NEW BRUNSWICK -- During the first week of October last year, thousands of Rutgers University employees, ranging from doctors to housekeepers, reported to their jobs as they always do.

The employees, absorbed by Rutgers as part of its 2013 merger with the University of Medicine and Dentistry of New Jersey, worked their regular hours and submitted their time cards, according to the unions who represent them.

Four months later later, they are still waiting to be paid for that week.

Rutgers owes about 5,000 employees an estimated $500,000 at least in unpaid wages for a week of work that was lost in the transition from the UMDNJ payroll system to the Rutgers payroll system, according to four labor unions. Though the university has pledged to fully pay the wages over time, the unions say they want the money now and filed a wage theft complaint with the Department of Labor last month.

Even if the money is paid, Rutgers should face a penalty for withholding wages, said Kathleen Hernandez, a union representative for 350 people who work in supervisory roles.

"It's the whole idea that they think they can not pay people," Hernandez. "The audacity."

The four unions involved represent housekeepers, clerical staff, doctors, clinicians, scientists, librarians and operation and maintenance staff working throughout the university.

Rutgers said in a statement it's working with the unions to resolve the dispute but declined to comment on why it delayed the payments. At the university Board of Governors meeting on Wednesday, President Robert Barchi said the question isn't whether they money will be paid, but when.

"There is no question that Rutgers intends to see that all the employees are appropriately reimbursed," he said. "You have my guarantee as president that that's the case."

Rutgers offered to provide part of the missed pay in March and the rest in July, Hernandez said. But the unions shouldn't be punished for Rutgers apparent lack of planning for the payroll transition, she said, adding that some of the affected employees make a little as $13 an hour.

"Our people don't want to wait," Hernandez said.

The problem is one that was predicted by some when Rutgers and UMDNJ merged in 2013, the largest higher education merger in U.S. history.

At UMDNJ, employees would work for two weeks and receive a paycheck the following Friday, a one-week delay in payment. At Rutgers, employees work two weeks and receive a paycheck on Friday with no delay in payment.

Rutgers could have elected to pay the legacy UMDNJ employees for three weeks in one paycheck when it made the payroll transition, Hernandez said. Instead, those employees worked for three weeks but received pay only for the final two, said Juanita Howard, a union representative for medical fellows, residents and interns.

"It's one thing to withhold," Howard said. "But you have to give the money back in a reasonable amount of time."

Howard, a Rutgers-Newark alumnus, told the Board of Governors she was having a difficult time explaining what happened to her union members.

"As somebody who has gone to this school and loved this school, it doesn't feel good to have to explain that this has happened and that we're trying really hard to get the wages out of you," she said.

Adam Clark may be reached at adam_clark@njadvancemedia.com. Follow him on twitter at @realAdamClark. Find NJ.com on Facebook