New Hourly Employee Checklist

This checklist is to help new hourly employees and managers provide a smooth transition into employment at Texas Law.

Payroll application: Please contact your professor’s faculty assistant (for students) or Texas Law HR (for other hourly employees) so that they can initiate the payroll application that you need to complete for your assignment. NEW: In the Fall, one form may be submitted for combined Fall and Spring Semesters, as long as it can be reasonably expected that the student will work both semesters. A separate form is required for summer assignments. Fall assignment end dates will default to January 15, Spring assignments end dates will default to May 31 to avoid additional paperwork if a student is reassigned for the following semester.
If you are a new employee at UT or have not worked at the University in the last year, there are a couple of things that need to happen before we can finalize your assignment.
1. I will initiate a Background Check Request for you. You will receive an email asking you to complete and authorize the request. However, sometimes those emails route straight to the Spam Folder, so I am including the link here: https://utdirect.utexas.edu/apps/hr/bca/applicant/
2. As a new employee to the University, you will need to complete a Form I-9 (Employment Eligibility Verification) as part of your onboarding process once your assignment is finalized (if you worked at UT before, but had a break in services the same rules may apply). Before any of that can happen, you will need to make sure you have the appropriate I-9 documentation, which can include a US Passport, or a Driver’s License plus a Birth Certificate or Social Security Card. A complete list of acceptable documents can be found here: https://hr.utexas.edu/current/services/employment-eligibility-verification-i9-docs. The important part here is that whichever documents you choose, you must have the ORIGINAL. Copies or electronic versions (pdf or jpeg, etc) are not acceptable.
3. Here are the instructions for remote I-9s following post pandemic guidelines.
  1. I will email you a pdf of the I-9 form as well as the instructions (attached to this email). You will complete section 1 twice, once in Workday after your assignment is finalized and you receive your onboarding email, and once on the paper form. Make sure that the address on both forms match and don’t forget to mark whether you used a translator or preparer. Then any adult other than you can complete and sign section 2 thus certifying that they saw your original documents (see directions below). Note: The paper form must be signed manually, electronic signatures are not acceptable.
  2. Once that is done, you scan copies of the completed form and your documentation to pdf and upload them directly to your documents page in Workday (see attached instructions from Central HR on how to upload your documents). Please make sure to upload the I-9 and supporting documents as separate pdfs, not combined into one.
  3. UCIS has temporarily relaxed their requirements to where any adult other than you (preferably a family member) can act as an “authorized representative” to complete and sign section 2 of your I-9 as well as verify your documentation. By doing so, they confirm that you had the original documents, and that they are not expired or fake.
  4. Here is what they will need to do:
    1. Enter some information from section 1 to the top of section 2
    2. Enter the information for the documents being used.
    3. Enter the date for the first day of your employment just above the box for section 2
    4. Signature of Employer or Authorized Representative: Individual verifying documents must sign his/her name
    5. Today’s Date (mm/dd/yyyy): Date using same format
    6. Title of Employer or Authorized Representative: Individual must write/type “Representative”
    7. Last Name of Employer or Authorized Representative: Write/type the person’s last name
    8. First Name of Employer or Authorized Representative: Write/type the person’s first name
    9. Employer’s Business or Organization Name: University of Texas at Austin
    10. Employer’s Business or Organization Address (Street Number or Name): 1616 Guadalupe Street, Suite 1.408
    11. City or Town: Austin
    12. State: Texas
    13. ZIP Code: 78701
4. There will be other onboarding tasks as well, such as making payment and tax selections. If you do not make a payment selection, your paychecks will print on paper and will be held at the Payroll Office in the Main Building for you to pick up.
5. If you did not use an email ending in “utexas.edu” on your payroll application, please add it as your designated “Work” email as soon as your assignment is finalized. We have encountered several issues where workers did not get important information because they did not have a valid work email (one that ends in .utexas.edu).
Once your assignment has been finalized, you will receive an email from Workday with instructions on how to complete your onboarding tasks, which you will find in your Workday Inbox. All onboarding steps should be completed within the first three days of employment, starting with your I-9 form, your payment elections, and your Federal Income Tax elections. If those elections are not completed by the first payroll deadline, any payments you earned will be processed as a paper check, which will be held at the Payroll Office for you to pick up with appropriate identification.
Timesheets: It is of utmost importance for each employee to complete and submit timesheets on a weekly basis and at the end of each pay period (15^th and last day of each month). This may involve submission of partial timesheets. Timesheets are proof that you actually worked throughout the time of your assignment. If timesheets are not submitted on a regular basis, Texas Law reserves the right to cancel the assignment, which means employment cannot be verified later on, if necessary. You can access your timesheets from your Workday Home Page by clicking on the Time Clock icon in the Applications section of your page.