W-2 forms available online

Kristine Gill

Student employees, faculty and staff will be able to access their W-2 forms online this year. Employees must give their consent by Jan. 11 in order to view and print their W-2 through FlashLine.

“The W-2 represents your taxable earned income for the calendar year starting in January and ending in December,” said associate university treasurer David Young. “It’s an important document because almost all of the information has to be reported on a tax return.”

Young said Internal Revenue Service (IRS) wants all tax reporting to eventually be electronic and making the W-2 available online was one step.

Payroll Manager Lisa Heilman said the new Banner system allows Kent State to offer its employees the form online for the first time, adding that most employers currently offer the online form.

“IRS regulations require that you consent to get it online,” Heilman said. “If you don’t consent you’ll still get a mail copy.”

Heilman said forms will arrive in the mail within two weeks of the consent cut-off date for those employees who did not give consent. Heilman said having the form available online should make things easier, especially for student employees.

“We always have a problem with students because their addresses change,” she said. “It’s hard just keeping the addresses up to date and different systems have different addresses listed.”

Heilman said having the form online means employees won’t have to wait for it to come in the mail and can reprint their copy if it gets lost.

Contact student affairs reporter Kristine Gill at [email protected].