The Enter sickness details option may be used to record the dates an employee is sick and to generate Statutory Sick Pay (SSP) payments to the employee based on a set of government SSP rules and SSP parameters.
If the company is claiming a part of the SSP back from the government under the Threshold Percentage Scheme introduced 06/04/1995 it is necessary to record the amounts of SSP generated within the field called SSP gross since the SSP gross amount has to be reported at the payroll year end for those tax months a claim for SSP has been made, the SSP gross figure for each employee is generated by using the Enter sickness details option.
If on the other hand your company is not claiming back SSP from the government there is no need to report SSP gross figures at the payroll year end and then the use of the Enter sickness details option is optional. There are however still some advantages of using the Enter sickness details option listed in the Why use Enter sickness details? section of this help file.
The SSP history consists of records of periods of sickness in chronological sequence each having a maximum length of 7 days.
The system decides whether the sickness record entered attracts a SSP payment or not and allocates one of five record types to it. The only record types which can be considered for SSP are START and LINKED, that is the start of sickness and following records which qualify to link under the SSP rules.
The value of the SSP payment is determined record by record as it is input and the details saved in the SSP history to be used by the calculation option.
The system caters for the Percentage Threshold SSP Recovery Scheme introduced 6/4/1995.
When the pay period is carried forward into the next payroll period further checks are made and the new records in the history file are flagged as historical. Only current records can be edited.
To access Enter sickness details
The Payroll Password form is displayed.
Enter your payroll password.
The PAYROLL menu is displayed.
Select the Enter sickness details option.
The Payroll period information form is displayed. This should be checked to ensure you are in the correct payroll type and period.
Note: If the payroll has been confirmed for the current period the message Period payroll has been confirmed is displayed at which point you should select the Exit option to return you to the payroll menu since further updating of the payroll is not possible without the payroll being reset.
Select the OK option.
The Enter sickness details form is displayed.
The Enter sickness details form is displayed when you select the Enter sickness details option from the PAYROLL menu and select OK to the payroll period information form.
What do you want to do or be advised about?
Employee selection
Employee number: The individual number allocated to each employee consisting of up to six digits. The first available employee number within the employee record sequence will either be shown if the payroll type parameter called Employee default is ticked otherwise will default to number zero. The employee number chosen may however be changed by the user by entering the employee number or by using the search function described in the tip below.
Tip : Click the Ellipsis button
to search for an employee number from the employee records file by either a surname search or a word search. The search will only list those employees that have been created for your current payroll company and payroll type that do not have their left flag set to Y or P indicating a left employee in the current and previous tax year respectively.
If the payroll type parameter called Block edit of own record is ticked it is not possible to select your own record as identified by the Employee record containing your user id in the User ID field. If you enter your own payroll record number the error message You are not permitted to edit your own payroll record is shown.
Create a sickness record
To create a sickness record containing a maximum of 7 days of absence:-
Enter the employee number.
Click the Create button at the bottom of the form.
The system checks the SMP weeks left field on the employee's payroll record and if it is non zero gives a warning WARNING: Employee is receiving maternity pay but will allow the continuation of input.
The system also checks the Holiday counter field on the employee's payroll record and if it is non zero shows a message Employee currently on holiday - log SSP when returned and prevents the continuation of input.
Complete the sickness record form as described below.
Click the OK button to the right of the form.
Once all of the sickness records have been correctly set up for the employee click the Save button to the right of the form.
Amend a sickness record
Only the most recent live status sickness record can be amended due to the chronological linking of the sickness records:-
Enter the employee number.
Click or select using the up and down cursor keys the most recent sickness record .
Click the Amend button at the bottom of the form.
Complete the sickness record form as described below.
Click the OK button to the right of the form.
Once all of the sickness records have been correctly set up for the employee click the Save button to the right of the form.
Delete a sickness record
Only the most recent live status sickness record can be deleted due to the chronological linking of the sickness records:-
Enter the employee number.
Click or select using the up and down cursor keys the most recent sickness record .
Click the Delete button at the bottom of the form.
Click the OK button to the right of the form to confirm deletion.
Once all of the sickness records have been correctly set up for the employee click the Save button to the right of the form.
Sickness record form completion
The Sickness record form is displayed when you click the Create or Amend buttons in the Sickness details form.
The top two lines are the last two history records for visual continuity checking, and below the line are live status sickness records each being not more than 7 days in length and they must be entered in chronological sequence - the system checks that the new date entered is greater than the previous date for all dates.
Start date: Enter the first date of the sickness period. Alongside it will be displayed the day of the week.
Tip : Click the Ellipsis button
The start date is checked with the end date of the previous START or LINKED record, whichever is found first, to determine the record type, (other record types are ignored when checking the history).
It is a LINKED record if the number of days separation is less than or equal to the Maximum linked PIW separation period in days from the SSP parameters.
If the number of days are outside this period then the record is UNLINKED but may represent a START of a PIW which is dependent on the end date entered.
It is always a LINKED record if the end date of the previous record was the day before the start date of the new record.
If the employee is excluded or transferred as defined by the flags on the Static 2 TAB of the payroll record no days qualify and the SSP record type is set to EXCLUD or TRANSF.
If there is no linked previous record in the SSP history then the start date will be checked against the Last date of sickness (SSP1.L) on the payroll record to check for a link, if the dates link then the total SSP weeks liability on the PIW is reduced by the weeks on the Weeks already paid (SSP1.L) field. It is a START record requiring a new set of waiting days before SSP is paid again. The basic period pay is used to determine the rate for SSP since there will be no valid pay history for working out an average.
If the record is a START record the age of the employee is checked on the first day of the PIW. If the employee date of birth is not set a warning is shown WARNING:- employee's date of birth not set since the age exclusion rule cannot be applied. If the age is beyond an age defined within the System parameters (currently 65) and the start date is before 1st October 2006 no SSP is due and a warning message is shown WARNING:- No SSP due - employee is aged 65 years or older on the first day of the PIW. In this case an EXCLUD type record is created and the Exclusion flag on the Static 2 TAB of the payroll record is updated with the code AG - Age related exclusion.
If an employee is aged beyond an age defined within the System parameters (currently 65) and the start day is on or beyond 1st October 2006 when new Age Discrimination legislation came into effect SSP is allowed to be logged and paid.
End date: Enter the end date of the sickness period. Alongside it will be displayed the day of the week.
If an employee is aged on the start date beyond an age defined within the System parameters (currently 65) and the start day and end day straddle the 1st October 2006 when new Age Discrimination legislation came into effect you are advised with the message Date range should not straddle the 1st October 2006 for employees over 65 and have to instead log absence records up to the 30th September 2006 and then from 1st October 2006.
Tip : Click the Ellipsis button
Length (days): The end date entered is checked against the start date and the period length recorded.
If the number of days is greater than 7 re-enter splitting into two records is required. A maximum of 7 days can be entered on each sickness record due to the SSP scheme being a weekly calculated scheme.
If the number of days is less than the Minimum PIW (days)(currently 4) then the record type is 'NOTPIW' and no days qualify, unless the start date of this record and the end date of the previous record are consecutive days and the previous record type was START or LINKED, under these conditions this record is LINKED. The record type is set to START if its length is between Minimum PIW (days) and 7 days and it does not link with any other record.
Qualifying day mask: The qualifying day mask is defaulted from the payroll record, and editing of the mask is allowed to cater for special circumstances such as an employee who works an irregular day pattern. The qualifying days are determined by comparing the actual days with the qualifying mask. Only days which coincide with 'Q' days qualify for payment.
Pay day mask: The days for payment are indicated by the letter P in the Pay day mask field and the system will default the qualifying days to days for payment except in the following circumstances related to Waiting days (currently 3):
The Waiting days must be deducted from the qualifying days for a START record.
For a LINKED record the history is checked for each record to ensure that in the linked sickness period all of the waiting days have been taken (that is if the total number of days that qualify in the history since the start of a sickness less the total number of days paid is less than the waiting days then the waiting days not taken will be deducted.
The pay days can be altered for various reasons by adding or blanking out 'P's. If an alteration is made you should enter a reason code in the column provided. The reason code is not verified by the system and reason codes can be entered regardless of circumstances.
Reason code: Enter the reason code for the sickness.
Tip : Click the Ellipsis button
Average period: The Average period code is only used for a START record and is used to determine if the most recent S.S.P./S.M.P. gross pay earnings history or the history one period further back is used when determining the average pay. The field defaults to C but the following options are allowed:-
- C - Current period for the sickness
- P - Previous period for the sickness
The average pay is calculated only for START records. The average pay is calculated from the last 8 weeks for weekly paid employees using the S.S.P./S.M.P. gross pay earnings history.
If, however, the start date of the sickness is in the previous pay week (for weekly payrolls) then you must set the code to 'P' for previous. This will cause the average pay to be calculated for the 8 weeks starting with the week before last instead of last week. The Average period code can only be set by the user since it is dependent on the relationship between the normal pay DAY and the start day of the sickness.
Note: When the system calculates average pay - if the oldest periods are zero then the average is taken over the number of periods for which a value is found.
Average calculation for other payroll types:-
2-weekly - take last 4 history periods
4-weekly - take last 2 history periods
Monthly - take last 2 history records times 6 divided by 52
SSP Record types: The SSP record type will be one of the following:-
START - unlinked PIW - start of sickness
LINKED - linked with previous start or linked record
NOTPIW - not to be considered for SSP
EXCLUD - exclusion flag set on payroll record
TRANSF - transfer flag set on payroll record
A PIW (period of incapacity for work) must be 4 or more days (SSP parameter), therefore an entry of less than this would be flagged as NOTPIW on entry and would not result in a payment unless it was linked by a consecutive date with the previous START or LINKED record. All records flagged as anything other than START or LINKED will be ignored for SSP purposes whether history or current.
SSP threshold: The average weekly pay is checked against the SSP rate table. If the average weekly pay is below the first threshold the employee is NOT paid any SSP (Rate = 0), above the first but below the second - the first payment value represents the weekly rate to be used, etc. The number of the threshold (weekly rate) to be used is stored on the SSP record. If the record is LINKED the rate on the previous original START record is used (or last valid SSP record if also LINKED).
The final stages are:-
Click the OK button to the right of the form.
Once all of the sickness records have been correctly set up for the employee click the Save button to the right of the form.
Value of each record
In Weekly terms: For each record the days to be paid are compared with the number of qualifying days in the week, the following table gives the official fractions to be used for the recording of number of weeks in the sickness:
Number of Qualifying Days for week
Decimal fraction of week for one day
7
0.143
6
0.167
5
0.200
4
0.250
3
0.334
2
0.500
1
1.000
that is all rounded up to 3 decimal places.
In Monetary terms: The daily rate of pay however is calculated officially by:
'X' = (Weekly rate) divided by (Qualifying days for week) truncated to 4 decimal places.
SSP = 'X' times (number of days SSP) rounded up to nearest penny.
The weeks and value are stored on the SSP record.
Statistics
After completing the detailed entry the system gives the following statistics:
Start of current sickness: This will be the start date of the current START record or the start date of the last START history record if this sickness is linked.
Totals in weeks: The Weeks already paid (SSP1.L) will be taken into account when calculating total weeks for the linked sickness if there is a link to SSP1.L.
This total is checked against the SSP parameter Maximum weeks SSP liability and Weeks for transfer notice and corresponding warnings are given:
WARNING: SSP liability exceeded - reduce paid days
WARNING: Transfer form required
This is checked against the SSP parameter Maximum linked period in years and a warning given if the employee is at or over the limit.
WARNING: PIW exceeds limit - alter end date
PUSH BUTTONS:
Exit: Returns you to the PR MAIN MENU.
Help: Displays help on the current application in your default company browser.
Cancel: Cancels any changes that you have made to the Sickness details form and returns you to the PR MAIN MENU.
Save: Saves any changes that you have made to the Sickness details form and returns you to the PR MAIN MENU. Unless your system is set up for automatic updating of the rates table you should now review the payment rates being paid to the employee during the current payroll period.
If the payroll type parameter called Posting warning before confirm is ticked the nominal ledger postings to be generated as a result of using the option are verified and any posting validation errors are brought to your attention. Press Continue to close the form and correct the employee or payroll record as soon as possible. Posting errors will normally be due to the Cost centre or Cost centre split fields on the employee record forming an invalid account combination with the NL Grade field on the Static 1 TAB of the payroll record.
Next: Displays the details of the next employee number.
Previous: Displays the details of the previous employee number.
Create: Displays a blank SICKNESS RECORD form where you may create a new sickness record.
Amend: Displays the SICKNESS RECORD form of the highlighted record.
Delete: Allows the last line on the form to be deleted.
Calculating period pay processes
SSP payments are added to gross for Tax, NI and Pension.
The SSP calculation is done after the consideration of Rates and Additions/ deductions and is shown on the Totals TAB of the payroll record as follows:
The values and days of the current SSP records from the SSP history are stored in Statutory Sickness Pay Gross This period and in Statutory Sickness Pay (S.S.P) Paid (days) This period.
To arrive at the value of SSP which will appear on the employees payslip, a comparison between the SSP gross and the gross pay calculated from the Rates and Additions/deductions is done in the following way:-
If the SSP check box is set to a tick on any entries used by this employee a separate record of the payments containing SSP is maintained, and these in turn are split between those with SSP days associated with them and those with none.
For the records with days, the value of gross pay is compared with the value of the same number of SSP days, the lesser of the two values is subtracted from the SSP gross total. If there is a positive value of SSP left then compare this value with the gross pay values that had no days associated with them, subtract this other gross pay value from the SSP and any positive SSP value remaining is stored in the 'SSP paid' this period, this value must be paid to the employee.
SSP and payslips
For the printing of SSP on payslips a payroll type parameter on the SSP TAB called Show SSP detail on payslip is used.
If this check box is left unset only the 'SSP paid' value is printed as 'SSP'
If this check box is set to a tick then the full value of the 'SSP gross' is printed as:
'SSP for XXX days' - Value of SSP gross
and underneath
'SSP already incl.' - Difference between SSP gross and paid if not zero
Reporting SSP
It is recommended that the Period SSP details report be added as a mandatory end of period option report. This report may otherwise be run from the Reports & enquiries, Period reports menu.
It is recommended that the SSP recovery report be run at the end of each tax month having calculated all of the payrolls to be run in the payroll company for that month. This report is run from the Reports & enquiries, Period reports menu.
Select new period
History - all current records are flagged to be history records and cannot be amended except the last record entered if it is a 'NOTPIW' record, this may be added to in the next period making it a valid PIW.
If the employee has had the Maximum weeks SSP given by the SSP parameter Maximum weeks SSP liability then the SSP transfer field on the payroll record is set to 'T' for this employee.
The Percentage Threshold SSP recovery scheme
To assist in the operation of this tax month based scheme, a SSP recovery report exists on the period and year-end report menus.
You can run the report for either an individual tax month or for all periods. The latter produces a printed copy of what is seen when responding Yes to the Are you claiming any SSP for this payroll type question when running the P14/P60 forms, P35 listing year or internet year end options.
The report will scan all payroll history files and the payroll files and extract NI employee, NI employer and SSP gross information.
Class 1A contributions are ignored following the HMRC rule.
Each tax month is treated in isolation, if the SSP gross amount exceeds the total NI multiplied by the Recovery threshold (%) SSP parameter - 13% for the 2005/2006 tax year, then the full amount of excess may be claimed back.
In the unlikely event of SSP being claimed, a Nominal Ledger journal should be carried out external to the payroll module using the report.
Exactly how the SSP claim is proportioned between individual employees/cost centres is left up to the user to decide.
EMailing managers
The payroll system may be set up by users to use five different criteria for a single electronic mail message to be automatically sent to the direct or more senior manager of the employee following the use of the Enter Sickness Details option. The mail message does not stop the SSP records being recorded or paid but acts as a reminder to the manager.
This option will only work if the Administrator mailing system is currently working on your system. If this is not the case you should log an Environment type software support call.
For example, mail the manager a sickness warning for an employee if one or more of the following criteria are reached:-
More than 10 days of total absence in the last rolling year
More than 5 days of total absence in the last rolling 6 months
More than 5 separate records of absence in the last rolling year
More than 3 separate records of absence in the last rolling 6 months
Set up stages for Emailing sickness warnings:-
Use the Miscellaneous options menu, Utilities options menu option called Update SSP mail manager to set up as required the Direct manager and Senior manager fields on the Static 2 TAB of the payroll record.
A priority 8 user is required to use the System maintenance menu option called Payroll type parameters to set up the SSP mailing rules on the SSP TAB.
The Mail Message
To Payroll record MANAGER field (8 long)
From Payroll operator user id
Subject Absence information
Header text for the first entry only EMPLOYEE / COMPANY / TYPE - FORENAME SURNAME
Blank line
This employee has had absence logged in payroll and exceeds one or more pre-defined limits as follows:-
Blank line
Absence count = xxxx exceeds tttt days/records since dd/mm/yyyy
The word days or records is included depending on the mail type.
When a record count type is used a second line as follows is added:-
This represents the period in the last xx ppppp prior to the start of the current payroll period
Follow by a blank line
Where:-
xxxx = count
tttt = trigger
dd/mm/yyyy date generated
xx = period count
ppppp = period type such as days, months or years
The mail message is ended with the following line:-
Please refer any queries regarding this Email to your payroll department as soon as possible.
Human Resources calendar update
The payroll system may be set up by users if the optional Human Resources (HR) module is installed so that the calendar facility within the HR system is automatically updated with calendar data once the Enter sickness details option is used. If the HR calendar code is switched on for detailed analysis the calendar codes created will have the one character code assigned such as S - Sickness and a detailed calendar code set to the payroll sickness reason code. Any HR detailed codes not present will also be created as a result of this process.
Set up stages for HR calendar update:-
Within the HR module using the main HR menu option called Human resource records Calendar TAB, Codes option to create calendar codes and to switch on the detailed analysis codes if required.
Use the Payroll Miscellaneous options menu option called Sickness reasons to set up the calendar code to be used for each sickness reason. Only the HR calendar codes with a 1 day unit may be used.
Automated rates table update
The payroll system may be set up in an advanced mode so that once Enter sickness details has been used the rates table itself is automatically adjusted to reflect the period of absence and the optional payment based on service entitlement of up to five different rates of company sick pay. This process is highly parametised and needs to be carefully thought through and understood before set up.
Consultancy is recommended for the implementation of this process but please note that due to varied nature of the process it cannot be guaranteed that the system will handle the exact process required which will only be determined during a consultancy review process.
Set up stages for Automated rates table update:-
A priority 8 user is required to use the System maintenance menu option called Payroll type parameters to set up the SSP logging rules on the SSP TAB.
A priority 8 user is required to use the System maintenance menu option called SSP service length codes to set up the company sick pay entitlement parameters based on service length.
Why use Enter sickness details?
Reasons to use the Enter sickness details menu option are as follows:-
Longer term record keeping allowing for trend, pattern and cost analysis.
Implementation of the 28 week employer liability rule is possible.
Implementation of the 3 year Period of Incapacity to Work (PIW) rule is possible.
Implementation of the age related SSP exclusion rule is possible.
Implementation of the rules using former employer sickness certificates in order to reduce your own company SSP liability.
Optional facilities available are described within this help file and are as follows:-
Electronic mail messages may be generated and sent to the employees' manager.
The optional Human Resources calendar can be updated with the sickness records.
The contents of the rates table can be adjusted to reflect the absence and payment of company sick pay automatically when entering the sickness details.
What is the next process?
Your next step in the payroll process is to use the Enter maternity details option to input the maternity details.
The overall process of running a payroll period may be summarised as follows:-
Make amendments to existing employees and create new employee and payroll records and if used, Human Resource records for joiners using either the main employee records or payroll menu option called Full employee edit or the Employee records main menu option called Add/modify employee details, the main payroll menu option called Add/modify payroll record and the main human resources menu option called Human resource records.
Input pay details option to input the main payroll details.
Enter sickness details option to input the sickness details if this option is to be used on your system.
Enter maternity details option to input the maternity details.
Enter paternity details option to input the paternity details.
Enter adoption details option to input the adoption details.
Enter court orders/CSL option to input the court orders and student loan collections.
Enter leaving dates option to maintain leavers and to re-instate payroll records to perform final irregular payments to left employees.
Calculate period payroll option to calculate the payroll.
Reports & enquiries option may be used at this or at any other entry stage to check the data that has been entered onto the system.
Print payslips option to first preview the payslips on screen or to print them on plain paper for checking and then to print the payslips followed by selecting the Update option.
Print cheques option to first preview and then to print cheques if used as a payment method followed by selecting the Update option.
Print bank giros option to first preview and then to print bank giros if used as a payment method followed by selecting the Update option.
Confirm/reset period payroll option to freeze the input of the payroll and to generate nominal and optional BACS postings held at this stage within the payroll module.
BACS listing option to produce a BACS listing report if BACS is used.
Transfer BACS buffer to BACS option to copy the payment data to the BACS submission module on the main accounting system or the payroll system ready for transmission to BACS if BACS is used.
Confirm/reset period payroll option to possibly reset the payroll and to correct the original generated payroll. This is typically followed by selective use of all the steps prior to the first use of the Confirm/reset period payroll option.
Execute EOP options option to produce the reports set up for mandatory running within the payroll period - this is best left until you are satisfied with the accuracy of the payroll processed.
Reports & enquiries option to produce any other optional reports and at payroll year end mandatory reporting.
Select new period option after a nightly system backup to select into the next payroll period or payroll year including the optional copying of the nominal ledger postings to the main accounting system and any other BACS generated postings to the BACS submission module on either the main accounting system or the payroll system ready for transmission to BACS.
