Thousands of state workers will see a two-week delay in getting their full paychecks this summer, when North Dakota state government begins using new computer software for its payroll.

The changes have raised alarm among employees and state agency administrators, many of whom say the change is being foisted upon them without adequate consultation.

One objector, Tony Clark, the president of the state Public Service Commission, has requested a meeting with Pam Sharp, the state budget director, on Wednesday to discuss the changes. Other state agency administrators have been invited, Clark said.

"There aren't a lot of people who are going to go out and throw a party over this," Clark said.

North Dakota government and the university system have more than 10,000 employees. Most are paid at the first of the month, for work done in the previous month.

There are some exceptions. At the University of North Dakota, for example, professors, hourly workers and student jobholders have been paid twice a month for years.

However, software changes are prompting a uniform switch to twice-monthly paychecks, which are common in private business. As now planned, the move will include a 15-day delay from when a state employee finishes a two-week work period, and when he or she is paid for that work.

The shift is tentatively scheduled to begin July 1, Sharp said, when most North Dakota government workers will be paid for their work during June.

However, the July 30 check, issued a month later, will cover only the first two weeks of July. It will be roughly half its normal size, as part of the shift to twice-monthly paychecks.

Under the proposal, workers would be paid for the second half of July on Aug. 15; for the first half of August on Aug. 31; the second half of August on Sept. 15; and so on.

The lag is important to provide for more thorough accounting of payroll expenditures, vacation time and sick days, Sharp said. It will cut down on adjustments that are made after checks have already been cut. Under the present system, needed changes are made eight days after checks are issued, she said.

Sharp said the new pay dates are not final. In any case, state workers will be given several months to make necessary financial arrangements, such as switching automatic bank withdrawal dates for mortgage payments and other bills, she said.

"When you affect people's paychecks, it affects their lives," Sharp said. "We knew this would be a really difficult issue to deal with."

Chris Runge, director of the North Dakota Public Employees Association, said state officials must take time to keep workers informed in the run-up to the payroll switch.

"Some of the employees do want to be paid twice a month. They don't mind that. It's how do we get there?" Runge said. "What you don't want to have happen is, you have a bunch of people, come July 1, upset because their payroll got all screwed up."

The changes are part of a comprehensive overhaul of the state's administrative computer software, which began more than three years ago and is expected to cost close to $30 million. Dubbed ConnectND, the project is designed to knit North Dakota's state government, public colleges and some school districts together as part of one system.

The twice-monthly payroll cycle was implemented last April at Valley City State University, Mayville State University and the university system's central office in Bismarck, which were designated as tryout sites for the new software.

The two universities have been using an eight-day lag between the end of the work period and when an employee gets a paycheck. However, university officials want to extend the delay to 15 days when the system's nine other campuses begin using the payroll software in July, said Laura Glatt, vice chancellor for administrative affairs.

To help workers at Valley City State and Mayville State with the payroll transition last spring, employees were allowed a no-interest advance of their two weeks' delayed salary, on the condition that they would repay it within a year.

Fewer than a dozen workers took up the offer, out of almost 700 full- and part-time employees at the two campuses, Glatt said.

Sharp said a similar program will be offered to state government workers. Laurie Sterioti Hammeren, the state personnel director, will be heading a transition committee that will work out the program's details, and handle other issues arising from the change, she said.