What is the purpose of each of the following control procedures (i.e., what threats is it designed to mitigate)?
a. Compare a listing of current and former employees to the payroll register.
b. Reconciliation of labor costs (based on job-time ticket data) with payroll (based on time card data).
c. Direct deposit of paychecks.
d. Validity checks on Social Security numbers of all new employees added to the payroll master file.
e. Cross-footing the payroll register.
f. Limit checks on hours worked for each time card.
g. Use of a fingerprint scanner in order for employees to record the time they started and the time they quit working each day.
h. Encryption of payroll data both when it is electronically sent to a payroll service bureau and while at rest in the HR/payroll database.
i. Establishing a separate payroll checking account and funding it as an imprest account.
j. Comparison of hash totals of employee numbers created prior to transmitting time-worked data to payroll provider with hash totals of employee numbers created by payroll provider when preparing paychecks.
k. Periodic reports of all changes to payroll database sent to each department manager.
l. Providing employees with earnings statements every pay period.
m. Check for paychecks with no social security or income tax withholding.
n. Check for multiple direct deposits to the same bank account in a single pay period.