At the end of November, some faculty members at Cape Fear Community College received a call telling them the payroll department overpaid them in late November 2023, and this money would be reverted to the college right before the December holidays. A total of 50 instructors were affected by the mistake; those faculty members had to return a collective $31,536.92. The average amount each employee had to revert was $630.74; individual repayments ranged from $1,244 to $209.
According to communication records acquired by WHQR through a public records request, 18 faculty members, from various departments on campus, sent the payroll and human resources departments emails asking them to explain, in writing, the reason for the mistake. Records of emails from staff to payroll employees for the first three weeks of December show employees were repeatedly denied this request.
What happened with back pay?
Christina Hallingse, CFCC’s director of media relations, declined an interview, but wrote in an email to WHQR, “Unfortunately, due to a procedural mistake, these faculty members received a duplicate retroactive payment, resulting in an extra amount on their November 2023 paycheck.” She added that these faculty members also received a salary adjustment to “bring their incomes in line with the market rate.”
In some of the emails, Julie Hesse, CFCC’s interim payroll manager, referenced that she “hand keyed” the salary numbers. For clarity, Hallingse said that was because “most of our faculty operate on a 9-10 month employment basis, our payroll division cannot batch processes for salary adjustments. These adjustments require manual input.”
To explain the faculty’s ‘retro pay,’ Hallingse said the state passed their budget in September 2023, which included a 7% raise for state employees over two years, 4% this fiscal year, and 3% the following one. This budget bill was then reviewed by the state community college system in October 2023. The college then had to disperse backpay, or ‘retro pay,’ for several months, since the raise technically kicked in at the beginning of the fiscal year on July 1, 2023.
"It is my recommendation not to respond to the email.”
In records reviewed by WHQR, three instructors put the specific amounts they were being asked to return before the holidays — $660, $496.99, and $495 — in emails to payroll, in an attempt to get an explanation for the situation in writing.
Another instructor wrote a payroll technician, “I would love to see a pay schedule and pay scale, as well as understand what I owe and how this was calculated.” Email records indicate this instructor never received documentation or a written explanation.
A Spanish instructor wrote to payroll, telling Hesse as interim manager, “I am still confused about what exactly happened to the last paycheck. I received less money than I had calculated,” and asked questions about tax filing. She received an extensive response from Hesse, but there was no written acknowledgment of the retro pay mistake.
Another sociology instructor sent four emails reiterating the need for payroll to write to her — and to stop calling her.
Hallingse said in response to the calls payroll made rather than explain in writing, “We wanted to reach out to the 50 impacted faculty members and let them know, firsthand, of the issue in their November paycheck. This also provided employees an opportunity to speak to someone to receive clarity on the issue, as well as ask any additional questions that they might have.”
Faculty also asked why they were being called on their cell phones.
One music instructor wrote Hesse, “I wanted to inquire about a request I’ve gotten on my cellphone (not my office phone) from Kim Moore in payroll; she said there was an audit on the retroactive stipend, and I was paid too much and that I would have to pay some of it back. Is this correct? [...] I thought it was weird I was getting requests on my cell phone and not my office phone.”
Hallingse didn’t directly address situations where staff were initially contacted on their personal phones, but did say, “faculty members were called on their work phones. If they could not be reached they were called on their cell phones. This was in order to ensure that they were made aware of the issue in a timely manner.”
After receiving the request for written responses, payroll asked human resources for support. In at least one case, HR explicitly recommended against email communication.
Jacqui Johnston, human resources business partner, wrote to Hesse on December 7, “HR has no reason to indicate that [the sociology instructor who repeatedly emailed] would have any accessibility issues that would present a barrier for her to participate in a phone conversation. Please continue to reach her by phone. If you receive voice mail again, you may want to leave a message offering to have her stop by the Payroll office to meet one-on-one. It is my recommendation not to respond to the email.”
Confusion
Email records also show a reference to underpayment in past years — although CFCC said there were no ‘mistakes.'
Vice President of Business Services Christina Greene wrote to Hesse on December 7, that one nursing instructor got a “22-23 faculty minimum adjustment so [their] retro for $1,486 is made up of $550 for last year and $936 for this year. So we owe her $2,025. The attached should help (or make it more confusing, lol).”
Records also show on December 7 there was some confusion in the payroll department.
Greene said to Hesse, “Thank you for looking behind me!! I don’t know if anybody else did”
Hesse responded, “Truth! Yeah, I noticed you did the check figures [a way to verify calculations of retro payments]. It was good to look through and see how you figured it all.”
Greene said, “I’m telling you, nothing about these calculations was easy!! Check figures was my best friend.” Hesse responded that it made sense, and she “didn’t think about the 22-23 fiscal year.”
