Select the allowance name from the list, or just type the allowance name in. Elite Payroll will check to see if the allowance already exists, and if it doesn’t exist you'll be asked if you want to add it. Enter Car Allowance in the Name column.This example uses the sample company file to demonstrate setting up an award.
1 From the Lists menu, choose Awards. The Awards List is displayed.
To add an award from the Tour Guide, click Create New Award from the Company section.
2 Click Awards>New. The Adding a New Award window is displayed.
3 Complete the award details on the Standard Details and Award Payment Details tabs. To create a Timesheet award, you must also complete the TimeSheet payments tab.
1 When creating a federal award, use the name of the award. If you are creating an award to hold information about a group of employees, enter a name that means something to you. For this example, enter the award name Sales Staff.
2 Enter the name of the department where the employees under this award would normally work. This award is for the sales staff, so the department will be Sales. You can either select the department from the list, or just type the department name in. Elite Payroll will check to see if the department already exists, and if it doesn’t exist you'll be asked if you want to add it.
3 Select how often employees under this award will be paid. The sales employees are paid once a month. To ensure Elite Payroll pays the employees once a month we need to select the pay period Monthly.
4 Most employees are entitled to employer paid superannuation. The sales employees are entitled to SGC. To ensure the correct amount of superannuation is calculated each pay period you need to select Percentage and enter the SGC percentage of 9%
5 The employees are also entitled to annual leave and sick leave. To set up the annual leave, click in the Leave Type column and select Annual Leave.
6 In the Start Accruing After column, specify how long the employee must be employed for before leave starts accruing. In this case the probation period is three months, so enter 3 in the Number column, and select Months from the Period drop-down list.
7 Finally, you need to enter how much leave should accrue. Because these employees are monthly we have specified that they accrue 13 hours each pay period, no matter how many hours they work. Enter 13 in the Accrue Hours column.
This process is repeated for each type of leave the employees are entitled to. When finished, complete the Award Payment Details tab.
1 The rates of pay need to specified for the employees under the award. When you create employees these rates of pay will be copied to the employee. Each rate of pay needs to be assigned to a classification, or level, within the award. The sales department has 3 levels of remuneration, the first level being called Level 1. Enter Level 1 in the Classification column.
2 The type of remuneration your employees receive needs to be selected. The sales staff are monthly employees who are paid a retainer. To specify that they get a fixed amount per month, select Monthly from the Type column.
3 You now need to specify how much remuneration employees under this award receive. For each classification, or level, in an award you can specify different remuneration amounts for permanent, part-time and casual staff. Under Permanent, enter $1850 and under Part-time enter $1080.
4 Some casual staff receive a loading amount in their hourly rate. This is to compensate them for not being entitled to annual leave or sick leave. Elite Payroll will automatically calculate the loading rate and adjust the employee's hourly rate accordingly. For this example, leave casual blank.
5 Elite Payroll now needs to know how to handle the classification. You can tell it to advance to the next level within the award automatically, or you can tell it not to do anything. In our example, the sales employees move between the classification levels when we move them. To do this, select Manual from the Advance column.
6 Each classification that you set up can have its own specific allowances and set rates for overtime or other rates of pay. The allowances and extra remuneration rates are copied to the employee record, speeding up the process of adding an employee.
For our example, only sales employees who are on level 3 receive a car allowance and are paid overtime at a fixed amount per hour. To enter a car allowance of $150 per pay we need to:
Select the allowance name from the list, or just type the allowance name in. Elite Payroll will check to see if the allowance already exists, and if it doesn’t exist you'll be asked if you want to add it. Enter Car Allowance in the Name column.
Enter 150 into the Amount column. This is the amount the employee will receive each pay.
Specify how often the allowance should be paid to the employee. In this example, we are specifying that it should be paid each pay period. Select Pays from the Based On column.
7 To specify that sales employees on this classification level receive $35 an hour for Time and a Half we need to enter these details in the Classification Extra Pay Rates section.
Tick the þ Advanced box at the bottom of the awards window. This opens the Classification Extra Pay Rates section.
From the Pay Rate column, select the pay rate Time and a Half.
Specify that we are entering an hourly rate. From the Pay Rate Type column, select Hourly Rate.
Enter 35 into the amount column.
Specify that superannuation is payable on any overtime the employee does.
Note that we did not specify the number of hours overtime that are normally worked. By leaving the hours worked at 0 we are preventing accidental payment of the overtime when it isn't due.
Once awards have been created, adding new employees or changing remuneration rates for a whole department becomes very easy.
If the award is a timesheet award, then you must also complete the timesheet award tab.