MYOB Payroll - Frequently Asked Questions Looking for help with MYOB Payroll? This knowledge base aims to answer every question that readers have, compiling the list of questions (and answers!) found in the guide Making the Most of MYOB Payroll, available for purchase online at the special price of only $19.95. This content is helpful for anyone using MYOB Accounting Plus, MYOB Premier or MYOB AccountEdge. You'll find that our MYOB Payroll page is a work-in-progress, with new content added every week or so. If you can't see the answer you're looking for, visit our MYOB Forum Board and pose your question there instead. Getting Started with MYOB PayrollIf you’re new to the game, managing your payroll using MYOB is a big learning curve: not only do you have to get your head around how the software works, but you also have to acquire an understanding of industrial awards and government regulations. (If you don't have MYOB Payroll yet, and to read more about different versions of MYOB Accounting Plus, MYOB Premier or MYOB AccountEdge, visit our Choosing Accounting Software page.) In real life, you can’t expect to become an instant human resources expert, especially if you’re learning how to work accounting software at the same time. However, what you can do is set off in the right direction, building your knowledge as you go. You may find that you record your first few employee pays without having much of a clue about holiday leave accruals, tax scales or superannuation. The detail comes later, as you build an understanding of how the pieces of the jigsaw fit together. Becoming an Employer The frequently-asked questions below give you a few pointers on some of the obligations you have as an employer. However, don’t be hoodwinked into thinking that with these steps in place, you’re set; in theory, as an employer, you need to become an expert on everything from industrial relations to occupational health and safety. To research these obligations further, the government-sponsored Business Online website is worth a visit: go to www.business.gov.au and follow the ‘Employing people’ link. How do I register as an employer?
Do I need any special insurance policies?
What forms should I give to new employees? Using MYOB Payroll SoftwareIf you’re reading this webpage, you probably already have MYOB Accounting Plus or MYOB Premier (the versions of MYOB that include payroll features). However, just in case you haven’t already made the leap, the next questions are for you. At what point is payroll software worthwhile?
My version of MYOB software doesn’t include payroll. What are my options?
What’s the best time of year to start?
What do I need to maintain by way of employee records? Working with the MYOB Easy Setup AssistantWith the help of the question-and-answer interview built into the Easy Setup Assistant, setting up MYOB Payroll is pretty straightforward. If you’re setting up your company file from scratch, you automatically work your way through this interview. However, if you’re already recording transactions in your company file, you can access this interview by going to your Setup menu and selecting Easy Setup Assistant, followed by the Payroll button. By the way, for more detail about installing MYOB software and setting up your company file from scratch, see Making the Most of MYOB Business Software. What’s the minimum I have to do to get started?
How do I load my tax tables?
What should I choose as my payroll year?
How many hours are there in a working week?
What’s the go with linked accounts?
How do I review my payroll categories?
How do I set up a new employee?
Can I import my employee list from another program?
I started payroll mid-year. Where do I record pay history details? Protecting your MYOB Payroll Data using Passwords
Unless you do your bookkeeping away from your office or workplace, you almost certainly want to protect your MYOB company file. Not only do you have to consider the rights of employees to keep their personal information private from other employees, but you also want to prevent the possibility of an employee getting into their records and manipulating their own wages records (such cloak-and-dagger stuff is surprisingly common). How do I keep employee records private? Can I set levels of access for different employees? MYOB Payroll - Understanding wages, allowances and awards For some businesses, paying wages is a simple proposition: you discuss with the employee their relevant hourly rate, multiply that rate by the number of hours worked each week to come up with their weekly pay rate and you’re done. However, as your business grows, paying wages is bound to get more complex as you encounter things like employee allowances, vehicle reimbursements, bonuses, back pay, and much more. Underpinning any agreement with your employee is the award under which they are employed (with the exception of some salaried employees working in managerial positions, who aren’t employed under an award). Before agreeing with an employee about their base hourly rate, shift loadings or penalty rates, take time to research how your proposals fit with the legal minimum. Figuring out your base lineIf you’re new to the whole game of being an employer, then you’ll find that setting up an employee in MYOB Payroll is only half the picture. Not only do you need to understand how to pay your employees, you need to understand how much to pay your employees. What are awards and how do they work? Can I pay over the award for some things and under for others? Recording employee personal details and ratesWhen you click the Payroll Details tab of an employee’s card, you’re first shown their Personal Details. Most of the information in this section of their card is pretty self-explanatory, such as Date of Birth, Gender and Start Date. However, two of the settings – Employment Basis and Employment Classification – need more careful consideration.
What should I choose as the Employment Basis?
What about the Employment Classification?
Should I set up the Pay Basis as Hourly or Salary?
When I enter the annual salary, the weekly rate doesn’t calculate correctly. Why not?
Setting up standard pays The idea of standard pays is that they allow you to itemise the hours an employee works each week, what allowances they receive, whether they contribute additional superannuation and so on. These details then flow through to the Process Payroll window, ready to record each employee’s pay automatically. How do I review standard pays for each employee?
What if an employee’s pay varies from week to week?
How can I check whether the net pay is going to come up correctly? Setting up wages categories With MYOB Payroll, every type of wages paid to your employees has to have its own payroll category. For example, if an employee receives a motor vehicle allowance, you need a wages category called Motor Vehicle Allowance. Similarly, if an employee receives holidays, you need a wages category called Holiday Pay. Fortunately, MYOB software comes complete with a list that includes most standard payroll categories. All you have to do is customise this list to fit your business, deleting irrelevant categories and adding any extra categories specific to your business. How do I create a new wages category?
How do I create a new employee allowance?
How do I know whether tax is payable on an allowance?
What about employee reimbursements such as mileage or travel expenses?
How do I get employee reimbursements to show up separately in financial reports?
How do I claim back the GST on employee reimbursements? Setting up overtime and loadingsIf you’re going to be paying overtime and shift loadings, you need to become familiar with the relevant employee award. In particular, look to see whether overtime loadings are calculated on the normal casual hourly rate or on the base hourly rate that part-timers receive. Also, take care when paying shift loadings: the amount due often varies according to the number of hours worked; the day of the week and the age of the employee. What if an employee works at different rates, depending on their duties?
How do I set up overtime loadings?
How can I show casual holiday loadings as a separate amount?
How do I set up shift loadings? Employee advances, bonuses and sales commissions
Processing employee advances, bonuses and commissions can get pretty detailed and technical. Be comforted by the fact that most of these things are like riding a bike: once you’ve managed them once, you’ll never forget how. How do I deal with employee advances?
What happens with bonuses?
Can MYOB software calculate commissions?
How do I record comission payments? Dealing with pay rises and back pay
If you know that there’s been a pay rise and you have to update the pay rates for several employees, allow yourself enough time to get everything right. You’ll have to fix up pay rates in each employee’s card, double-check their pay, make sure everything comes up right when you to go to process payroll and last (if you’ve been late in implementing the pay rise), calculate back pay. How do I change an employee’s pay rate?
How do I record back pay? MYOB Payroll - Paying Your Employees
If you’re a newcomer to MYOB software, you’ll probably find the whole payroll process surprisingly easy — you record the number of hours worked and in a blink of the eye, all the calculations come up automatically, complete with the correct amount of PAYG withholding tax and superannuation. Once you get familiar with processing pays using MYOB software, take the time to learn how to process employee pays electronically. Whether you decide to pay electronically using MYOB M-Powered payments (where MYOB software essentially replaces your Internet banking software) or whether you decide to create a special bank file that you can then open using your Internet banking software, electronic payments are the way to go. Processing your first pay run using MYOB softwareThe next couple of help topics deal with recording employee pays and checking that you get their pay just right. Before you try to process pays, you’ll need to set up a card for each employee (see How do I set up a new employee?), and record each employee’s pay frequency, pay rate and standard pay details (as explained in Should I set up the Pay Basis as Hourly or Salary?, How do I review standard pays for each employee? and How can I check whether the net pay is going to come up correctly?) How do I record my first pay transaction?
How do I check that each pay is right?
When I go to process pays, one of my employees isn’t appearing. Why not?
When I go to process pays, how can I stop salespeople, suppliers or ex-employees appearing?
What if I get halfway through editing pays and then realise I have to quit to fix up an employee’s settings?
When I process pays for several employees in one hit, I find it hard to keep track of where I’m up to. Any tricks?
How do I review reports for my pay run before processing payments? Topics coming soon... How do I pay employees electronically?
What’s the difference between M-Powered payments and other kinds of electronic payments?
Can I split an employee’s pay across more than one account?
What if a pay is rejected by the bank?
How do I record payments made by cheque?
What if I prefer to pay employees by cash?
What if I prefer to pay employees cash straight from the till?
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