Cell Phone Allowances

Employees whose position responsibilities require them to use a personal communication device for university business are eligible to receive a communication allowance each pay period as determined by a divisional Vice President. Employees determined to be eligible will receive a minimum supplement of $25 per pay period, which is considered the minimum to fairly approximate costs involved in maintaining cell phone and/or mobile data plan service. This supplement is taxable income and will be set apart on the payroll stub as "Communication Allowance". The communication allowance is not considered part of the employee's base salary and will not be used to compute any type of salary increase or benefit accrual.

The university will provide an allowance to an employee for only one cell phone and/or mobile data plan, regardless of the number of devices an employee may use to access the university. Employees are not required to maintain a separate communications device for this purpose and may use a personal device; however, the phone number of any cell phone associated with the allowance must be provided to the university for distribution or posting as appropriate to the needs of the institution. All equipment purchases are the responsibility of the employee.

To initiate a cell phone allowance, a Personnel Action Form should be prepared and forwarded to Human Resources. The Personnel Action Form should indicate the start date and biweekly amount of the allowance. A signed Cell Phone Allowance Agreement must accompany the Personnel Action Form. Personnel Action Forms for Cell Phone Allowances will not be processed until the signed agreement has been received in Human Resources. This agreement can be attached to the Personnel Action Form when routing it through DocuSign for processing.

Cell phone allowances are not automatically carried forward from one position to another as the allowance is attached to the default earnings on the individual position. So, if an employee changes position number (within the same department or in a new department) and their cell phone allowance is to be continued, the department must note this on the Personnel Action Form for the new position.