Confessions of a payroll manager – ‘Mighty Morphin Payroll Rangers!’
Another episode in a series of occasional yet insightful/inciteful, anonymous and whimsical reports revealing the arcane, weird and sometimes torturous world of payroll frequented by payroll professionals. Y ou know that feeling you get when walking around a shop, perfectly innocently without thought of shoplifting or being even vaguely naughty, and suddenly you spy the security guard? Despite the fact that you know you’ve done nothing wrong and the only thing you’ve ever stolen in your life is a wheel off your little brother’s scooter to make a unicycle for your pet rabbit, there’s a guilt that washes over you. A sense that somehow you’ve been caught! That’s exactly the feeling I had a week last Tuesday when the finance department called to set up a visit from the internal audit team. As a manager of a sensitive team of misfits and the much-misunderstood, it was my task to see them through the audit despite my own fears. Much like a mum catching a spider in her bare hands to prove to little Timmy that they’re not at all scary while simultaneously seeing spots in front of her eyes and reassuring herself she’ll shower with Jif later. That’s me, with my team. It was time to bring out my annual (fool proof) strategy for getting through an audit. Soft soothing sounds, sympathetic Bambi eyes and the three rules of audit survival for them all to get behind. ● Rule one – be careful what you say. Even if that means pretending you’re on a sponsored silence for world biscuit day – better to say nothing at all than confess to signing off Mr Crumbitt’s underwear
expenses (long story!). ● Rule two – make the auditors lots of tea. It’s hard to act intimidating when they’re constantly running to the toilet! ● Rule three – do not offer the auditors any of Mr Crumbitt’s ‘special’ biscuits. The apprentice three back from Jace offered the audit team a plate full of ‘mustard’ creams. The audit was somewhat cut short that year and the report was damning! There was also a lot of time spent reassuring the team that really we had nothing to hide and we are very good at what we do with controls sufficient to impress MI5. Despite this, Evie started sobbing at one point and finally confessed that she was three days behind with her filing. Two hot chocolates later and a hug from Tom Cumberland (crafty Evie!) she was bright as a button and filing merrily in the stacks. The power of cocoa, sugar and Tom! After a rather tense start to the team audit survival meeting (which felt more like a Western stand-off than a gathering of friendly colleagues) we managed to have a thorough look at all the areas the auditors wanted to inspect: gross to net calculations, termination payments, expenses and the control accounts. (I’m meant to reconcile the controls every month – but though thinking I might have missed a couple it turned out to be seven! Oops – security guard guilt!) The night before the audit, the team upped a gear and transformed into something resembling the Mighty Morphin Power Rangers. We were seriously kick ass! Jace was on food and drink detail (his takeaway ordering was almost military in its efficiency – and we got three free pizzas),
while the rest of us got filing up to date, crossing ‘t’s, dotting ‘i’s and giving everything a darn good tidy. As we sat and ate our free pizzas I told the team about past audits and I suddenly realised they were all properly listening to me. There was actual silence (apart from the sound of tearing pizza base and the occasional muffled belch – pardon). A couple of them were taking notes and I was happy to see that everyone looked really rather relaxed. On audit day this spirit of relaxation, confidence in our processes and general camaraderie led to a very successful outcome – we were deemed ‘excellent’. I was so proud of them all I had to excuse myself and go and have a little cry on the fire escape. There was only one slight hiccup which came from Jace taking my “be friendly” advice just a little too far and asking one member of the audit team out on a date. My embarrassment was short-lived however as she immediately agreed and they’ve swiftly become the romance story of the year. So, it’s back to whatever can be called ‘normal’ in the office and the team have been floating on the cloud of audit success for a couple of days now. For me it’s straight back to expenses wizardry as Mr Crumbitt has handed in a claim form for two metres of liquorice ribbon, eight jars of pickled onions, a pasta roller and a pair of Spiderman pants. The mind boggles! o The Editor: Any resemblance to any payroll manager or professional alive or dead, or any payroll department or organisation whether apparently or actually portrayed in this article is simply fortuitous.
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| Professional in Payroll, Pensions and Reward |
Issue 23 | September 2016
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