Tag Archives: phenix

Treasury Board Changes Compensatory Leave Cash Out

This year, employees must request the cash out.

Treasury Board has issued an information bulletin to departments regarding the automatic cash out of compensatory leave. Departments are directed to temporarily change the process so that employees must request the cash out. If they do not ask for the cash out, the compensatory leave credits will remain in their leave bank and be useable until September 30, 2018.

The change is another result of the flawed Phoenix pay system that cannot cope with a large automatic payout at this time. PSAC is continuing to work with the government to address Phoenix problems. Extending access to compensatory leave over a longer period of time is necessary to prevent further problems with pay.

Normally, any banked compensatory leave credits would automatically be cashed out as of September 30 each year.

A version of this article was also published on the PSAC website.

Phoenix: PSAC Negotiates New Measures to Attract and Retain Compensation Advisors

PSAC has negotiated a Memorandum of Understanding with Treasury Board to address recruitment and retention of compensation advisors. The aim is to ensure the government has enough staff resources to deal with the many problems related to the Phoenix pay system.

Recruitment and retention incentives

To address the staff shortage, we have negotiated measures to improve recruitment and retention of compensation advisors who work under Treasury Board. The measures include:

Compensation advisor retention allowances for current staff, new recruits, and former retirees who return to work
Improvements to overtime, carry-over or cash-out of vacation leave, and compensatory leave
An independent job content and classification process for all PSPC compensation Advisor employees at the AS 1, 2 & 3 levels

Shortage of compensation staff

When the former Conservative government consolidated the federal public service pay system, hundreds of compensation advisors were laid off. The expertise and experience of those workers was lost. When Phoenix went live in 2016, there were not enough staff to deal with the problems it caused.

Although the government has tried to bring back former compensation staff, the pay centre in Miramichi and the satellite pay offices remain understaffed.

“We hope that these measures will bring in more compensation staff so that Phoenix-related problems are addressed more efficiently. All federal public service workers deserve to be paid on time and correctly,” said Robyn Benson, PSAC National President.

Additional information:

Q&A on Compensation Advisor Memorandum of Understanding [PSAC website]
Memorandum of Understanding regarding incentives [PDF]

A version of this article was also published on the PSAC website.

Phoenix and Tax Implications

As tax season approaches, many PSAC members are concerned about the effects of Phoenix pay problems on their taxes.

If you have questions about the tax implications of an overpayment or underpayment, or about your T4, here are two useful links:

Government of Canada: Information for employees on tax slips.
Canada Revenue Agency: Questions and Answers – Tax Implications of Phoenix payroll issues

This article was originally published on the PSAC website.

PSAC National President Continues to Work Toward Fair and Complete Phoenix Compensation

For months, we’ve been hearing from many of our members about the difficulties they’ve faced as a result of ongoing problems with the federal government’s pay system. Our members who were not paid accurately or on-time have faced penalties, interest charges and exceptional fees.

Compensation: The committee tasked to deal with Phoenix-related compensation, co-chaired by PSAC National President Robyn Benson and the Secretary of the Treasury Board, meets today to further discuss optimizing the compensation process, and the right to grieve inaccurate and/or untimely pay if necessary.

PSAC continues to advocate to make the compensation process as fair as possible. The Treasury Board’s offer to compensate public service workers for Phoenix-related losses came in the wake of PSAC demands and a court application filed by PSAC and several other public service unions.

Following today’s meeting, we will provide a comprehensive update on the compensation system for our members. The claim form for compensation can be found here.

Minister Foote faces heated questioning: The Minister of Public Services and Procurement Canada appeared before a Parliamentary Committee yesterday, where she faced pointed questions about her handling of the Phoenix debacle. Watch her testimony, and that of other witnesses, here.

This article was originally published on the PSAC website.

Phoenix Issue: Minister Foote finally agrees to meet with PSAC

Yesterday, the PSAC sent National President Jean-Pierre Fortin the following link regarding the Phoenix system: Minister Foote finally agrees to meet PSAC after repeated requests

By now, we are all familiar with the problems related to the Phoenix pay system and know that some CIU members have been affected. On behalf of all CIU members, Brother Jean-Pierre Fortin wishes to recognize the extraordinary efforts of our PA group colleagues in the Pay and Benefits Section who have been dealing with this difficult situation since mid-April.

Even if the new pay system will not allow them to fix problems immediately, they are doing everything they can to process emergency salary advances and ensure their sisters and brothers are paid.

True solidarity!