REWARD
February is themonth of love! This Valentine’s Day, unwindwith these payroll love stories... Payroll love stories
Back in April 2017, the public sector introduced off-payroll working. Anyone who has dealt with this knows how much of a shake-up it caused. At the time, I was processing payrolls for the National Health Service – temporary staffing and doctors to be more specific – a group that regularly utilised limited companies to process work. All this changed overnight: payrolls that were 90% limited companies, which required less processing, were now 90% pay as you earn (PAYE) workers. This meant a lot more processing was required, on top of the need to process many new starters, at the start of a new tax year, no less. We all know a new tax year can be busy, but this was another level. The whole team did a fantastic job, we pulled together and shared information. We supported each other with getting payrolls completed on time. The work was stressful, but the environment was fantastic. Thank you to all the colleagues who made that time manageable, the software developers that helped us deliver, the clients that understood how difficult it was and the entire payroll community for the ideas and discussions shared online. You make me proud to be a payroller.
When I first started on my payroll journey, I didn’t understand tax codes. Leave that to the wizards behind the curtain at Her Majesty’s Revenue and Customs (HMRC). How do they work? Who knows? Leave that to the system. An employee complains they have been taxed wrong – that’s what the computer has calculated. So, when I was given the chance to learn manual calculations, I jumped at the opportunity. That is, until I was presented with reams of paper and informed this was the instruction booklet. Pages upon pages of directions and numbers, leave it to the computer I thought, this is going to be way too complicated. But I read the instructions, I followed the guidance, tried a few examples and was completely shocked to realise how methodical it is. It’s all there in black and white, it’s nothing to fear. Before long, I was doing them every chance I got, teaching others and loving it. Learning manual tax calculations was one of the best things I did early in my payroll career, and I would encourage any new payroll administrator to do it as soon as possible. It makes such a difference and made me so much more confident in my payroll abilities.
This isn’t your archetypal love story. It doesn’t centre on two people who fall madly in love, but rather on the love for a profession, and for the others who work within it. Payroll is very niche in its nature. There are ongoing discussions on whether it should sit within human resource (HR) or finance, or, indeed, if it should be a department within its own right. To me, none of that matters. What payroll professionals are genuinely concerned with, is giving their customers (whether that be members of staff or clients) the best possible service and ensuring that people are paid both accurately and on time. I reluctantly talk about the pandemic (as it’s all we’ve heard about for the past two years), but it has undoubtedly shone a light on the payroll profession. Payrollers continued to process payrolls while the coronavirus job retention scheme guidance was frequently updated (at one point, daily). They proved their department’s strategic value, often assisting organisations in making key decisions about who to place on furlough and the best course of action to take. Hopefully, in 2022, everyone will continue to see the true value of the payroll department and of having knowledgeable, conscientious payroll professionals working within organisations. We love you, payroll.
| Professional in Payroll, Pensions and Reward | February 2022 | Issue 77 30
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