Taxes: General Information
Each payroll-related tax (whether it is of the employee withholding type or the employer type) is represented by a payroll tax code. The tax code describes the type of tax, the jurisdiction it is associated with, the tax agency that receives the tax payments, and the specific tax location information necessary for the calculation of the tax by the Symmetry Tax Engine software. Many taxes require additional detailed information, as mandated by the specific government entity, and these details are entered and maintained through attributes associated with the specific tax code.
Learning Objectives
In this chapter, you will learn how to create payroll-related taxes and assign the appropriate taxes to employees based on their work location or address.
Applicable Scenarios
You configure payroll-related taxes if you want to process payroll documents with state withholding taxes and employer taxes calculated because the system will prevent you from calculating a paycheck if the relevant taxes are not assigned to the employee.
Setting Up Taxes
By clicking Update Taxes on the form toolbar of the Tax Maintenance (PR208000) form, you download the latest tax details from the Tax Symmetry engine, and then the system creates tax codes related to all employee addresses and work locations stored in the system. As a result, the Tax Codes tab on that form becomes populated with data. You need to perform this operation during the initial configuration of taxes in the system and then each time new tax information becomes available in the Tax Symmetry engine—you will see a warning on the Paychecks and Adjustments (PR302000) and Payroll Batches (PR301000) forms if tax information needs to be updated in the system.
On the Tax Codes tab of the Tax Maintenance form, all available taxes are listed in the table. In the row of each tax code whose settings need to be updated or reviewed, a warning or an error icon is displayed, depending on whether the setting is marked as required. The settings of the selected tax code are displayed in the Tax Settings table. By clicking View Tax Details on the table toolbar, you can open the Tax Details dialog box, which displays the details of the selected tax, such as the government-issued identification code for the employer and information from the tax engine.
On the Company Tax tab of the Tax Maintenance form, you can review and edit details for various employee attributes used for taxation. The list of attributes is loaded from the Tax Symmetry engine and updated when you click Update Taxes on the form toolbar.
After the taxes have been created and reviewed, you can click Assign Taxes to Employees on the form toolbar. As a result, the system assigns the relevant taxes to all employees based on their work locations and resident addresses, which are specified on the General tab of the Employee Payroll Settings (PR203000) form. (For more information about work locations, see Work Locations: General Information.)
To assign taxes to an individual employee, you need to click the Import Taxes button on the Taxes tab of the Employee Payroll Settings form. As a result, the system fills in the table in the left pane of the tab with the relevant taxes based on the work locations and the address specified for the employee.
Using Custom Notes
To record a piece of information about a tax code or tax attribute and share it with other users, you can use custom text notes.
Each of the following tables has the Note column, which you can use to attach a custom text note to a particular line:
- The Tax Codes table on the Tax Codes tab of the Tax Maintenance (PR208000) form
- The Tax Settings table on the Tax Codes tab of the Tax Maintenance form. A note added through this table is displayed for the same tax attribute in the Company Notes column of the Tax Settings table on the Taxes tab of the Employee Payroll Settings (PR203000) form
- The table on the Company Tax tab of the Tax Maintenance form. A note added through this table is displayed for the same tax attribute in the Company Notes column of the table on the Tax Settings tab of the Employee Payroll Settings form
- The table on the Tax Settings tab of the Employee Payroll Settings form
- The Tax Settings table on the Taxes tab of the Employee Payroll Settings form