Payroll Consultant (FA3)

State of Washington•Thurston County – Olympia, WA

2d•Hybrid

About The Position

The Department of Licensing (DOL) is seeking a Payroll Consultant to join their Human Resources Division. This role focuses on providing employee payroll consultation, ensuring compliance with regulations, and processing payroll and benefit activities for new hires, transfers, retirements, separations, and internal employee actions. The position is crucial for accurate financial reporting, fiscal accountability, and compliance. The DOL emphasizes a culture of belonging, respect, trust, diversity, inclusion, and equity, and values work-life harmony. This role offers an opportunity to foster a supportive environment that enhances employee satisfaction.

Requirements

Five (5) years of combined relevant professional work experience and education.
Two (2) years of experience independently composing and formatting professional emails, memos, letters, and other documents using proper spelling, grammar, and punctuation.
Two (2) years of experience using Microsoft Products (Word, Access, Excel, Outlook, and PowerPoint).
Six (6) months of experience identifying, interpreting, applying and explaining employment laws, rules and policies such as Collective Bargaining Agreement’s, Revised Codes of Washington (RCW) and Washington Administrative Code (WAC).
Excellent and responsive customer service to all internal and external customers by listening attentively, identifying issues, providing options, fulfilling services, and exercising knowledge of applicable laws and regulations to provide technical assistance or resolve problems.
The ability to facilitate meetings, presentations, workshops and training sessions.
The ability to independently assess a situation and/or analyze information and apply appropriate judgement using existing knowledge and resources to determine a logical and accurate course of action, recommendation, or solution.
The ability to effectively handle highly stressful or adverse situations, making good decisions, working calmly and accurately and helping to calm others.
The ability to effectively prioritize tasks in the presence of competing demands.
Understand and follow agency values of respect, trust, diversity, equity, and inclusion through behaviors and decisions.
Promote and support a respectful, equitable, and inclusive workplace for all employees.
Promote and support respectful, equitable, and inclusive delivery of services to customers.
Be curious about yourself and others, take responsibility for knowing your own strengths and weaknesses, and use learning to make government programs and processes more efficient and effective to serve all in Washington.
Be flexible, adaptable, customer-service focused, and willing and able to empathetically respond to the unique needs of the people you work with and serve.
Experience can be obtained concurrently. Experience could include payroll data entry, time & leave processing, personnel / payroll processing, reconciling payroll or accounting data, consulting with employees or managers on inquiries and time sensitive information, or experience providing technical payroll assistance to employees or supervisors on the phone, or in person, applying knowledge of rules, policies, and / or procedures, WACS or CBAs.
Up to four (4) years of relevant education may substitute year for year for experience. (Associates degree = 2 years Bachelor’s degree = 4 years)

Nice To Haves

A Bachelor’s degree in business, Human Resources, employment law, public administration, or a related field.
Experience utilizing and/or entering data into HRMS/SAP.
Experience analyzing and reconciling general or subsidiary ledger for validity and accuracy to include making transactions to balance accounts.
Experience with the current Washington State human resource data and benefits system HRDIS/PAY AFRS/Enterprise system to analyze, calculate, and enter Journal Vouchers.
Experience with the Department of Retirement Systems verification website.
Experience with the Shared Leave process within state government to include but not limited to; USSLP, VISSLP and the FPSLP, tracking and processing donations and journal vouchers.

Responsibilities

Ensure accurate, compliant, and timely processing and reconciliation of payroll and benefit transactions, maintaining balanced accounts in accordance with GAAP, GASB, SAAM, FLSA, and relevant regulations.
Provide expert consultation and timely, responsive support to managers, supervisors, and employees regarding payroll, benefits, leave administration, and related inquiries.
Deliver clear guidance to promote understanding of payroll and benefits policies, resolve complex issues, and assist with accurate form completion.
Frequently interact with DOL executives, managers, supervisors, and employees, as well employees from the Attorney General’s Office, outside investigators, union representatives, attorneys, Washington State HR employees (OFM), employees from other agencies, and members of the general public.
Process payroll transactions, benefits eligibility, financial reconciliations, leave and attendance management.