Support for the Alabaster ruling

Karishma Updated by Karishma

Payroll has introduced as part of the 2.56 upgrade support for the Alabaster ruling. The ruling applies for any pay rise from the start of the 8-week reference period up to the end of maternity leave. If the ruling is applicable, Payroll will recalculate the average pay from the pay reference period and backdate any earnings owed to the employee.

The field SMP end date is used for the end of maternity leave. If it is not set, the end of the maximum SMP paid period will be used.

If a pay rise is applied using Payroll's pay rise system it will be used to recalculate the average pay and total SMP paid.

If you navigate to system>Maintain pay rises and either Add a new pay rise or Modify an existing one.

Tick Alabaster applies in the pay rise screen if Payroll needs to check whether the pay rise affects any employee's SMP.

When applied, the Pay rise anomalies report will advise of any employees where Alabaster may apply.

There is also a new employee field Alabaster applies which is normally set to N

Payroll will set it to R (Required) when pay rise applied if there is some SMP that would be affected.

Payroll will set it to A (Applied) when the average pay is recalculated. This is done automatically if the new pay group option to Automatically calculate SMP, SPP etc. is set.  Otherwise it is recalculated when the employee's SMP form is opened. 

Payroll will reset it to N when the SMP record is cleared down.

The check pay report will check this field and error if it is set to required. To correct this select Enter payroll details and open SMP for the employee.  A message will advise that the average pay has been recalculated.  Review the details and then select OK for SMP and then for Enter payroll details to save the update.

Pay rises will be checked when calculating average pay. Any pay rises that fit the Alabaster rule will adjust the pay for pay periods before the pay period that the pay rise was originally applied. The tax year and pay period applied are saved in the pay rise record to allow this. The SMP calculation will then use the new average pay.

Leavers and Alabaster

These should appear in the Pay rise anomalies report produced when applying the pay rise but must be processed manually. The employee field Alabaster applies will be set to R.The report will flag any leavers where the Alabaster rule may apply. You will need to review these leavers and if their pay does need to be adjusted you will need to add them to the pay cycle for a payment after leaving. Then follow the same process as detailed above to recalculate the SMP.

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Automatic recalculation of SMP,SPP etc

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