The Savings Tool is a financial planning tool that's available to faculty members who are paid during 10 months of the calendar year. It's located in the Payroll & Tax section of the Employee Center task tile in One.IU. This tool allows you to calculate your potential take-home pay based on a variety of scenarios, including changes to tax withholdings, retirement contributions, and insurance deductions.
The Savings Tool helps you determine how much to set aside each month to cover the unpaid months of June and July. By examining your net pay, the tool calculates the appropriate amount for you to save each month to simulate being paid over twelve months. Projections made using the Savings Tool are only intended for planning. Changes made in the Savings Tool won’t affect your actual payroll or tax information.
Watch this short video to learn how to use the Savings Tool.
Frequently Asked Questions
- Who can use the Savings Tool?
- This tool is only available to A10 staff. A10 staff are faculty members who are paid 10 months of the calendar year.
- Once I determine my savings goal, how do I save the money?
- Click on the Direct Deposit link on the results page and update your distributions as necessary. Review the Direct Deposit & Paycards page for help updating your direct deposit.
- What are the hours of operation for the Savings Tool?
- Generally, the tool is available 24/7. However, there are temporary outages during late-night system maintenance and when University Payroll calculates final payroll figures.
- How often can I use the Savings Tool?
- Up to 25 times per day.
- How is the Savings Tool different from the Paycheck Modeler?/dt>
- The Savings Tool is a modified version of the Paycheck Modeler. It is designed specifically to assist A10 faculty members with budget planning for June and July when they do not receive regular IU paychecks. The Savings Tool determines what a faculty member's paycheck would be if it were distributed over 12 months and bases a savings goal on two months of that hypothetical monthly pay.
- Why can't I edit certain fields on earnings?
- Depending on the type of earning, you may only be able to enter hours, amount, or rate; or a specific combination of the three.
- Why is the "edit" button missing from my taxes?
- If you have a Special Tax Status of “no taxable gross; no tax taken”, you cannot edit that particular tax class.
- What is a "Special Tax Status"?
- Most employees have a Special Tax Status of “None”. You will only see something different if you are a nonresident alien (NRA) or claiming Exempt.
- Why is the "edit" button missing from my taxes?
- If you have a Special Tax Status of “no taxable gross; no tax taken”, you cannot edit that particular tax class.
- Why are my deductions inflated?
- Arrears, or voluntary deductions due from prior pay periods, are included in paycheck modeling. If you have arrears, they will be on any modeled check.
- Why do I see previous localities?
- Due to the complexity of Indiana local tax, IU maintains record of any previous localities you had reported but is unable to hide previous localities from view in the Paycheck Modeler.
- You can, however, only model checks based on current localities. To update your localities, you must update your WH-4 in the Payroll & Tax module of the Employee Center. Select IN Tax Withholding in the left-hand menu to update your WH-4.
- Why did my salary reductions for supplemental retirement increase?
- Since supplemental retirement (e.g., tax deferred annuity and 457b) deductions are based on a percentage calculation, any change in earnings will result in a difference in those deduction amounts.