Tax Specialist - Payroll

Green Mountain Higher Education Consortium•Burlington, VT

23h•$60,000 - $68,000•Hybrid

About The Position

The Tax Specialist is responsible for taxation of US residents and non-residents paid as employees and students. The Tax Specialist manages all aspects of payroll tax compliance, reporting, and filings across local, state, and federal jurisdictions. This role ensures accurate tax withholdings, oversees multi-state tax setups, reconciles payroll tax accounts, and resolves agency notices to maintain organizational compliance.

Requirements

Microsoft Office: specifically Excel (including pivots and VLOOKUP), Google Suite, and Adobe Acrobat
Payroll software
Basic knowledge of general accounting principles
Tax law
Internal Revenue Service and federal and state regulations
Data collection, data entry and reporting
Organize and prioritize work, take initiative, resolve problems, and manage multiple tasks simultaneously
Recognize several likely causes of events, analyze relationships among several parts of a problem or situation, and formulate a multi-step response if required
Build strong, positive relationships with external and internal contacts
Communicate effectively both verbally and in writing
Manage and analyze financial data accurately
Interpret and apply company policies and procedures
Maintain confidentiality and appropriately handle sensitive information with tact and discretion
Work closely with others in a small cooperative office in an open office environment
Independently achieve results and self-direct work responsibly
Contribute to a leading edge, creative team that is highly focused on success for our College partners
Meeting deadlines for daily, weekly, annual, and project workload goals
A bachelor’s degree in accounting, business, finance or in another related field
3-5 years of payroll or tax experience

Nice To Haves

CPP certification a plus

Responsibilities

Responsible for U.S. state and federal taxation for Payroll
Reconcile and submit federal, state, and local payroll tax filings and deposits on weekly, monthly, quarterly, and annual schedules.
Oversee and execute year-end tax processing, including audit, generation, and distribution of Forms W-2 and W-2c
Act as primarily liaison to ADP for tax processing
Review and address or respond to tax notices and rate updates
Conduct W-4 Exempt Review
Validate SOC codes quarterly
Send Quarter Sign-off to ADP
Review balance adjustments done throughout each quarter
Register business units in new jurisdictions
Review biweekly payroll (both Federal and State)
Submit payroll tax wire
Process FICA flag loaders for Student
Draft and submit balance adjustments - examples include: State-to-state adjustments, FICA refunds, overpayments, etc.
Act as a backup for Payroll Specialist colleagues
Follow IRS announcements and staying current in tax law
Research payroll taxes on the state, county and city level
Educate and train payroll and HR teams on applicable tax laws
Ensuring that tax-related policies and pay practices are legally compliant and providing research, consultation, analysis and modeling on tax issues and tax policy implementation
Ensure appropriate documentation is in place
Advise on how to set up new payroll elements for tax purposes
Monitor employees working in USA on a VISA
Submit SSN validation files to the SSA
Review Multistate Employees
Review Employees with Mismatching WFH flags
Prepare Quarterly Review Workbook and share with College HR teams. SSN Validation, WFH Mismatch, Multi-State Employee Review, (CC only) WFH/ State Tax Validation
Conduct quarterly system testing
Ensuring data quality by reviewing error reports provided by internal systems and/or vendors and then troubleshooting and correcting problems