P/R Flow Of Events
Once the master files are defined, each pay period's processing involves running down the P/R Processing Menu one option at a time. The General Ledger entries are posted to the G/L TEMPORARY file at the end of the month (or after each pay period) and reports can be printed at any time. Zeroing options are taken at the end of each month and year. The Flow of Events provides a general outline for these procedures.
Payroll processing can be divided into six main activities:
1) maintaining master files
2) processing Payroll
3) printing monthly reports
4) month-end processing
5) printing quarterly reports
6) year-end processing
Maintaining Master Files (Options from the P/R Master File Maintenance Menu)
As new employees are hired, add new Employee Numbers to the EMPLOYEE MASTER file. If you need to add Hours Codes (methods of paying employees), States (where employees live or perform their work for you), or Deductions (reductions from an employee’s paycheck), refer to the appropriate Maintenance option.
Whenever changes are made to a master file, it is a good practice to reprint the master file report to have a current hardcopy on hand. Options to print master file reports may be found on the P/R Master File Reports Menu.
Before the calendar year end, make sure that you have entered Social Security Numbers for all employees for which you must print a W-2 form.
Processing Payroll (Options from the P/R Processing Menu)
Verify that you have posted the prior pay period's checks before starting a new pay period. If you do not remember, a good way to determine if you have posted checks is to print a Pre-Check Verification Report. If there is no information on the report, you have posted checks.
Enter hours for each employee to receive a check this pay period (TimecardMaintenance).
Review the Timecard Report to see that hours were entered correctly.
Review the Timecard Deduction Report to see all deductions that will be taken from each employee's check.
Run the Check Printing) option. After the checks are printed, review them and check for correct amounts and proper alignment.
Review the Check Register carefully as this register reflects all data for the pay period you are processing.
If the checks are OK, run the Check Posting option.
Reports in the Payroll module may be run at any point in time. However, we suggest reviewing reports each time checks are posted. If this is not feasible, hardcopies of these reports should be printed, verified and filed at least once a month prior to month-end processing. After each pay period you may wish to run the following reports:
Hours Summary Report - is used to review MTD, QTD and YTD hours for each Hours Code and/or Employee.
General Ledger Report - is used to review the disbursements that will be posted to the GENERAL LEDGER TEMPORARY file.
Employee Earnings Report - is used to review employee's MTD, QTD, and YTD Earnings and Withholdings.
Distribution Earnings Report - is used to review your payroll breakdown by the Distributions you set up.
Workers’ Comp Earnings Report - is used to review the Regular and Premium wages accumulated for each code.
To insure the integrity of the data in your Payroll files, the following steps should be completed before entering any new timecards or checks for the next month.
At the end of each month...
Print any reports that include MTD information for which you want to keep a hard copy (see the Printing Monthly Reports section above).
Backup data (see the procedures provided with your backup device).
Use the P/R To G/L Posting option on the P/R Zeroing Menu to post Payroll expenses to the GENERAL LEDGER TEMPORARY file in the General Ledger module). (Or run the P/R General Ledger Zeroing option to clear the SUMMARY file for the month's information.)
In addition to Printing Monthly Reports (listed above), print the following reports:
Unemployment Report - used to review unemployment information.
941 Report - used to review 941 information.
Year-End Processing: (AT THE END OF THE CALENDAR YEAR)
Perform the Month-End Processing listed above.
Follow the procedures for Printing Quarterly Reports listed above.
Print the following yearly reports:
Employee Year End Report - used to review breakdowns of Employee information.
IRS W-2 Forms - used to print Employee information on IRS W-2 forms.
Delete all Terminated Employees from the EMPLOYEE MASTER file using the Employee Maintenance option on the P/R Master File Maintenance Menu.
Run the YTD Zeroing option on the P/R Zeroing Menu to clear all YTD fields.
You may also run the History Reorganization on the P/R Zeroing Menu to "clean up" your HISTORY files and keep their sizes smaller on your hard disk.