To be eligible for Federal Work-Study employment, in addition to meeting all general requirements for Federal Assistance,  student's must be registered and attending at least six (6) credit hours.  If a student stops attending classes or drops/withdraw below six (6) credit hours, employment must be terminated immediately.

It is the responsibility of the employer and the student employee to closely watch the Financial Aid Earnings Reports. If a student employee has over-earned or is close to over-earning his or her workstudy funds, a new Work Authorization Form must be completed to allow the student to be paid from department funds OR the student must stop working.

Per Federal & State Wage and Hour Laws, employees must be paid for all hours worked. A student who has a Federal Work-Study award may not volunteer. Once a student has FWS and is in a paid position, the employee must be paid, regardless of whether or not wages exceed the FWS award.

Excerpt from the Encyclopedia of Student Financial Aid: (4.4.6.1.4)

The Fair Labor Standards Act of 1938, as amended, prohibits employers, including educational institutions, from accepting voluntary services from any paid employee. Therefore, any student employed under FWS must be paid for all hours worked.

Hours worked in excess of the FWS award will automatically be charged to your department's budget, as you are considered the employer. We can't emphasize enough the importance of carefully monitoring a student employee's Federal Work-Study award, as well as complying with Federal and State regulations regarding legal and prompt payment for hours worked.

Student employees who work in excess of 40 hours per work week (Sunday through Saturday) will be paid at the overtime pay rate (equal to 1.5 times their pay rate) for the hours worked after 40. Federal Work-Study Funds cannot be used to pay overtime.

If your department does not wish to pay overtime, please make sure that the student employee does not work over 40 hours. If the employee happens to work overtime, they must be paid for that overtime.

Please consider that students can work in different departments and have more than one job. A student employee could possibly (especially during vacations or breaks) work more than 40 hours a week between 2 or more jobs. PeopleSoft calculates overtime and the appropriate department(s) will be charged for any overtime. In this case, you might want to coordinate hours with your student and his/her other jobs, explaining that you wish to avoid paying overtime.

Due to the absence of collective bargaining for department funded positions and Federal regulations regarding Federal Work-Study positions, only actual hours worked can be reported as time worked. Student employees are not paid for the following:

Departments who hire student employees must comply with mandated labor laws regarding prompt, legal, and accurate payment of all employees. Due to liability issues, time entered into PeopleSoft must reflect the actual hours and days that an employee worked. Payroll must be able to go back and verify that an employee was working on a certain day, at a certain time. The following lists some examples:

• Hours not reported on one week can't be added to another week. In other words, there must be a time entered into PeopleSoft for each week, by day, that is worked.

• Because breaks and lunches are not paid, in and out times must be entered into PeopleSoft.

Employees must be given specified breaks based on the number of hours worked according to Federal & State Wage and Hour Laws. An employee may be permitted to work for no more than six (6) consecutive hours at one time unless he or she is given the opportunity to take as least a 30 consecutive minute rest.

Excerpt from the Supervisor's Guide to Student Employment 2004-2005 published by the Student Financial Aid Office:

Wage and hour laws require that a student be paid within a "reasonable" amount of time. "Reasonable" amount of time is defined by laws governing the Federal Work-Study program as one month. If a student begins working for you prior to your submission of a properly completed Job Description Form and Work Authorization Form and 2 payrolls have passed without the required information, Student Payroll will charge the department's budget to pay the student for hours worked through the week ending of the current payroll.

Student employees must have a current W-4 Forms and I-9 Form on file in the Student Payroll Office BEFORE they begin working.

Although the student's legal employer is USM - University of Maine System, its departments are considered agents in ascertaining that the student employee is provided with the necessary information required to meet all of his or her legal and moral obligations. This means you must advise the student employee that he or she is required to have a completed I-9 Form on file in the Student Payroll Office within three (3) business days from date of hire. In addition, completed W-4 Forms (Federal & Maine) are required for all new USM employees. These forms are required for new University of Southern Maine employees who are defined as:

Employees are required to file a W-4 forms (Federal & State) with the University of Southern Maine for the purpose of filing appropriate withholding status. The Federal W-4 form also provides the University with a permanent mailing address for mailing the W-2 (statement of wages and withholding) produced at the end of each tax year. Please note that address changes with the Registrar's Office do not update to USM Payroll records and the student must notify us separately.

U.S. Department of Justice Immigration and Naturalization Service requires the University to verify that all employees are eligible to work legally in the United States. The Immigration and Naturalization Service specifies what documents are acceptable to verify both identity and employment eligibility. Please refer to the back side of an I-9 form for the LIST OF ACCEPTABLE DOCUMENTS.

Both forms must be completed in ink and must also provide a permanent mailing address (dorm room addresses are not permitted).

PLEASE NOTE: If the employee you wish to hire is an International student, please refer to the section "International Students" as there may be different requirements and/or restrictions.

International Students with expired passports, expired I-20's or IAP66's, NO Social Security Card/Number or for any reason considered "out of status" can not work under any circumstances.

The Office of International Programs provides International students with information and handouts explaining the requirements and restrictions of "on campus" employment. Please be sure that any prospective students you plan to hire are in receipt of this information. It explains the procedures and steps that an International student must follow before employment can begin.

With the approval of USM's representative, Immigration rules state that an International student employee may only work a total of 20 hours per week during the academic year regardless of how many jobs he or she may have. (During vacation breaks, the student may work full time.) For example, if a student has three jobs, he or she may only work a total of 20 hours between all three positions.

Time Worked must be entered into a PeopleSoft's Time and Labor system. Please review the information contained on the Student Payroll web site.

Paychecks will be mailed to employing departments. If a student works for more than one department, please make sure the student indicates to which department he/she wishes the check to be mailed when completing the Work Authorization Form. Students will need to check with the paycheck location department for mail times.

Student paychecks are released every other Friday - opposite Classified Payroll (unless otherwise posted). A schedule is on the Student Payroll web site.

The Student Payroll schedule provides the dates upon which the paychecks are available. The University of Maine System does not allow any paychecks to be released until those dates indicated. There will be no exceptions made. Student employees may wish to consider direct deposit as it is an effective alternative.

Student employees can enter their direct deposit information directly into PeopleSoft via Self Service. If a student used direct deposit in the past, and there has not been any changes to the account since then, then re-application is not required. If necessary, forms are available: click here for a form and click here for instructions.

If a student employee has more than one job, he/she must be very careful to enter time on the correct job.