Unpaid Pandemic Leave to 30 June 2022

Hi CL1234,

Thank you for your post.

If the 2-week leave entitlement is available in full and they don’t have to accrue it, you can enter the opening balance manually (once the entitlement is created). Further down the track, if the leave balance has been exceeded, a warning message will appear during the pay run to notify you of this. 

The first thing you will need to set up is the Wage category - this is the category that is used in the pay run when an employee is taking leave:

1. Go to the Payroll > Payroll Categories.
2. Click the Wages tab.
3. Click New and give the category a name.
4. For the Type of Wages, select Hourly (you can use this for both hourly-based and salaried employees).
5. Choose the applicable ATO reporting category. If unsure, check with your accounting advisor or the ATO. Learn more about assigning ATO reporting categories for Single Touch Payroll reporting.
6. For the Pay Rate, select Fixed Hourly Rate of $0.0000 (as this is UNPAID leave)
7. Place a tick in the Automatically Adjust Base Hourly or Base Salary Details box. This ensures that when your employees take leave, their regular pay hours and amounts are adjusted accordingly—so they're not overpaid.
8. Click Employee and select all employees who are entitled to this leave
9. Click OK.

You will next need to set up the Entitlement Category:

1. Go to the Payroll > Payroll Categories.
2. Click the Entitlements tab.
3. click New and give the entitlement a name.
4. Select User - Entered amount per pay run (as the opening balance will be entered manually and the employee will not accrue this leave)
5. (Optional) To show accrued leave on payslips, select the option Print on Pay Advice.
6. For the Linked Wages Category, select the wage category that you set up in the previous steps. This ensures that the leave balance is reduced from the entitlement whenever the employee takes leave.
7. Click Employee and select all employees who are entitled to this leave
8. Click OK

Lastly, you will need to process an adjustment pay run to enter the open balances for each employee entitled to this, see example below:

Once you have entered the balances and recorded this pay run, the setup is complete. I will also attach an example of the warning message that appears when the leave has been exhausted:

Please let me know if you have queires or you require further assistance, I'd be happy to help.

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