Pay Group Maintenance

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Pay groups determine the frequency the employees in your business are paid. Your business may have weekly, fortnightly or monthly pays - each of these needs a pay group. Alternatively you may have two fortnightly pays that are run on alternate fortnights, these too will need separate pay groups established as the calendar assigned to the pay group will define the pay period end dates. Calendars should be established before the pay groups are created.

The pay group is also used if transaction types are flagged x by weeks. Greentree Desktop uses the weekly conversion factor on the pay group to calculate the value of the transaction type.

For example, all the employees in a business may work a 40 hour week. However, some are paid monthly (weekly conversion is 4.3333) and some fortnightly (weekly conversion is 2). If the ordinary time transaction type is set to x by weeks, the ordinary hours assigned to each employee can be 40. When the pays are processed employees, who are assigned the monthly pay group is paid 173.3333 hours (40 x 4.33333) and those paid fortnightly is paid 80 hours (40 x 2).

The Annual Conversion factor is used on the Employee Maintenance form when converting values for an employee from an annual amount to a weekly, fortnightly, four weekly, or monthly amount. These are usually set as 52 for weekly and 26 for fortnightly.

If using these values to convert back to a weekly or fortnightly amount, the figures are inflated as there are more than 52 weeks and 26 fortnights in a year. For this calculation to be exact, you must take leap years into account. For example, 365 x 3 + 366 = 1461 ÷ 4 = 365.25 ÷ 14 = 26.089285 = 26.09, which is a four-year average that takes leap year into account. Selecting the pay frequency defaults these values.

Expected Payment Date

Days from end of pay period and day of month (for monthly pay groups only).

These values determine which pays to include in the YTD values on the pay slips. In Australia, this is used for calculating the expected SGC payment date, and to determine the date for the tax calculation. In the UK, this determines the estimated payment date and calculations of PAYE tax and National Insurance. If there is a delay between the pay end date and the payment date, the delay could force the pay into a new period or financial year. If the pay end date and the payment date are the same, the value entered should be zero.

If you enter a value here, and the payment date is in a new period, the pay is excluded from the YTD value on the pay slip. The tax is also calculated using the payment date and the effective date of any rate changes on the tax transaction type (in Australia only). If the payment date spans a financial year end, in Australia, the pay is accounted for in the next year's payment summaries.

Earnings Summary

The pay group also allows selection of information related to calculating averages, including the Accumulators which contains the transaction types to include in the average, how many weeks or months to include and if there are any weeks to exclude from the calculation. The display of the averages can also be set on this form and optionally overridden at an employee level. These averages can be viewed by clicking the Scales button on the Employee or Pay forms.

When setting this up for a monthly pay group, only set the number of months. For a weekly pay group, set the number of weeks and any weeks to exclude if used. These figures are for informational purposes only. The settings do not change the value returned for New Zealand on a pay using the change on the transaction type. For New Zealand, the number of weeks should be set as 4. The 52 week average is hard coded in Greentree Desktop.

The accumulators on the Pay Group will vary depending on the country. For Australia and United Kingdom, one accumulator that defines which transaction types are included in the average calculations and used for the Apply rate override calculations from the transaction type.

For New Zealand, you must set three accumulators: Gross Earnings, Ordinary Weekly Pay and the Relevant Daily Pay. These are used for the Apply rate override on the transaction type, and other calculations. The accumulators are used for:

• Gross Earnings
• 52 week rate change calculation
• 8% annual leave calculation (on termination when the employee is employed for less than a year)
• Extra pay calculation to determine the tax code for the extra payments.
• Ordinary Weekly Pay
• Four week rate change calculation
• Relevant Daily Pay
• Day of week average rate override

The Employment New Zealand website specifies which payments should be included for each of these calculations. The accumulators should include the transaction types that make up these definitions.

Name

Enter or select the name of the pay group to edit.

Calendar

Enter or select the calendar for the pay group.

GL Clearing Account

Use this field to either enter an entire general ledger account code or part of a general ledger account code along with wildcard characters (*). The general ledger clearing account code maintained in this field may control if the employee's pay is expensed in the general ledger.

Note: This field defines whether or not the employee's pay is costed.

Expense Account Mask

Use this field to either enter an entire general ledger account code or part of a general ledger account code along with wildcard characters (*). The expense account code maintained in this field may control if the employee's pay is expensed in the general ledger.

Note: This field defines whether or not the employee's pay is costed.

Pay frequency

This field displays the pay frequency that applies to this pay group. Options are Fortnightly, Four Weekly, Monthly, and Weekly.

A default weekly and annual conversion factor is based on this selection, but you can change it if salaries are based on 52.14 weeks or 26.09 fortnights per year.

Weekly Conversion Factor

This is the number of weeks in the pay frequency. This defaults from the Pay frequency field, but enter the conversion factor relevant to the pay group maintained.

Annual Conversion Factor

The annual conversion factor is used in the Annualisation on the Employee Maintenance form. This is taken from the Pay frequency field, but enter the conversion factor for the pay group

You can use the conversion factor if the annual salary doesn't use the pay group conversion factor. This could be — for example, if salaries are based on 52.14 weeks or 26.09 fortnights per year.

Browser Summary Tree

Select the summary tree to use in the browser client for displaying alternate pay slip heading details. Sites can split out Superannuation (Aus), PAYE, and NI (UK) separately or any other values from the pay.

HMRC Group (UK Only)

Select the HMRC Group that applies to this pay group.

Estimated Payment Date

Days from end of pay period

Enter the normal number of days between the pay end date and the payment date.

Day of month

For a monthly pay group, if the payment is made on the same day of the month, enter the date here.

Accumulator (Aus and UK)

Select the accumulator that contains the transaction types that will be used for the average earnings calculations.

Gross earnings (NZ)

Select the accumulator that contains the transaction types that make up gross earnings.

Ordinary weekly pay (NZ)

Select the accumulator that contains the transaction types that make up ordinary weekly pay.

Relevant daily pay (NZ)

Select the accumulator that contains the transaction types that make up relevant daily pay.

Number of weeks

Enter the number of weeks of pays to include in the average.

Number of months

Enter the number of months of pays to include in the average.

Exclude weeks

Enter the number of weeks that the average shouldn't include. If the number of weeks is set as 4, and the exclude weeks is set as 2, then the average is for the last four weeks, excluding the two most recent weeks.

Hours

The options selected will influence the average rate calculation.

The options are:

• Normal Hours Worked - The average is calculated by dividing the wages by the hours on transaction types on the pay defined as normal hours.
• Standard Hours - The average is calculated by dividing the wages by the hours per pay entered on the Balance Tracking tab.

The wages are determined by totalling the transactions in the accumulator above for the combined pays.

Display Type

This option will define the way the average rate displays on the Balances form.

The options are:

• Weekly - Greentree Desktop will show the average using the number of weeks set on the pay group, and an average based on 52 weeks.
• Monthly - Greentree Desktop will show an average using the number months set on the pay group, and an average based on 12 months.

Default for expected SGC payment date (Australia Only)

You can select the method used to default the expected SGC payment date to the Employer Cost tab on the Pay Entry form. This date uses the period end date for each pay and can be overridden. Pay slips displays the message Expected payment of SGC on or before dd/mm/yyyy.

Plus X days

Select this option to add a specified number of days to the Period End date for the pay. For example, the period end date is 15^th July. If you enter 10, the default is 25 July.

Xth day of these month

Select this option to add a specific date in these month. For example, period end date is in July - if 10 is entered, the default is 10 August.

Xth day of the month after the end of the quarter

Select this option to add a specific date in the next quarter. Quarters are based on a calendar year (January to December). For example, the period end date is 15^th July. If you enter 10 in this field, the default date is 10 September.

No default

Select this if no date is to default to the Employer Cost tab on the Pay Entry.

Where X =

Enter the number of days to use if one of the first three options above is selected.

• Employee Maintenance
• Process Payroll
• Module Control

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