Payroll
the relevant sources (including CIPP, of course), and also lean on vendors and experts who interpret these changes for application to your business. Remember that payroll technology solution vendors not only build and sell these platforms, but their teams are also dedicated to the understanding and translation of legislative updates. One such expert is my colleague Darren Brennan, CoreHR’s dedicated legislation manager, who tweets legislative updates and their associated impact on UK and Irish payroll teams: https://twitter.com/DarrenB_ CoreHR. Study the detail Legislation is evolving quickly. What was current a week ago may have now been superseded by an update, the impact of which on your business can be judged only by you. Staying abreast of the implications of legislation on your business enables you to leverage support from peers, vendors and industry experts in time so you can plan. Review your systems What has been working until now will likely need some amendments to take you through the next few months. The key elements to review are compliance with legislation, data security and barriers to payroll accuracy and timeliness. If you are using one unified software product to manage human resources (HR), workforce management and payroll – and, even better, your system is cloud- hosted (software as a service (SaaS) – you are in a good position. Assess what features are available within the platform to support new ways of working, e.g. irregular shifts, updated payment schedules, updating of employee records and the subsequent impact on payroll. Have you reviewed your system access and security, now that your team may be accessing remotely? Ensure you are still compliant, and that everyone has the necessary access to complete payroll tasks. If, however, you are using a standalone software product take precautions around the accuracy of data as multiple system owners amend their processes during this time. Review the security of data transfer and understand whether there will be delays that could impact payment runs. Now that your team is working remotely, compliance and the flow of data could be
...a skilled, agile and able group that’s getting on top of this new reality...
CoreHR is one such vendor, currently running compliant payroll for over one million customer employees through our secure managed payroll service. We also offer an emergency payroll service that enables new or existing customers to call on our years of payroll experience when you need it most. It is likely your solution vendor will also be publishing a wealth of freely available commentary and product recommendations, to enable you to leverage functionality currently held in your platform at this time. At CoreHR, we have released updates on product features to meet specific COVID-related needs, and are also publishing free guidance, including expert-led webinars. Learn more at www.corehr.com/ covid-19/. n We are all in this together As time ticks by, as much as payroll professionals might have had cause to panic a few weeks back, I believe we are a skilled, agile and able group that’s getting on top of this new reality. With the support too of highly responsive payroll tech and services providers, many of us are now coping well under Covid-19 conditions, even if we cannot yet claim all is ‘business as usual.’ CoreHRs’ Payroll in a crisis: Covid-19 and beyond can be viewed here: https://bit.ly/2y810gR.
a challenge for you. It’s important not to underestimate how a change in processes and ways of working will impact the time it takes to run your payroll jobs, and that’s without considering the potential loss of expertise from your payroll team. This will increase workload and reduce the resources you have available to resolve queries that may well increase exponentially now from managers across the business. Whatever system you use, leverage the support available from your solution vendors, stay connected with them on things like identifying and paying furloughed employees, making a claim for reimbursement, system access while working from home, reconciliation with the relevant legislative bodies, operating the subsidy scheme (in Republic of Ireland) to ensure employees will be in receipt of the subsidy payment along with any weekly wages paid by their employer.
Seek support It is worth remembering that this is
happening to every payroll professional. There could be great benefit in reaching out to peer networks, knowledge sharing, and seeking support from industry experts and solution vendors who are speaking daily with payroll teams. And if it’s the case that you are unable to run your payroll on time and accurately, there are teams available to you that can.
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| Professional in Payroll, Pensions and Reward |
Issue 60 | May 2020
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