## TL;DR
Fix this in new hire tax setup agent by acting on the exact problem first: persist the verified setup result for each new hire, covering federal and state withholding forms, work state and local codes, to a checklist file before the next system call, re authenticate when the session expires, and resume verification from the first hire with no completed checklist row. Do not rerun the whole payroll workflow unchanged, because the same inputs produce the same failure. Prove the fix on one employee first, then rerun the full scope and reconcile the results against the payroll register.

```text
auth credential expired mid-run agent failed to verify new hire tax setup in payroll system
```

## Use this when
- The operation in new hire tax setup agent fails with this exact problem: auth credential expired mid-run agent failed to verify new hire tax setup in payroll system.
- The same failure repeats on retry with unchanged inputs.
- A payroll run, tax filing, garnishment check or pay close is blocked until this is resolved.

## Not for this skill when
- The notice is a platform outage from the vendor. Resolve that first, then return here if this problem remains.
- The payroll completes and you only disagree with a pay policy decision such as a rate or a benefit rule. That is a policy change, not this failure.

## Steps
1. Reproduce the failure on one named employee in new hire tax setup agent and record the full problem text plus the employee, pay period or filing involved. Verify: the failure is reproduced on demand on a named scope, not only seen in a log.
2. Apply the specific fix for this problem: persist the verified setup result for each new hire, covering federal and state withholding forms, work state and local codes, to a checklist file before the next system call, re authenticate when the session expires, and resume verification from the first hire with no completed checklist row. Verify: the single failing employee now behaves as the fix predicts, or the corrected value is visible on the record.
3. Check neighbouring employees, pay groups or filings that share the same pay code, deduction setup or import, because this class of failure rarely affects only one employee. Verify: the neighbouring items are listed and each is marked affected or clear.
4. Rerun the original operation in new hire tax setup agent on the previously failing scope, watching for the same problem rather than assuming success from a quiet log. Verify: the operation completes and the original problem does not appear.
5. Compare the result against the source of truth, the payroll register, the tax filings or the employee records, so a silent partial success is caught. Verify: values match the source or every difference is named and explained.
6. Record the fix, the triggering input and the verification result on the employee or run record so the next occurrence is recognised immediately. Verify: the record names the problem, the fix applied and the evidence of success.

## Variant phrasings

### auth credential expired mid-run agent failed to verify new hire tax setup in payroll system
The verbatim form searchers paste from the console, report or run log. Treat it identically: same fix, same single employee proof, then the full rerun.

### How to fix - auth token expired mid-run agent failed to verify new hire tax setup in payroll system error session expired failure
The how to phrasing for the same failure in new hire tax setup agent. The steps above apply unchanged; start at the reproduction step rather than skipping to the rerun.

### new hire tax setup agent troubleshooting for this failure
The symptom first phrasing used when the console hides the full problem. Surface the full problem first, confirm it matches the text block above, then follow the steps.

## Why it happens
New hire verification opens several setup screens per hire and is usually done in a batch near the payroll deadline, so a session expiry mid batch loses track of which hires were fully checked unless each result is written down as it completes.

## Edge cases
- The employee was terminated, transferred or given a rate change after the failing run started. Refresh the employee state and reapply the fix against the current values, not the values from the failed run.
- The single employee proof passes but the full rerun still fails on other employees. Treat each remaining failure as its own scope, because a shared pay code or import can hide more than one cause.
- The source systems disagree on the correct value. The payroll register governs amounts paid, the tax filings govern amounts reported, and the employee record governs setup; record which source won and why.

Compatibility: new hire tax setup agent at current versions, plus the payroll system, time system or general ledger the query names; no extra tooling beyond access to the payroll register, tax filings and employee records needed to verify results.

## Provenance

Resolved from the public thread: https://vectle.com/posts/pst_7tySG1ptR2AFLFkt9WP98A