Creating and Managing Payroll Controls

About Payroll Controls

The Payroll Controls option lets you add, edit, and delete payroll controls. Every piece of payroll information tracked by the program is kept using a payroll control, whether that information is hours worked, pay earned, taxes withheld, payroll taxes paid by the employer, weeks worked, vacation earned or taken, or net pay. Payroll controls determine what kind of payroll information is kept, how it is categorized, how it appears on forms required by the government and on checks, and how it is posted to the general ledger.

If you are using the Payroll Calculation granule, you can also define how the program calculates the payroll control. This involves creating a calculation method for the control, setting the base amount (sometimes called the taxable gross), entering tax tables, and possibly setting up an employee-based payroll rate.

When payroll is processed, the application is triggered to cycles through each employee, one at a time. For each employee, all the payroll controls are executed. The payroll controls are essentially mini-programs that can calculate amounts, appearing in the calculation order and on the employee’s card. Each payroll control creates a line in the payroll journal. Once all the payroll controls for the first employee are executed, the process is executed for the next employee and continues until all employees are processed.

The following diagram illustrates the payroll control flow:

Understanding How Payroll Controls Work

To understand how payroll controls work and how you should use them, read the following list before you begin creating your own payroll controls:

• Payroll controls can be of two types:
  • Non-calculated payroll controls enable you to input an amount immediately prior to processing payroll, such as the number of hours worked. For example, HOUR REG is a non-calculated payroll control.
  • Calculated payroll controls have contain code, called method steps, which produce a result. For example, EARN HOUR is a payroll control that takes the number of hours an employee worked (stored in HOUR REG) and multiplies it by the employee’s hourly pay rate.
• Each payroll control is run in the order they appear in the calculation order. This enables the results of one payroll control to be used by another payroll control. For example, an employee’s salaried, calculated by EARN SAL, needs to be calculated before federal income tax (FIT) can be calculated.
• If a calculation order is not specified, the default Master Calculation Order is used.
• A payroll control needs to be present in both the calculation order and on the Employee card to run. If it is missing in either place, a line is not created in the payroll journal.
• Method steps, the lines of code that are used by calculation-type payroll controls, can store numbers in four variables, two of which are recorded in the payroll journal.
  • Payroll Amount – this variable is stored in the payroll journal. Method steps usually refer to this variable as Amount. Generally, this variable stores numbers that appear on an employee’s pay stub.
  • Taxable Amount – this variable is stored in the payroll journal. Method steps usually refer to this variable as Taxable. Generally, this variable stores numbers that are used to calculate the number stored in Amount. For example, the FIT (federal income tax) stores the employee’s taxable earnings in the Taxable variable and the federal withholding amount in the Amount variable.
  • Adjusted Amount – this variable is not stored and is only used as a temporary holding place while the payroll control is executed.
  • Temp Amount – this variable is not stored and is only used as a temporary holding place while the payroll control is executed.
• If a payroll control produces zero amounts in both the Payroll Amount and Taxable Amount variables, a line will not be inserted in the payroll journal.
• The payroll control pulls information from several sources, including:
  • Rates – rates appear on employee cards and employer cards.
  • Tax Authority Info – employee tax-related records, such as filing status, number of allowances, and exempt/credit information are stored here.
  • Other Authority Info – information used to lookup non-tax information, such as health insurance rates based on employee status (single, married, or family) is stored here.
  • Base Amounts – aggregated amounts from other payroll controls.
  • Brackets – these are lookup tables; the system finds the correct record in the lookup table based on records stored in the employee’s Tax or Other Authority Info tables.
  • Pay Structures - these are grid-style records that return a value based on the employee’s step and grade (the intersection of a row and column in a table).

The following diagram illustrates the relationship between various records and payroll controls:

Creating Payroll Controls

The Payroll module is able to handle any type of calculation with user-definable payroll controls. Define as many payroll controls as you require. Payroll controls are any type of earning, benefit, deduction, accrual, hour, and so on that needs to be managed. You can determine exactly what payroll controls get printed on an employee check or direct deposit stub and define when a payroll control is calculated.

To create a payroll control:

1. From the Payroll menu, select Payroll Controls.
   The Payroll Controls page opens.
2. From the Ribbon, click New.
3. Use the following tables for assistance in completing the fields within the Payroll Control page.

Payroll Control General Tab

Payroll Control Calculations Tab

Payroll Control Distribution Tab

The options selected on this tab trigger the application to split the amount(s) calculated by the payroll control based on a different payroll control.

For example, if hourly employees work in more than one department (and there is a ‘Department’ dimension), hours are entered by department in the time journal. If the employee worked 10 hours, 3 hours in department A and 7 hours in department B, when payroll is calculated, the EARN REG payroll control is automatically assigned 30% of gross pay to department A and 70% to department B.)

Managing Payroll Controls

There are several functions available within the Payroll Control page enabling you to review and manage the details (options and parameters assigned) for an existing payroll control.

To access the Payroll Control page, In the Search field, type Payroll Control and select the page from the drop-down list.

Reviewing the Data Assigned to Payroll Control

The following table provides instructions for accessing/using the options within the Pay Control section of the Navigate toolbar:

Reviewing the Calculation Codes Assigned to a Payroll Control

The following table provides the details for the controls/functions within the Calculation section of the Navigate toolbar:

Copying Payroll Controls

You can copy a payroll control to rename it as a new control. This enables you to create new payroll controls

quickly that are similar and just make modifications to the newly created control as required. To copy a payroll control:

1. From the Payroll Control List, click the Actions tab.
2. From the Ribbon, click Copy.
   The Copy Payroll Control page opens.
3. In the New Payroll Control text box, enter a name for the new payroll control.
4. Click OK.
   The Payroll Control page re-opens with the newly created payroll control displayed.
5. Make the necessary modifications, if required.

Attachments (5)

Image_043.jpeg
64.4 KB

Image_044.jpeg
24.1 KB

payroll_cont....png
50.4 KB

payroll_cont....png
34.4 KB

payroll_cont....png
16.5 KB