Overview of the Employee Tax Status Update
The Tax Status Update feature allows you to change your Federal and/or State tax status information:
your marital status, number of allowances, and extra withholding amounts. This information affects the
amount of taxes withheld from your pay.
However, if you have a letter from the IRS or other taxing authority on file at USC indicating that you must be taxed a certain way, then you cannot use this online process.
To experiment with different tax status variables, you can use the Tax Modeling Utility to see how changes in your tax status would affect your net pay.
Using this process to change your tax status information is equivalent to filling out an IRS Form W-4 for your Federal tax status and the California DE-4 form for your state tax status. However, you cannot use this online process to do any of the following:
- Claim more than 9 withholding allowances.
- Change tax exemption status.
- Change foreign tax status.
- Change out-of-state tax status.
To do any of the above listed actions, or if you would rather submit a paper form instead, download the forms from the University Payroll Services web site.
Note: For the field descriptions listed below, fields marked with double asterisks "**" are required fields. Other fields are optional and may be left blank.
Legal Statement Certification Page
Any change you make to your Federal and/or State tax status affects the amount of tax withheld from your pay.
Under penalities of perjury, you must acknowledge that the information you are submitting is true and that the
number of allowances you are claiming does not exceed the number to which you are entitled.
You must answer "Yes" to certify your agreement to these statements before you may continue.
If you choose to change only either the Federal or the State tax status, you may acknowledge the corresponding statement, and you will be able to change the tax status for only that agency.
State Tax Status Section
| Federal Statement | ** | Under penalities of perjury, select either "Yes" or "No" to indicate whether or not you certify that you are entitled
to the number of withholding allowances you claim in this processing. You must answer "Yes" before you can change your Federal withholding allowances. |
| State Statement | ** | Under penalities of perjury, select either "Yes" or "No" to indicate whether or not you certify that the number of
withholding allowances you claim on this processing does not exceed the number to which you are entitled. You must answer "Yes" before you can change your State withholding allowances. |
Page Buttons
There are 2 buttons near the bottom of this page:
| Submit | Upon certifying to the legal statements, click on this button to continue on to the Tax Status Entry Page. | |
| Exit Process | Click this button to return to the eTrac main menu without making any changes. |
Tax Status Entry Page
Employee Information Section
The top section of this page displays your personal and work information. If any if it is incorrect, contact your Home Department Coordinator to update it.
Miscellaneous Information Section
This section displays your tax reporting status and payroll activity.
| Tax State | This field lists the state for which you will file taxes. | |
| Tax Country | This field lists the country for which you will file taxes. |
| Last payroll posted to this record | This field lists the last payroll activity made to you. | |
| Tax Information Last Updated | This field shows the date when this tax information was last changed and the person/service who made the change. |
Federal Tax Status Section
If you certified to the Federal legal statement on the Statement Agreement Page, this section is displayed for you to make changes.
| Tax Exempt | This field indicates whether or not your wages are exempt from Federal tax withholding. If you need to change your federal tax exemption status, contact University Payroll Services for further paperwork. | |
| Marital Status | ** | Indicate your marital status: either Married or Single. |
| Number of Allowances | ** | Select the number of withholding allowances, from 0 to 9. If you need to claim more than 9 allowances, contact
University Payroll Services for further paperwork. Note that as per your certification on the legal statement, you certify that you are entitled to the number of allowances you are entering. |
| Extra Withholding | If you want to have an extra amount withheld from each paycheck for Federal taxes, indicate in dollar value, the amount. |
State Tax Status Section
If you certified to the state legal statement on the Statement Agreement Page, this section is displayed for you to make changes.
| Tax Exempt | This field indicates whether or not your wages are exempt from state tax withholding. If you need to change your state tax exemption status, contact University Payroll Services for further paperwork. | |
| Marital Status | ** | Indicate your marital status: either Married, Single, or Head of Household. |
| Number of Allowances | ** | Select the number of withholding allowances, from 0 to 9. Note that as per your certification to the legal statement, you certify that you are entitled to the number of allowances you are entering. |
| Additional Allowances | Select the number of additional withholding allowances, from 0 to 9. Note that as per your certification to the legal statement, you certify that you are entitled to the number of allowances you are entering. | |
| Extra Withholding | If you want to have an extra amount withheld from each paycheck for state taxes, indicate in dollar value, the amount. |
Page Buttons
There are 3 buttons near the bottom of this page:
| Submit to Confirm Changes | Click on this button after making your changes. The system will load the Confirmation Page for you to review before submitting your changes. | |
| Return to Entry Page | Click this button to return to the Tax Status Entry Page to make further changes. | |
| Exit Process | Click this button at any time to cancel changes and return to the eTrac main menu. |
Tax Status Change Confirmation Page
This page will display all your current changes in the Update Summary table.
You can review all your changes before submitting them to the system.
The following descriptions explain the table columns:
| Description | This column lists the name of the item you changed. | |
| Current Values | This column displays the value of the item that is in the system currently. | |
| New Values | This column displays how you want the item changed. |
The certification statements are displayed again for any Federal and/or State tax status changes. When you click on the button, you certify under penalities of perjury that these statements are true.
Page Buttons
There are 3 buttons near the bottom of this page:
| Submit to Update Changes | After reviewing your changes, click on this button to submit the changes to the system. The system will send you an email confirmation that you have changed your tax status. | |
| Return to the Entry Page | Click this button to return to the Tax Status Entry Page without submitting any changes to the system. | |
| Exit Process | Click this button at any time to cancel changes and return to the eTrac main menu. |
Tax Status Update Message Page
This message page will acknowledge that the system has updated your tax information.
Page Buttons
There are 3 buttons near the bottom of this page:
| Return to Update Page | Click this button to return to the Legal Statement Page. | |
| Exit Process | Click this button to return to the eTrac main menu. |