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Automate your Payroll Time in Lieu Calculations

The following article will walk you through several scenarios where you can automate the calculation used to accrue and take time in lieu. Common scenarios for this Rule Set include:

Helpful Hint

Pay condition rules only work if you apply the rule set to the employee's Pay Run Defaults page.

Configuring the pay category

You will need to go to the Payroll Settings Pay categories page and add a new pay category which you will use when creating your rule set. The pay category in this scenario will be a new not-linked pay category called Time in Lieu, and this will accrue leave and super. Also, make sure that you use the Leave - Other Paid Leave payment classification option

Configuring the leave category

You will need to go to the Payroll Settings Leave categories page and add a new leave category which you will use when creating the rule set. You would call the leave category in this scenario Time in Lieu with the following settings:

  • Select the Nil option to the Leave loading question.
  • Select the Standard option for the Leave category type question.
  • Select the Tracked option for the Employee Leave Balance question.
  • Do not tick any of the following two boxes:
    • Automatically accrues.
    • Exclude from termination payout.
  • Select the ETP option
  • The next three boxes are a personal preference
  • Payment setup:
    • Report the earnings for the leave taken against another pay category, and select the Time in Lieu pay category.
    • Also, select the Use Pay Rate of Employee's Primary Pay Category for Transferred Earnings Line option.

Configuring the work type

The next part of the process is setting up the required work type. You will need to:

  1. Create a work type which the employee can use to indicate that they are taking time in lieu.
  2. Call it TIL leave taken, this will only be applicable for full-time and part-time employees in this scenario, but you are free to alter this configuration.
  3. Link it to the Time in Lieu leave category that you created earlier. 
  4. Click the Save button.

Configuring Tags

You can apply tags to specific employees, and then use them in rule sets as a way of specifying individual or groups of employees in which a specific rule should apply. For example, in the case of time in lieu, we can use a tag to decide whether a time-in-lieu rule triggers according to whether the employee has the relevent tag. It is especially handy when not all employees accrue time in lieu.

You will need to go to the Payroll Settings Tags page and add a tag that says TIL. Once you add the tag, you will be able to apply it to the required employees by ticking the box alongside their name

Configuring rule sets

If you already have employees attached to a rule set, you will need to add the rules in addition to the existing rule set so that they link to the other existing rules. To do this, go to the Payroll settings Rule Sets page, and click on the existing rule set. If you attached them to an award, you will need to select the award first from the drop-down box. 

If your employee is not already attached to a rule set, and you do not want these rules to be part of any existing rule set, you can create a new one for this purpose. To do that, go to the Payroll Settings Rule Sets page, and click the Add button to the right of the page. 

One thing to note about rule sets before going further is that rule sets work in order of evaluation from top to bottom, meaning the processing of the rules at the bottom happens last. Usually, you want something that pays the employees more to happen at the bottom.

Scenario 1 - The employee can accrue time in lieu of overtime at a rate of one hour for every hour of overtime worked

Once you have your rule set in order, you will need to create the following rule called TIL One Hour to One Hour of OT using the below instructions:

  1. When time worked in a shift period. You can change this to weekly, day etc, to suit your needs.
  2. Where employee has the following tags TIL. You will need to click the   to see this option.
  3.  Is greater than employee standard hours. Be aware that with this rule, the employee standard hours are those hours on the Employee file Pay run defaults page.
  4. Then select multiple actions first before you then apply pay category none.
  5. And add leave accrual of 1 unit of Time in Lieu per hour worked. 
  6. Click the Save button.
Scenario 2 - The employee can accrue time in lieu of overtime. The hours accrued will equate to the penalty rate for the overtime that would have been received

Add another rule called TIL at Penalty Rates using the below instructions:

  1. When time worked in shift period.
  2. Where pay category is Overtime + 50% for example. You will need to click the   to see this option.
  3. Is greater than 0 hours i.e., all hours that fit that criteria.
  4. Then multiple actions.
  5. Apply pay category none.
  6. And add leave accrual of 1.5 units of time in lieu per hour worked. To do this, click the Add Rule button on the right hand side.

Like the previous rule, you can look at adding the criteria to a tag as it will mean this rule triggers for specific employees as opposed to all of them. The important thing to note in this rule is that it will only trigger if you use the Overtime +50%' pay category.

Scenario 3 - A salary employee will submit timesheets for different locations but still need to be paid their standard hours per week

Quite often, salaried employees are going to be paid the same hours every week, so, a common example might be that they are paid for 38 hours each week at their particular hourly rate. However, if you would like their wages to be divided up into different locations, you might want to use timesheets.

The following rule set will pay the employee their standard hours, but will accrue time in lieu for any hours above their standard hours. Additionally, they will take time in lieu if they do not work their standard hours.  Create a rule called Salaried TIL using the below instructions

  1. When time worked in a week. You can change this to shift period, day, etc, to suit your needs.
  2. Where employee tags has the following tags TIL. You will need to click the   to see this option.
  3. Where employment type is full-time.
  4.  Is greater than employee standard hours. Be aware that with this rule, the employee standard hours are those hours on the Employee File Pay run defaults page. 
  5. Then select multiple actions first before you then apply pay category none.
  6. And add leave accrual of one unit of time in lieu per hour worked. 
  7. Click the Save button.

Now, you can also automate scenarios where they work under their standard hours. Create a rule called TIL Under time using the below instructions

  1. When time worked in a shift period.
  2. Where employee tags has the following tags TIL. You will need to click the   to see this option.
  3. Is less than employee standard hours. Be aware that with this rule, the employee standard hours are those hours on the Employee File Pay run defaults page. 
  4. Then add remaining time.
  5. And apply pay category None. To do this, click the Add Rule button on the right hand side.
  6. And add leave accrual of -1 units of time in lieu per hour worked.
  7. Click the Save button.

What this will do is reduce the employees TIL balance by the number of under-worked hours and will pay them their standard hours. 

Testing the rules

You can check what is happening for each shift by using the rules tester:

  1. Go to the Rule Sets page.
  2. If required, select the Award from the drop-down menu at the top of the page.
  3. Select the rule set you want to check.
  4. Click the Test Rules button.
  5. Check the current period dates. The pay run period dates should match exactly to the current period or a previous period.
  6. Click on the Import button.
  7. Select the employee whose shifts you want to test
  8. Scroll down and click the Run Test button.

Once each day's earnings display, you can expand the day you want to check and click the   to show you the list of rules that triggered for the shift. Then you can go check each rule that triggered it, and see how and why it applies to that shift. Keep in mind that rules are applied in order from top to bottom, so a rule that triggers may be overridden by another rule further down the list.

 

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