Pike County payroll system error puts departments at risk to lose state funding

PITTSFIELD, Ill. (WGEM) - Pike County is at risk to lose state funding due to a mistake made with the county’s payroll system.

County officials said a new system, Paycom, put in place last year is to blame and department heads struggling to keep up and work together.

When Pike County Treasurer Scott Syrcle pulled up the county’s funding status report it showed zero dollars being spent by Pike County departments.

The final report shows Pike County having just under $3 million. In reality, more than $2 million was spent over the course of the year.

“It’s been ongoing now since June of last year,” Syrcle said. “I repeatedly brought it to the finance committee’s attention and they knew it was off because the payroll was not hitting the fund status reports or the budget status reports, either one.”

Syrcle said the county board approved Paycom. He was against it.

“That was picked by the county clerk’s office,” Syrcle said. “We had no decision in it.”

County Clerk Natalie Roseberry said switching to Paycom would save the county money. County Chairman Jim Sheppard said the old system was having its own set of issues.

Syrcle said the old system was more straightforward with getting them the payroll figures they needed. He said pulling information from Paycom is a battle. He said he had repeatedly asked other department heads for help.

“Paycom was the one that was unwilling to work with us,” Syrcle said. “I mean, repeatedly, we would ask questions, you know, trying to figure out how to pull it out. We even asked the county clerk to help interpret for us and pull the figures that we needed to transfer.”

County Chair Jim Sheppard said the county’s payroll clerk left their position in the middle of Paycom training. So there was confusion over who was supposed to do what.

“There’s a lot of this is my job and that’s somebody else’s,” Sheppard said.

Sheppard and Syrcle agree Paycom has been a headache to deal with.

“If I had to do it all over again I would put more time into getting spun up on Paycom,” Sheppard said.

Sheppard and Syrcle said they are unsure if they can have the audit report completed an August 30 deadline.

After that, Pike County could face issues getting state funding.

The state funding issues could affect all the departments including health, sheriff, ambulance services and more since reports show they spent zero dollars over the last year.

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