For customers processing payroll, this is an important and mandatory release for the following reasons:
- it includes tax changes for the new financial year, effective 1 July 2020
- it includes changes and enhancements to support end of financial year reporting
- it includes changes and new features to support STP Reporting
- other general software enhancements.
What's in this Wagemaster release?
Database changes:
- Australian Tax Changes to STSL tax tables – effective 1 July 2020
- New additional ETP payments option for terminated employees
- STP Update Event – Payment date
- Financial Year boundaries – messaging added
- Fix to duplicated recording of ETP’s when termination wizard run more than once.
General changes:
- New payslip format with pay rate loading details
- ESS view log file added to ESS dashboard
- Notifications update
- Housecleaning wizard process enhancements – removal of planned leave records
- Block Times Award – fix to Normal hours on database upgrade.
Database changes:
1. New tax table pdl files with Australian Tax Changes to Student and Training Support Loans (STSL) tax tables – effective 1 July 2020.
These changes have been applied to the file, Tax Tables 2020-21_UPDATE.Pdl, within the Wagemaster installation folder (default location: C:\Users\Public\Documents\Wage Easy Payroll\Association Data\Australia). The update of tax tables via the pdl file will need to be run on each Wagemaster database for the new tax tables to take effect once your PPE date is at a date in July 2020.
While all tax tables have had descriptions updated to include 2020-21, only STSL tax tables have changed
New Termination tax changes to Redundancy tax-free amounts and ETP Lower Cap.
It is advisable that the tax table update should only be applied once EOFY 2019-20 processing has been completed.
More information from the ATO on these changes available at:
Instructions available to complete the update is available on Agrimaster Help centre.
2. New additional ETP payments option for terminated employees
It is now possible to add to a terminated employees file, ETP amounts that can then be reported to the ATO via STP.
Employee>Payments>ATO Summaries - ETP
New grid added for entry of ETP’s:
- ETP Code
- Payment Date
- Taxable Component
- Tax Withheld
- Tax-Free Component
3. STP Update Event – Payment date
To stop ATO rejection of STP Final Update Event reports at the end of the financial year, with error ‘UPDATE submission Pay/Update Date cannot be later than the date of submission (ie. today’s date)’ the Update Event Payment Date no longer defaults to 30/06. The Payment Date on STP Update Events will now be as per current or system date.
4. Financial Year boundaries
Messaging added to remind of the need to check (and possibly change) the Taxation Year boundary setup. This is especially relevant when the final PPE in June is paid in July and thus requires a change to the Taxation Boundary End Date.
Messaging comes up automatically once the PPE is in June. It is important for correct End of Financial Year reporting that the End Date is changed where the last PP in June is paid in July.
This message continues to come up for the month of June unless ‘Reviewed Tax Year boundary for current FY’ is ticked in Period End Handling screen (File>Company Details>Configuration>Period End – Taxation Year Boundary).
5. Fix the duplicated recording of ETP’s when termination wizard run more than once
In some instances, when the termination wizard is run more than once in the same wages process, (ie. Add and Finish termination wizard and Add Termination again without previously saving or closing wages first) ETP values are not cleared and incorrectly reported.
General changes:
1. New payslip format with pay rate loading details
In order to meet with FairWork ‘best practice’ guidance for payslips, a new payslip format has been added that provides additional detail on pay rate loadings being paid.
In addition to using this new payslip format, it is advisable that the Print Option to ‘Show Base Pay Rate Panel’ be selected and for some, a Note added to payslips to further explain pay rates paid.
2. Notifications update
Renaming of the file to ensure Wagemaster Notifications on new releases, updates and news appear correctly. Look out for the Wagemaster green Notifications icon when new information is available.
3. Housecleaning wizard process enhancements – removal of planned leave records
We have enhanced the financial year housecleaning wizard process to remove planned leave records where there is no corresponding payslip. Upgrade to this release will see this also done for past financial years that have been housecleaned. This ‘tidy up’ assists with ESS implementations as planned leave doesn’t come in and remain as leave still to be paid.
4. Block Times Award – fix to Normal hours on database upgrade
Any changes made to Normal hrs values in Block Times Award will no longer revert to default value on upgrade. Any changes made will now be retained after upgrade.
5. Known Issues in this Release
An issue has been found in the payment of overtime in Block Times Awards when there is a break entered in the Block Times shift. In order to ensure correct overtime payment, it is advisable that Block Times be entered as a single continuous entry with no break-in shift entered. And to capture overtime after a maximum number of hours is worked in a shift, consider entering Normal hrs. For example, the below settings would see Monday normal hours worked between 7.00 – 15.00 up to a maximum of 10 hours.
6. Financial Year Boundaries messaging
Message will incorrectly display during June in other country databases. This can be stopped by ticking ‘Reviewed Tax Year boundary for current FY’ is ticked in Period End Handling screen (File>Company Details>Configuration>Period End – Taxation Year Boundary).
After you Upgrade:
After the upgrade is installed, you should check that the correct software and database versions are displayed. If the latest version numbers are not as displayed below, Wagemaster may not have been successfully upgraded.
To check the version of Wagemaster:
The version number is displayed on the bottom right-hand corner of the main Wagemaster screen.
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After you have upgraded and opened your database, you can also check the version number by going to Help > About. |
Your new database version number after the upgrade should be 7.3.0.8217.
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