then you changed the work breakdown structure level 2 or 3 for the new expense item.

Defect 873180: Employees with an expense administration level of Staff (entered on the Time & Expense tab in the Employees hub) were unable to add a new expense report for themselves.

Defect 873128: Users and employees who had a timesheet administration level set to System and Edit, should have been able to make changes to submitted timesheets for other employees, but they could not.

Defect 866181: The vertical scroll bar on the right side of the Timesheet form did not display after a timesheet was approved or posted if you used Windows Internet Explorer (IE). It did display if you used Google Chrome.

Defect 870610: This issue applies for the timesheet and expense reports that you print in either My Stuff » Timesheet or My Stuff » Expense Report using Other Actions » Print. In the reports, the name of the submitter of a timesheet or expense report displayed below the signature line when it should not have. This occurred when the Employee Signature Required check box was not selected on the Options tab in Settings » Time for timesheets or in Settings » Expense for expense reports.

Defect 870955: When the Force User to Reset Password at Next Login option was selected and saved for a role in Settings > Security > Users, you had to log out and back in for the changes to take effect. If you then logged in for the role and used the new password, a script error displayed when Activity Reminders was selected from the Notifications option.

Defect 870966: You received an error when you ran reports in the DPS desktop application or you ran saved reports in the DPS browser application. This occurred for the Time Analysis report in Reporting » Employees, as well as for many other reports. One of the errors you received in the desktop application was "Framework Exception: Error Object reference not set to an instance of an object." An error that you received in the browser application was "Server Error in the <xx> Application." 

Defect 865861:  Even though access to Favorite Reports was removed on the Access Rights tab in Configuration > Security > Roles, the report still displayed under My Stuff > Favorite Reports after logging out and back in to the application.

Defect 868143: When printing a Firm List report that included associated projects, the firms that were set to Vendor for the Type did not include the associated projects. This did not apply to firms where the Type was set to Vendor and Client.

Defect 866411: In Screen Designer, you can have up to three items (fields, grids, and buttons) in a row (from left to right) across the screen. This includes user-defined and standard items. If you placed items in the second and third positions in a row and the first position remained blank, when you clicked Save, the items were incorrectly moved to the first and second positions in the row. They should have stayed where you originally placed them.

Defect 871995: If you entered a labor category in the DPS desktop application on the Labor Categories tab in Settings » Advanced Accounting » System, you received an error when you tried to select the labor category for an employee in the Employees hub. You must enter labor categories in the DPS browser application in Settings » Labels and Lists » Lists. The Labor Categories tab in Settings » Advanced Accounting » System in the desktop application has been removed in DPS 1.1.5.

Defect 870323: This defect applies if you have multiple companies in DPS. The projects in the drop-down list in the Project field in the Company Paid Credit Posting section in Settings » Expense » Options incorrectly included projects from other companies.The list should have included only the projects that belong to the active company that you are logged in to.

Defect 865851: This defect applies if you have multiple companies in DPS. The time groups that you set up for a company were incorrectly available for all companies. Time groups should apply only for the company in which you create them.  

Defect 867125: If your only activated modules are CRM or CRM Plus or one of those two along with Resource Planning, Key Formats > Projects was not available in the desktop application, so you could not change the format of your project numbers.