Documenting Addresses

The National Finance Center (NFC) Payroll/Personnel System (PPS) utilizes the following two address types for Federal payments and distribution of information by NFC:

  • Residence mailing address
  • Check mailing address

NFC uses addresses as follows:

  • NFC mails salary payments when an employee has obtained a waiver, including annual leave lump sum, compensatory time, etc., to the check mailing address in NFC's PPS.  
  • NFC mails salary payments to the residence address when there is no DD/EFT or check mailing address in NFC's PPS.
  • NFC mails the employee’s Wage and Tax Statement (W-2), Personal Benefits Statement, and the Earnings and Leave Statement to the employee’s residence address unless the user elected to stop receiving a mailed copy.
  • NFC's PPS uses the residence address to determine voluntary state, city, and county taxes. The city, county, or state code on the residence address must agree with the city, county, or state code for the taxing entity on the tax document to successfully process any voluntary tax withholding.
  • NFC submits the residence mailing address to U.S. Office of Personnel Management (OPM) when electronic documents require the entry of a mailing address for use by a third party outside of NFC (e.g., SF 2809, Health Benefits Election Form and the TSP-1, Thrift Savings Plan Election Form).

Check Mailing Address

Federal laws 31 United States Code 3332, and Title 31, Rule 208 of the Code of Federal Regulations, require all Federal payments to be made electronically. Effective January 2, 1999, the Department of the Treasury (Treasury) discontinued issuing paper checks (excluding approved waivers) with few exceptions due to hardship. All Federal payments are disbursed electronically in accordance with the Debt Collection Improvement Act of 1996.

To receive payments by check, an employee must obtain a waiver from the head of the Agency.

Valid Geographical Locator Codes

A Geographic Locator Code (GLC) is an alphanumeric code that Federal Agencies use to identify geographic locations. Use of these codes facilitates the interchange and standardization of data between Federal Agencies and state and local groups.

The county, city, and state/country combination in the U.S. Postal Service (USPS) ZIP Code database must be identified by GLC combinations found in Table Management System (TMGT) Table 016, Geographical Location Codes with Names. These codes are loaded into TMGT Table 016 from the OPM Duty Station Locator System.

When a city is not identified in TMGT Table 016, refer to the OPM Duty Station Locator System. NFC cannot add any city/state to TMGT Table 016 if it is missing from the Duty Station Locator System.

Note: TMGT Table 016 also contains codes such as those used by the Payroll Computation System (PAYE) to determine the Consolidated Metropolitan Statistical Area for locality pay. Any code containing all zeroes or all nines for either the county or city code is not valid for use with addresses.  

  • If the city is in the OPM Duty Station Locator System, submit a request through ServiceNow to have the code added to TMGT.
  • If the city is not available in the OPM Duty Station Locator System, refer to the OPM website for instructions on adding a duty station. OPM will coordinate with the U.S. General Services Administration to create new city codes, as required.

Processing Addresses in NFC's PPS

Document Type 349, Employee Address, via an Agency's Front-End System Interface (FESI), Web-based Entry, Processing, Inquiry, and Correction System (EPIC Web), or EmpowHR, is used to add the employee’s current address or check mailing address to NFC's PPS. An employee may also use the Employee Personal Page (EPP) to change the residence mailing address. Verify that the address updated in IRIS Program, IR124, Address/Check Information.

All addresses entered in EmpowHR, EPIC Web, EPP, and an Agency's FESI must:

  • Contain a valid street address, city, state, and ZIP Code combination in accordance with USPS.
  • Identify the city, state, and country (when required) by a valid GLC according to the OPM Duty Station Locator System.

Note: TMGT Table 016 also contains GLCs used by other applications such as PAYE to determine the Consolidated Metropolitan Statistical Area for locality pay. Any GLC containing all zeroes or all nines for either the county or city code is not valid for use with addresses. 

According to USPS, all street address, city, state, and ZIP Code combinations must be valid. USPS cannot deliver mail to a street address, city, state, and ZIP Code combination that is not contained in the USPS ZIP Code system.

To verify an address is valid:

  1. Navigate to www.usps.gov.
  2. Select Quick Tools. 
  3. Select Look Up a Zip Code.
  4. Select Find by Address.
  5. Enter the address.
  6. Select the Find button to display the address.
  7. Select the drop-down in the address box to display the county.

The Personnel Input and Edit System (PINE) edits the ZIP Codes using data loaded from USPS to TMGT Table 013, State Name and ZIP Range, and TMGT Table 015, State Code and ZIP Range. TMGT 013 contains ZIP Code ranges for each state-by-state name or territory. TMGT 015 contains state and country names and codes with the corresponding ZIP Codes.

New Employees

In NFC's PPS, address documents are payroll documents. Personnel actions and payroll documents may be entered on the same day because personnel actions process prior to payroll documents; however, when the payroll document (e.g., address document), depends on the accession personnel action, and the accession action fails the edits, the payroll document fails the edits too. After the accession action clears the PINE process, the address document will apply. An Agency may process a hire action and another personnel action (e.g., availability pay, address document, or multiple payroll documents) on the same day.

Conditions to remember when processing address documents:

Condition

Action

If an address change is entered in the same pay period as a personnel action to change the employee’s Social Security number, name, or Agency code:

Enter the personnel action first.

To change from a paper check to DD/EFT:

Process a DD/EFT payroll document. It is not necessary to process an address change with blanks in the check mailing address fields.

To change any address data previously processed:

Enter another address document, as applicable. This is particularly important if the employee separates and changes addresses.

Separating Employees

Employees who are separating and whose residence address is also changing should process a change to their residence address prior to separation to prevent erroneous delivery of their final salary or severance payments. NFC's PPS does not allow changes to the addresses after the separation action applies.

Suspense Reports

Every pay period, PINE generates Document Type 999 - Informational Message 001 - Residence Address Missing-Submit AD-349. Any employee database record without residence address information will continue to generate the message every pay period until a residence address is entered on the database. After the first pass of PINE every pay period, Agencies should run suspense reports in EmpowHR, Payroll/Personnel Report Generator System, or EPIC Web to determine which employees are missing residence addresses.

A missing address could impact the rights and benefits of an employee. For example, when an employee is missing a current residence mailing address:

  • Electronic documents such as the TSP-1, which require the mailing address for the employee, will not load into the electronic Official Personnel Folder. This is a required document and if the employee is transferring to another Agency there is no proof of the employee’s election.
  • City, county, and/or State taxes are withheld based on the employee’s duty station. If the employee works in a different state than the residence, the employee may have to file taxes in two different states and may be penalized for taxes owed in the residence city, county, and/or state.