The act of paying employees is probably one of the most universal in the world and has gone on for centuries. We often take payroll for granted. It’s one of the most important business processes in any organisation. For employees, their pay is their primary motivator and the thing they need to keep their lives and families on-track. They need to trust and rely that they are being paid accurately to the cent and have peace of mind that taxes and superannuation compliance are taken care of. For the employer, people costs are nearly always the largest cost in the business. For that reason, payroll doesn’t just need to be good; it needs to be perfect. And the reality is, the process of payroll has been less than perfect for a long time. The modern-day complexities of employment such as income tax, insurance payments, national legislation, multiple work patterns and the complicated structure of pay and award contracts means that payroll is anything but simple.
On-premise payroll software has supported businesses for decades. But as the world of work has evolved, it has left teams frustrated and quite literally, tearing their hair out. These are some of the most common gripes that people have with their current payroll software:
The most common problems:
- Multiple legal entities
The team must process payroll for multiple legal entities as a matter of routine. However their payroll software can’t cope with one more than one.
- Multiple databases needed
Payroll data has ended up being spread across multiple different databases. This has become messy and is costing more than it should to host and maintain.
- Payroll software can’t cope with multiple payment frequencies
Chances are, you have people who get paid weekly, fortnightly, monthly and Bi monthly (and even rarer annually). Most payroll systems have a tantrum when you try and throw all this at them for payroll calculations.
- Can’t run multiple payrolls concurrently
If you’re one of the lucky ones and your payroll software can handle multiple payrolls, the chances are only one person can be working on one payroll at once (which is a challenge for productivity)
- Poor reporting and lack of visibility
Legacy payroll systems were designed to run payroll and often it stops there. They don’t give you the real-time insight needed to make informed business decisions. They don’t allow you to forecast flexibly.
- Pulling off a report is like going back to the 1980s
Does your payroll processing and timesheet system grind to a halt or crash when you try and pull off a report? It’s like computing was back in the 80s.
- Two payrolls fall on the same day! Oh no! What do we do?
So many people complain that when two payrolls fall on the same day, their software won’t let them run them both together. Is that you?
- That dreaded question; how much leave do I have in November? - Noooooooooooo
Your people care about their leave entitlement - and it’s a question they do ask from time to time. Does that question fill you with dread? - or does your legacy payroll management system make this easy for you? Most systems don’t make this simple.
Don’t sweat - because the next generation of cloud based Payroll software like Jemini solves all of the above for you and goes even further…
1. Easy Tax calculations
Your tax file for IRD, and ATO is automatically generated and the software links directly to the relevant portal
2. Deducting it right!
All deductibles from gross pay are calculated automatically and the payroll runs from beginning to end - even producing the pay slips. Sophisticated calculation of pay and taxable earnings can take into account multiple payment types such as overtime, commissions, piece rates, allowances and disbursements (with management of protected earnings and minimum superannuation levels).
3. A real time, up-to-the-minute view
Payroll systems like Jemini don’t rely on a batch process in order to update leave and accruals. It’s accurate every minute of the day (so you can access that data and trust and share anytime).
4. Automatic legislative updates
Have confidence that your payroll software reflects the latest legislative updates (e.g. SAAS). Look forward to regular updates, instead of heavy and intensive update processes. You’re always getting the latest enhancements at no extra cost.
5. Date Effectiveness made simple
It can be an administrative nightmare when employees start between payrolls and pay and taxes normally need to be calculated manually (not ideal). Cloud systems like Jemini automatically calculate these pro-rata for you.
6. Need to retrospectively calculate and apply back-pay?
That’s not a problem. Just set the appropriate award rates and your cloud based payroll software will adjust all the historical pay and let you know the additional payment needed to each person.
7. Super easy self service
A self-service portal solves so many challenges. It let’s your people securely access their pay-slips online from anywhere, putting an end to the risky practice of emailing pay-slips (which has many security flaws). More than anything, your self-service portal means people can make leave requests, log absences and see exactly how much leave they will be entitled to at a future point in time (even including time they have already asked to have off).
