Leave accruals

Nicole_7801064

We started using Hosted 2018 for our payroll this financial year.  I entered the leave balances as at the new pay year, but the accruals have taken on a life of their own and are calculating themselves (I believe based on when the individuals began working for us, not when we started using this program).
I tried some of the fixes that were suggested on here (including rebuilding the data x 3) but that didn't resolve the issue.  I need this fixed ASAP as one employee believes she has over 400 hours of personal leave when in fact she has less than 50 (and is likely to try to take it).

Acctd4

Hi Nicole

A few things to check in the employee's record ("Payroll & Compensation Info" tab under "Leave Details"): 

• Check the "Hours available as of ..." date & quantity. 

The " ... as of date" is usually the last pay date.  Check that the quantity shown here is correct.  If not, you can overwrite with the correct quantity to ensure accuracy going forward. 

• "Hours used this year"
  Unless an employee HAS taken any leave hours this FY (since starting Payroll in RAH), this should be "0.00" 

• "Accrual Period" & "Hours Accrued Per ..."
  It is crucial to make sure this is correctly set.  Different Accrual periods (Every hour v Every Pay v Beginning of year) have different accrual calculations. 

I find "Every hour" is most accurate as this also allows for correct pro rata accruals for part-time staff.

The standard, approx. "Every hour"-based accrual is 0.07692 Hrs for Holiday (Annual) Leave & half that (0.03846) for Personal (Sick) Leave.  (RA usually rounds these to 0.07694 & 0.03833 which is fine) 

• “Maximum Number of hours" - Make sure this field is BLANK (Not 0.00) 

• "Year begins on ..."  / "Day" / "Begin accruing time on ..."
  This usually defaults to the employee's Start Date which - unless their Award/Agreement states otherwise - should be left. 

• Tick the "Leave Liability" checkbox to ensure inclusion in reports     

Charley

Nicole, totally agree with Shaz and I also use the 'every hour' option

However because I know this can happen with Reckon and other accounting packages and it is often nigh on impossible to recreate what the accrual should be.

As such I have an Accrual spreadsheet that I use as a control so that it is easy fixed, if you want email me on [email protected]

Linda ABC

Nicole, it would also be helpful to see a screen dump or if you just post - how you have all the leave screens setup?  so we can see what is happening and why it is accruing more than you expect?

Nicole_7801064

OK, so I gave it 2 weeks to reset itself... the totals are now correct in the system, but they are still not printing correctly on the payslips - how can this happen?

Linda ABC

One thing to remember with using the Every Hour Option is to make sure your overtime payroll items are unticked for Include in Every Hour worked - otherwise you will end up with people accruing MORE than 4 weeks annual leave or 2 weeks personal leave!  It would be great if we could have a MaxHrs per Pay box to enter as well as the current Max Hrs (overall) that we could use - to ensure that no more than their entitlement is accrued - I have had several clients where this has happened and have had to explain to the staff that the accruals were incorrect and they actually dont have as much leave as they think they have!  

Linda ABC

Nicole it can get messed up in the payslip templates and its not easy to fix... have you tried all the templates to see if they all give the same result?  have you rebuilt the file x 3 times to see if this corrects the problem?  failing that, there is a KB article that you can follow to try and correct this...have used it before for previous versions, but I was pretty sure they had fixed the problems in 2018?  although your problem started in 2017 (you said it was a June pay?) can you work out if the amount it is out relates to anythng?  is it that used leave is not deducting or is it doubling up accruals?  sorry, very hard to help without specifics... maybe a call to Reckon Hosted Tech support 1300 799 150 would help and they can point you to the KB article to try those steps?  

Nicole_7801064

Leave accruals are (and have been since just after my last response) out again, so I am trying tech support today.  It's doing my head in - especially after I was on leave for 2 weeks and someone else was doing the pays - they weren't aware that the system amounts were incorrect and said employee has now gone in to the negative for personal leave!

Robyn Kelly (Partner)

Does this knowledge base article sound like what is happening to you:

http://kb.reckon.com.au/issue_view.asp?ID=5623

If not maybe one of your payroll items is not set up correctly?

Regards, Robyn Kelly

zaighamlilani

Morning - can you please advise the RA's rounding to 0.07694 & 0.03833 which in my calculation doesn't match with legal obligation of 2 weeks of Sick Leave and 4 weeks of Annual Leave. Thank you so much for the assistance.

Acctd4

Hi There

Yes, RA & RAH round it slightly due to the 5 decimal places but it still works out.

The hours you've quoted there are the "Every Hour" accruals for a 38-hr week (or 76-hr fortnight):

SL: 76 Hrs (eg 38 Hrs p/wk x 2 Wks) / 52 Wks / 38 Hrs = 0.03846 (RA/RAH rounds to 0.03833)

AL: 152 Hrs (eg 38 Hrs p/wk x 4 Wks) / 52 Wks / 38 Hrs = 0.07692 (RA/RAH rounds to 0.03833)

If your standard week is different (eg 37.5 Hrs or 40 Hrs), replace the "38" in the above calculations with your applicable weekly hours 😊

zaighamlilani

Thanks for the prompt reply Shaz. My query is how Reckon is reaching to these numbers as if I use the rounded figures (i.e., 0.07694 & 0.03833), I get the following numbers which is case of SL (although very minimal) is still lesser than the legal requirement:

SL: 76 hrs: 0.03833 * 52 * 38 = 75.74 hrs (and not 76 hrs)

AL: 152 hrs: 0.07694 * 52 * 38 = 152.03 hrs (bit more is fine)

SL: 80 hrs: 0.03833 * 52 * 40 = 79.73 hrs (and not 80hrs)

AL: 160 hrs: 0.07694 * 52 * 40 = 160.03 hrs (bit more is fine)

Acctd4

Would have to ask the developers that one!

It may be because it calculates more precisely eg based on the number of days/hours in a year rather than on weeks, as there aren't exactly 52 weeks in any year (eg 7 days x 52 weeks = 364 days 😬)

zaighamlilani

Agreed about the 52 weeks. Even if I use 52.1428 weeks in a year (i.e. 365/7 as used by FWO), it is still 75.95 hrs (0.03833 * 52.1428 * 38) which again is close yet not exact or more than the legal requirement of 10 SL days (i.e. 76 hrs).

Any suggestion about how to reach the Reckon admin or developers to check this query? I am just wondering if anyone else has raised this concern before as I am unable to find an answer. Thank you again Shaz.

Acctd4

I doubt it would be considered an issue legally, as you can't apportion 0.05 hours to accrue across an entire year! I think you're overthinking it - the employee still gets paid as per their entitlement & in reality, I'm yet to encounter a situation where this minimal rounding actually impacts that.

When Reckon parted ways with Intuit, part of the agreement - although no longer permitted to use the name "QuickBooks" (hence the name change) - was access to/use of the original database coding. Unfortunately as a result, there are some things that Reckon are unable to alter as the base coding is fixed. It's possible that the rounding thing may be one of those things ? (I don't know that, I'm just speculating)

@Rav may be able to shed more light on it ?

zaighamlilani

Much appreciated Shaz - I doubt it would be considered a legal issue as well; however, just ensuring it is done correctly. This was raised by an employee so wanted to investigate further to find a satisfactory answer.

Acctd4

Always good to stay informed 👍🏻👏🏻☺️