No Amounts or Incorrect Amounts Print on Employee W-2 Forms for Boxes 1, 3, 5, 17, or 20

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To solve this problem, check the following areas of your company:

Note: Before you start, make sure you haven't changed the order of payroll fields after recording payroll transactions.

First, display or print the Payroll Yearly Earnings report. Verify that the year-to-date totals on this report are different from the year-to-date totals on the W-2 form. If the report matches the form, the error could have been made during payroll entry. You will need to edit the payroll checks that are incorrect.

Make payroll adjustments after printing reports

If the Yearly Earnings report is correct and the W-2 form is incorrect, then you need to verify that the payroll field's Gross Pay adjustments are set up correctly.

From the Maintain menu, select Default Information, and choose Employees.
Select the Employee Fields tab. Select the payroll field line that represents withholding that is printing incorrect amounts (for example, the Soc_Sec or Medicare field).
To determine which fields are selected that will be included in the Adjusted Gross, click the Adjust button. The fields that are selected will be combined together as the Adjusted Gross when you print the W-2 form. If you see an error here, make the correction, and click OK.

For example, if federal income taxes for your employee's wages should be calculated after subtracting the 401(k) deduction, on the Calculate Adjusted Gross window for Fed_Income, check both the K401 and Gross check boxes. If the employee's gross was $1,000.00 and 401(k) contributions were $22.56, the Adjusted Gross that would show in Box 1 on the W-2 form would be $1,000.00 - $22.56 or $977.44.

If you make corrections on this window by checking or unchecking fields to include in the Adjusted Gross, the Box 1 amount on the W-2 form will reflect these corrections. However, the actual amount withheld shown in Box 2 will not change.
On the Company Fields tab, select the payroll field line that represents the incorrect withholding amount—for example, Soc_Sec_ER. Select the Adjust button to display the Calculate Adjusted Gross window and make any changes to match the changes made on the Employee Fields tab.
Click OK. twice to save your default settings and return to the Sage 50 main menu.

If your default information is correct, then the problem could be on the actual employee's record.

From the Maintain menu, select Employees/Sales Reps.
Enter or select the employee ID with the incorrect W-2 form.
Select the Employee Fields tab.
Make sure that both the Use Defaults check box and the Calculated check box are selected (checked) for the particular payroll field that is printing in error. Also, the correct tax name must be used in the Tax Name or Calculation Name box so that Sage 50 can include these gross amounts. If you do not have Calculated checked, no amount will be calculated for the W-2 since the system does not have a defined amount for the adjusted gross.

Note: If the employee has a nonstandard deduction or calculation, you may need to check both the Use Defaults and Calculated check boxes to resolve a W-2 form problem and then uncheck them both before running the next payroll. For example, if an employee has requested that a flat rate of federal income taxes be deducted each pay period, you must check the Use Defaults and Calculated boxes on the employee's Fed_Income line to print the W-2 form. After the W-2 is printed, you would change the employee's record back to the original setting.
Click Save to update the employee record.

Verify that the default information for printing payroll fields on the W-2 form is correct. To do this, make sure that the W-2 box descriptions in the payroll defaults match the appropriate payroll fields. This information is used for the Form 941 Worksheet and W-2s.

From the Maintain menu, select Payroll, then Payroll Settings.
Select Taxes in the left column. Then, select Assign Tax Fields, which appears just below Taxes.
Click the W-2 Fields button.
Verify that the appropriate payroll fields are assigned to each box on the W-2 form. If they don't, click the arrow button to the right of the box, and select the correct name from the drop-down list. The selected field and the amounts associated with it will now appear in the appropriate box on the W-2.

If employees have tips subject to Social Security, in the box next to the Social Security tips label, select the name of your payroll field for tips.
If you need to record fringe benefits, click the arrow button to the right of Box 12, and select the appropriate payroll field from the drop-down list.
If you have a 401(k) program, include the correct code as well as the 401(k) payroll field name in Box 12.
If you don't have a special deduction to record, leave None as the default.
Click OK., then Finish to save your payroll settings.

Note: Year-to-year totals for Federal Income tax, Social Security, Medicare, and State and Local taxes usually print on W-2s automatically, but other deductions such as union dues, health insurance, cafeteria plans, and 401(k) deductions need to be set up to print correctly on W-2s.

If in the Employee Defaults window you modified the order of the payroll field descriptions on the Employee fields tab or Employer fields tab, after you have entered payroll transactions, the W-2 amounts may print in the wrong boxes on the W-2. The order is sometimes modified to change the payroll field order printed on paychecks. This is not recommended if you have already entered payroll transactions.

If the modification occurred after payroll entries were made, delete all payroll entries that have the new modified fields; change the fields back to the way they were; and then reenter the checks. Use a printed copy of a payroll earnings report that has the previous order when changing the fields back.
Depending on the number of incorrect entries, you may want to consider doing the W-2 forms manually and making the corrections in Sage 50 before you process payroll for the next year.

If the previous solutions don't resolve the problem, you may need to run a synchronization test on your data. This will correct year-to-date errors on paychecks.
Warning! Be sure to back up your company data to a location other than the one you normally use for backups. It is imperative that you back up your company data before you use the Integrity Check. Otherwise, you might lose valuable data.

Change the accounting period back to Period 1 through the Change Accounting Period window.
Exit Sage 50.
Run the Integrity Check. How do I do this?
Under Data Synchronization Tests, select the Employee/Journal check box.
Click OK to continue. The test will run and synchronize each beginning balance and payroll transaction entered, correctly adding up the year-to-date totals for the appropriate field amounts.
Finally, reprint employee W-2 forms for the employee(s).