Jul 2019
11
Auto Enrolment: More payroll changes on the way
The government has announced major changes to the pensions system in Ireland, including State, private and public service pensions, which aims to address Ireland’s significant retirement savings gap.
The Taoiseach confirmed that the Government's key goals are to "create a fairer and simpler contributory pension system where a person's pension outcome reflects their social insurance contributions, and in parallel, create a new and necessary culture of personal retirement saving in Ireland".
From 2020, a new State pension system will come into place based on a ‘total contributions approach’ (TCA) where a person’s lifetime contribution will more closely match the benefit they receive. Under TCA, a person's contributory pension will be proportionate to the contributions they make, with fair regard for periods of child rearing, full time caring, and periods in receipt of social protection payments.
Although the State pension will be reformed and will remain at the core of the pension system in Ireland, a new retirement savings system is still needed to supplement the State pension.
Minister Regina Doherty said: “It is increasingly evident that most Irish workers are not saving enough, or indeed at all, for their retirement years. Many people will be faced with a serious reduction in their living standards when they retire – a fall in income they clearly do not want.”
This new 'Automatic Enrolment' retirement savings system will be introduced from 2022 to support and encourage personal savings provision. It is intended that employee savings in this scheme will be supported by employer and State contributions.
Under this system, workers will be ‘automatically enrolled’ into a workplace pension scheme with the option to opt-out, should they choose to do so. However, looking at the international experience of similar systems, for example in the UK, once enrolled, workers tend to remain in the scheme.
Automatic enrolment is a natural extension of the payroll process, making more sense for employers to process the majority of these duties within their payroll software. At BrightPay, we have experienced the rollout of auto enrolment in the UK first hand, where we introduced auto enrolment features which enabled users to automate and simplify the entire process.
Thesaurus Payroll Manager will be able to seamlessly cater for Auto Enrolment without any additional costs to the software, and also includes free phone and email support.
Jun 2019
25
PAYE Modernisation: The good, the bad and the ugly
Latest Revenue figures for PAYE Modernisation show that 161,000 employers have successfully submitted over 2 million payroll submissions in respect of over 2.6 million employees.
Although the new system has proved very successful overall, the first four months of the new real time payroll reporting system also faced some recurring issues with payroll submissions. Here are the 10 most common errors seen by Revenue:
- Employers mistakenly sending the payroll data to Revenue more than once.
- Employers incorrectly creating duplicate employments for the same employee.
- Payroll submissions, or parts of payroll submissions, failing the validation process.
- Employers ceasing employment for employees in error by incorrectly including cessation dates in payroll submissions.
- Employers failing to apply the most up-to-date Revenue Payroll Notification (RPN) when running payroll.
- Employees being taxed on the emergency tax basis where an RPN is available.
- Incorrect operation of emergency tax e.g. employee reported with emergency tax, but no tax deducted by the employer.
- ‘Gross Pay’ shown as less than ‘Pay for Income Tax’ and/or ‘Pay for USC’.
- No USC deducted where the employee is not USC exempt, and similarly, USC deducted where the employee is USC exempt.
- Employers paying their tax liability twice in error e.g. by setting up both a ROS Debit Instruction and Variable Direct Debit for the same payment period.
Where errors arise, employers should immediately rectify them to ensure that they are not included in future payrolls. Early action also reduces the possibility of a Revenue intervention. Revenue will continue to assist any employer who is experiencing genuine difficulty in complying with the new PAYE requirements. However, it is important to remember that employers who fail to engage with Revenue or who persistently breach the PAYE Regulations are liable to a €4,000 penalty per offence.
It is in every employer’s interest to ensure that the data submitted to Revenue is accurate and in line with the employee’s payslip record, especially now that employees have access to their pay and tax details through their myAccount. Any discrepancies between payroll details on an employee’s payslip and those reported to Revenue could result in employees seeking clarification from their employer.
Jun 2019
5
Thesaurus Customer Update: June 2019
PAYE Modernisation Update: Payroll and tax details now available to employees in myAccount
With real time reporting now in place for employers, Revenue has turned their focus to the benefits of this new system for employees. Since the 15th of May, all employees can now view their payroll details, as reported by their employer, through myAccount. Employers should be aware that employees can now view any discrepancies between payroll details on an employee’s payslip and those reported to Revenue.
Read more | Revenue help guide
5 ways Thesaurus Connect can help your business
Thesaurus Connect introduces powerful new features such as a free self-service app for employees and a web based self-service dashboard for employers. It also includes a secure and user-friendly way to backup and restore your payroll data on your PC to and from the cloud. Discover five ways that Thesaurus Connect can help your business.
New User Management Interface for Connect
Our new User Management feature for Thesaurus Connect makes it more seamless and quicker for users to be set up or amended. It offers the option to select permissions for multiple employers at one time for a standard user. There is also a new permission to allow standard users to connect and synchronise employers from BrightPay to Connect and a new feature to mark an employer as confidential.
Top 6 Thesaurus Connect FAQs answered
From the concept of cloud in general to getting your employees up and running on their smartphone app, we have answered a wide range of questions about Thesaurus Connect. Here are the top six most common questions we get asked.
From the support desk: A mistake has been made on the payroll. How can this be corrected?
Corrections must always be dealt with on the basis of 'follow the money'. This means that if an employee has been underpaid/overpaid in a previous pay period, the correction of the underpayment/overpayment should be made in the next payroll run you perform. Where an employee, however, has physically received a payment amount which differs to the amount shown in the payroll, this will require a 'correction submission' to be made to Revenue in order to rectify the error. Information on correcting a payment can be found here.
More FAQs | Online Documentation | Video Tutorials
GDPR: 1 Year On
It’s been one year since the introduction of the GDPR, and employers and accountants are reviewing their systems, processes and procedures on an ongoing basis to ensure they are doing their best to avoid hefty non-compliance penalties. Find out how Thesaurus Connect can help you overcome some of the key challenges GDPR presents when processing payroll.
May 2019
21
PAYE Modernisation Update: Payroll and tax details now available to employees in myAccount
PAYE Modernisation is now in full force with the majority of employers having seamlessly transitioned to the new reporting system. From January until the end of April this year, some 161,000 employers have successfully submitted over 2 million payroll submissions in respect of over 2.6 million employees.
With real time reporting now in place for employers, Revenue has turned their focus to the benefits of this new system for employees. Since the 15th of May, all employees can now view their payroll details, as reported by their employer, through their myAccount. Further improved services through myAccount will also follow later in the year.
Employers should be aware that employees can now view any discrepancies between payroll details on an employee’s payslip and those reported to Revenue. It is therefore very much in every employer’s interest to ensure that the data submitted to Revenue is accurate and in line with the employee’s payslip record.
For more information about employee pay and tax details in myAccount, visit Revenue’s new PAYE Modernisation for Employees helpguide.
May 2019
15
GDPR: One Year On
It’s been one year since the introduction of the GDPR, and employers and accountants are reviewing their systems, processes and procedures on an ongoing basis to ensure they are doing their best to avoid hefty non-compliance penalties.
Thesaurus Connect is tailored to help you overcome some of the key challenges GDPR presents when processing payroll. Although Thesaurus Payroll Manager is a desktop application,Thesaurus Connect enables users to store their payroll information in the cloud. Because the payroll information is stored online, it has allowed us to bring you even more functionality and benefits, enabling users to work quicker, more efficiently and more profitably within the scope of the GDPR guidelines.
GDPR Benefits of Thesaurus Connect
- Secure Backup - Thesaurus Connect enables you to securely backup your payroll data to the cloud. With the GDPR, it is important to keep a copy of payroll files safe in case of fire, theft, damaged computers or cyber-attacks. Thesaurus Connect maintains a chronological history of all backups which can be restored or downloaded at any time, keeping your payroll records protected.
- Self-Service Access - Under the GDPR legislation, where possible the controller should be able to provide self-service remote access to a secure system which would provide the data subject with direct access to his or her personal data. Since the payroll data is stored online, you can invite employees to their own password-protected self-service portal, which is accessible on any device. This fulfils the recommendation to provide remote access to a secure system where employees would have direct access to their personal data.
- Reduce Confidential Emails - For payroll bureaus, clients can log in to the employer dashboard anytime and run their payroll reports. As soon as the payroll is finalised, any report that is saved in the payroll software will automatically be available to the client on Thesaurus Connect, eliminating the need to manually run the report and email it to the client. Instead, this reduces your workload while securely giving these sensitive, payroll documents to the client, through the online account. Similarly, payslips will also be available to the employer as soon as they have been finalised.
- HR Documents - Employers can upload sensitive HR documents and confidential employee payroll information, again eliminating emails containing sensitive information. Employers can upload documents, resources and links for all employees (e.g. company handbook), individual employees (e.g. employment contract), departments (e.g. training documents) or they can choose to hide them from employees (e.g. performance reviews).
- User Access - Thesaurus Connect has the ability to set up users with restricted access, complying with the GDPR’s privacy by default, which states that you should only have access to necessary information required to complete the task at hand. With Thesaurus Connect, you can restrict users from viewing employee documents, employees marked as confidential, financial information including payslips and payroll reports and whether or not they can approve employee requests. There is also the option to restrict users to individual departments.
- Employee Personal Details - The employee can use the employee self-service to view personal information that is held in the payroll software, such as their postal address, phone number and emergency contact details. They can also update and amend these details through their self-service portal so that the employer has the most up-to-date and accurate information. This improves transparency with the employee and ensures that personal data is current and up-to-date, both of which are requirements by the GDPR.
- Annual Leave Management - Thesaurus Connect allows employees to request leave through their self-service portal and view their annual leave calendar. Again, this improves transparency with the employee, reduces email communication containing sensitive information and ensures that you have the most up-to-date information.
Many businesses are looking for better ways to keep their employee's payroll data safe and secure. By introducing Thesaurus Connect, you will be taking steps to be GDPR compliant. Book a demo today to find out how Thesaurus Connect can help you with improving GDPR compliance.
Apr 2019
17
Thesaurus Customer Update: April 2019
Say goodbye to sick days - A hidden benefit of Thesaurus Connect
Some businesses have noticed a reduction in sick days since implementing employee self-service systems. As sick days are much more visible on screen for both employees and their managers, this likely acts as an incentive to keep sick days to a minimum. With Thesaurus Connect, employees can view their annual leave and sick days instantly from their smartphone or tablet.
From the support desk: Processing leavers
Since the introduction of PAYE Modernisation, employers are no longer required to issue a P45 to an employee and submit the P45 Part 1 to Revenue. Instead, an employee’s leave date is to be reported to Revenue in the final payroll submission made for the employee. Therefore, to process a leaver in Thesaurus Payroll Manager, you will now enter their leave date at the time of entering a final payment to them and before you update the pay period.
Find out more | View more FAQs
Employee Self-Service: Reduce Your Workload Immediately
With Thesaurus Connect, the powerful and secure online portal for employees gives them access to view and retrieve historic payslips and other payroll documents, eliminating requests to their manager. Employees can also update their basic personal details including address, contact details, and emergency contact details online. This will ultimately reduce administration duties for managers, thus empowering employees.
Did you miss it? Watch our employment legislation webinar on demand now
New employment legislation was introduced in March bringing significant changes to employment law. The new Act requires employers to provide employees with key terms of employment in writing within 5 days of starting employment, as well as providing greater protection for those in casual working arrangements. This short webinar highlights the key legislative changes and gives practical advice to employers on how to comply.
How Thesaurus Connect is helping with GDPR
It’s been almost one year since the introduction the GDPR, and many businesses are reviewing their systems, processes and procedures on an ongoing basis to ensure they are doing their best to avoid hefty non-compliance penalties. Find out how Thesaurus Connect can help your business comply with the GDPR legislation.
Watch: Thesaurus Connect at a glance
Thesaurus Connect is an optional cloud add-on that works alongside Thesaurus Payroll Manager. Automatically store payroll information in the cloud and enable online access anywhere, anytime for you and your employees. Watch this video to see what you are missing!!
Mar 2019
13
Thesaurus Customer Update: March 2019
Have you activated your free Thesaurus Connect licence?
All Thesaurus Payroll Manager 2019 purchases include a complimentary Thesaurus Connect licence (worth €59). Thesaurus Connect is an add-on product that allows you to seamlessly backup your payroll data to the cloud with online self-service portals for employers and employees. It is important to note that Thesaurus Connect needs to be activated before it will backup your data.
Activate Thesaurus Connect | Book a Thesaurus Connect demo
New employment legislation brings significant changes to employers
The new employment legislation requires employers to provide employees with key terms of employment in writing within 5 days of starting employment, as well as providing greater protection for those in casual working arrangements. Failure on the behalf of individuals to comply with the new legislation will give rise to a criminal conviction resulting in a fine of up to €5,000 or imprisonment of up to 12 months.
Find out more | Free webinar | Book a Bright Contracts demo
Thesaurus Connect’s Employee SmartPhone App
Our employee self-service smartphone and tablet app is available with our Thesaurus Connect add-on. Employee mobile apps offer many benefits for employers, employees, and the business as a whole. The user-friendly portal will streamline payroll processing while reducing the number of payroll queries from employees.
Read more | Download employee app
Free eBook: How to avoid PAYE Modernisation mistakes
It is important that employers are aware of and understand their new real time reporting obligations. Employers need to be aware that mistakes can be very costly. Employers who fail to comply can expect Revenue intervention with non-compliance penalties and fines. In this guide, we discuss the key changes with PAYE Modernisation and what employers need to do to avoid non-compliance penalties from Revenue.
Free Webinar: PAYE Modernisation, Three Months On!! New Year, New Payroll Legislation
Free webinar with guest speaker from Revenue. Find out what has happened since the introduction of PAYE Modernisation and what challenges businesses are facing. During the webinar, we will peel back the PAYE Modernisation legislation to outline clearly how PAYE Modernisation affects the payroll process and what is expected from you in 2019 and going forward.
View agenda | Book your place now
PAYE Modernisation: How to deal with employees commencing and leaving employment
Employers are required to notify Revenue of any new employees or employees who have left their employment. Since January 1st 2019, employers are no longer required to submit a P45 Part 3 or a P46 to Revenue to register a new employee. Instead, an employer will now submit a Revenue Payroll Notification (RPN) request for the new employee.
Feb 2019
9
The P35 deadline is fast approaching
The P35 deadline is fast approaching, the deadline is February 15th. The deadline for an employer who pays and files electronically via Revenue Online Services (ROS) is extended to the 23rd of February.
Although PAYE Modernisation is now live, it is important for employers to remember that this end of year return is still required for the 2018 tax year. Failure to make a P35 return by this date may result in a fine.
With PAYE Modernisation, employers are required to send a real time payroll submission to Revenue each pay period. This submission is similar to the P35, and contains details of each of your employees, including PAYE, PRSI, USC and LPT. As Revenue will be receiving the periodic file submissions in real time, from 2019 onwards this end of year process for employers is no longer required. 2018 is the final year for which a P35 is required.
Please note, the deadline for issuing employees with P60s is also February 15th. Tax year 2018 is also the final year in which P60s will be issued to employees.
Help Documentation
To view our online documentation click on the links below:
Extended Customer Support Hours
This year, our support team have extended and Saturday opening hours until Saturday the 16th of February 2019.
Our opening hours for this period are as follows:
- Monday to Thursday - 8 am to 7 pm
- Friday - 8 am to 6 pm
- Saturday - 9 am to 1 pm
Feb 2019
5
How to avoid PAYE Modernisation mistakes
PAYE Modernisation is now fully operational and has brought many changes to the payroll process. Overall, it brings many benefits to all stakeholders involved - employers, employees and Revenue.
It is important that employers are aware of and understand their new real time reporting obligations. Revenue has strongly advised employers to review their payroll processes and systems to ensure that they meet the new PAYE Modernisation requirements.
Employers need to be aware that mistakes can be very costly. An employer is responsible for deducting the tax and paying over the liability to Revenue, and so non-compliance will result in interest to be paid by the employer. Employers who fail to comply can expect Revenue intervention with non-compliance penalties and fines.
The current penalty regime includes a fixed penalty of €4,000 for each breach of the PAYE legislation. It also includes a fixed penalty of €3,000 imposed on the company secretary for each breach. These penalties can be imposed on a per-item basis, so if you are even a mid-sized employer, these penalties can build up.
Download our free eBook for employers - Surviving PAYE Modernisation. In this guide, we discuss the key changes with PAYE Modernisation and what employers need to do to avoid non-compliance penalties from Revenue.
Interested in finding out more about PAYE Modernisation? Thesaurus Software and Revenue have teamed up for a new series of free PAYE Modernisation webinars. During the webinars, we will look at what has happened since PAYE Modernisation has gone live and what challenges businesses are facing.
Click here to book your place on one of our upcoming webinars.
Related Articles:
Jan 2019
28
PAYE Modernisation is now live - but how do I comply?
By now, all employers in Ireland should know about Revenue’s new PAYE Modernisation legislation. This system came into effect on January 1st 2019 and brought with it a new and improved method of reporting PAYE information to Revenue.
PAYE Modernisation has brought many changes to the payroll process. With the new system, employers are required to send real time payroll submissions to Revenue containing details of their employees’ PAYE information. These submissions must be sent to Revenue on or before the date an employee is paid every pay period. In most cases, this means a file will be submitted either weekly or monthly.
What happens if I don’t comply?
Non-compliant employers can expect Revenue intervention with non-compliance penalties and fines. An employer is responsible for deducting the tax and paying over the liability to Revenue and so non-compliance will result in interest to be paid by the employer.
The current penalty regime includes a fixed penalty of €4,000 for each breach of the PAYE legislation. It also includes a fixed penalty of €3,000 imposed on the company secretary for each breach. These penalties can be imposed on a per-item basis, so if you are even a mid-sized employer, these penalties can build up.
Free eBook: Surviving PAYE Modernisation!
Download your free copy of our PAYE Modernisation guide for employers. In this guide, we discuss practical PAYE Modernisation tips that every employer needs to know. Make sure you avoid fines for non-compliance.Download free guide
Find out more with our free PAYE Modernisation webinars
Revenue has teamed up with Thesaurus Software for a series of free PAYE Modernisation webinars. During the webinars, we will look at what has happened since PAYE Modernisation has gone live and what challenges businesses are facing. Click here to book your place on one of our upcoming webinars.
