Once again End of Financial Year is fast approaching! In order to get through this trying time relatively smoothly, we recommend you consider the following:
1. It is good payroll practice to ensure that all your payroll associated costs (Payroll, PAYG Tax, Deductions and Superannuation) are fully reconciled at the end of May with no outstanding issues. This ensures that in June you only have the current month to reconcile and this will ensure you are ready to print Payment Summaries on time to have in employees hands by the due date (14th July).
2. Take the time to review how your current system is set up, ensuring that the following is set to print on the correct area of the payment summary:-
- Allowances (to cover work related expenses eg. Car Allowance)
- Reportable Employer Superannuation Payments (eg. Salary Sacrificed Superannuation)
- Union/Professional Association Fees
- Workplace Giving Amounts.
3. Ensure your full Company Name, ABN and Authorised person are correct to avoid problems down the track
4. Check all terminations that were processed are entered into the correct Payment Summary Label eg. ETP’s should be Label C, Tax free portion of a Genuine Redundancy should be Label D, Annual Leave and Long Service Leave paid out should be in either Gross Wages, Label A or Label B depending on when accrued and why it was paid out.
5. Finally, before printing your Payment Summaries, ensure you print all the recommended reports and make all the necessary back-ups your software provider recommends.
To make it easier at year end, you should consider outsourcing your payroll as all the above would be taken care of.
