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Richland County details payroll cutover to Tyler, plans changes to sick and vacation accruals
Summary
The finance standing committee heard an April 8 update on the county's migration of HR/payroll functions to the Tyler system, including go‑live dates, a new approach to sick and vacation accruals, handbook changes and limits on comp time.
The Richland County Finance Standing Committee on April 8 heard a status report on the county's HR and payroll migration to the Tyler enterprise system and was told staff will change how sick and vacation leave are accrued and displayed on pay stubs.
County staff said payroll is being migrated in phases: Pine Valley and Highway payrolls will be processed in the legacy system through April 11, a final data pull is planned for about 4 p.m. April 16, and the remaining payrolls are scheduled to run in Tyler on April 17. Staff said they expect the county to stop using the legacy payroll system at the end of April and move fully to Tyler, acknowledging there will likely be several operational “bumps” during the transition.
Officials said the county will change accrual rules so sick leave is accrued automatically across the two pay periods that make up most months rather than posted as an annual “dump” on each employee's anniversary date. Under the planned setup, an employee’s sick accrual for the month will be split and posted half in the first pay period and half in the second, and months that include a third pay period will not post additional accruals in that extra pay period. When sick or vacation hours appear on an employee’s pay stub under Tyler, staff said employees will be able to use those hours immediately. The county indicated it will program a maximum sick‑bank cap in Tyler so employees at the cap will not continue to accrue.
Vacation will move from the current practice of an annual lump‑sum credit at hire/anniversary to per‑pay‑period accrual tied to the existing handbook schedule. The county proposes that accrued vacation must be used within 12 months of accrual instead of the current 18 months; staff said that change will require an update to the employee handbook and that exceptions (for example, to allow carryover) would be handled case‑by‑case and likely require board approval. For long‑tenured employees the county said existing cash‑out provisions remain available: employees with 15 or more years' service may be eligible to cash in one week (40 hours) of vacation, per current practice. Comp time was described as accruing as earned with a maximum bank of 40 hours.
Staff cautioned that the new approach slightly alters some fractional accrual totals (for example, rounding to simpler fractions to match Tyler's handling), but said the changes are intended to reduce manual spreadsheets and administrative work. Managers and department heads will be informed of the changes before they are applied, and handbook revisions will be prepared and returned to the board for formal amendment.
The committee was not asked to take formal action at the meeting; staff said they will instruct the Tyler implementation team to configure the system based on the committee's direction and bring handbook changes to the board for approval in the coming weeks. Staff also said additional training and support will be required during the cutover and that they will continue parallel verifications of payroll runs until confident the migration is complete.
Ending: County staff plan to finalize the Tyler configuration and begin phased go‑live work in mid‑April; the committee directed staff to proceed and to return with formal handbook language and any remaining implementation details for board action.
