Written by Joshua Lagunas.
The North Carolina Office of the State Controller negotiated a contract with Sprintax Calculus (Sprintax) for all state agencies, universities, and community colleges to replace International Tax Navigator as the foreign-national tax compliance management software. NC State’s conversion took place on August 1, 2024.
International individuals receiving any payment from NC State should reach out to the International Compensation and Taxation (ICT) team within the University Payroll Office to request a tax assessment before receiving their first payment. The tax assessment determines tax residency status and the appropriate federal and state tax withholding on behalf of the nonresident alien.
In Sprintax, the individual receives a link from ICT to create their Sprintax account, enter their information, upload their supporting documents and sign the tax forms that Sprintax generates. ICT verifies the accuracy of the information that the nonresident alien has entered.
With Sprintax, ICT manages the tax profiles of the university’s international recipients all in one place through an accessible dashboard. The enhanced functionality of Sprintax benefits both the international recipient, as well as the ICT team.
Benefits to the University
One enhancement is in the delivery of tax form 1042-S. Under the former software, there was no electronic delivery option of form 1042-S to the recipient. The 1042-S is the tax form generated annually by ICT for anyone classified as a nonresident alien for tax purposes and who has received a non-wage payment from the university. Sprintax has the functionality to make this tax form available electronically offering more convenient delivery to the recipient and saving printing and mailing resources.
Additionally, the university currently offers students and scholars, who are nonresident aliens for tax purposes, the ability to file their federal tax return with Sprintax at a nominal cost. Since the 1042-S recipient creates a Sprintax account when requesting a tax assessment from ICT, the information from the 1042-S will automatically populate in the individual’s tax return when they use Sprintax to file their federal tax return.
Finally, the university will see benefits in several ways. Once ICT has generated the tax forms each year, Sprintax will electronically file those with the Internal Revenue Service. This was previously performed by ICT. Sprintax integrates with PeopleSoft, which means ICT can run a process to populate payments made through PeopleSoft to Sprintax to generate the 1042-S tax form. Under the former software, reports were generated from PeopleSoft, and data was manually keyed into the tax forms.
If you have any questions about Sprintax, requesting a tax assessment, or any general questions about international compensation and taxation, please reach out to ictquestions@ncsu.edu.