Overview:

This screen is used to create payroll batches to be exported to your payroll system. This step is done after timesheets have been approved by the group manager and checked by the payroll officer in Timesheet Administration. Once a timesheet line has been batched, it can no longer be modified.

Screen Guide:

Initial Payroll Batch List:

Open

The default filter will always show open batches in the current Period, but you can change this in the Filter section.

You can create a new batch by clicking + New Batch, which will pop up the Create Batch window (see below).

Clicking on the Batch No field of an existing batch will open the Payroll Batch Entry screen where you can add timesheets to the batch. The blue ellipsis button allows you to edit the batch itself, mark it as closed or not for export (exporting happens in Batch Control), and run reports on the contents using Print.

Create/Edit Batch:

Open

These windows are designed to create and edit batches for Payroll. You can create as many batches as necessary for each payroll period, e.g. one for wages and another for salaries, or only one for everyone.

The Reference field does not need to be unique, but is useful for identifying a batch quickly. Batch Notes are optional, but are useful for unusual batches to explain its purpose.

You can mark batches as Closed or Not for Export here, but it is more commonly done in Export Control.

The Print button is used to print batch reports, showing the contents of the batch.

Payroll Batch Entry:

This screen is reached by clicking on the Batch No field of the desired batch in the list screen. Here, the details from the create/edit window are displayed in the header section, with the lower section used as a filter to narrow down the range of timesheets to include in this batch.

To add timesheets to the batch, select from the available filter options to accurately target the range of timesheets you desire. Remember that Time Sheet From and To dates are the week ending dates. For example, in the above picture, 01-Dec-2019 would be the last day of the timesheet week, and would include the entire week in this batch, therefore having the From and To as the same date would include just that week's timesheets. You can switch from week ending dates to Use Transaction Dates to specify exact date ranges rather than entire weeks.

Payroll Name comes from the Users profile, allowing grouping based on key words such as "wages" or "salary." By default, the batch will ignore unapproved timesheets, but you can tick Include Unapprove if you are certain that all timesheets specified in the filter have been checked.

Click Save once your filters are set. Workbench will include all of the timesheets in the filter parameters, if any exist. A green bar will appear at the top of the screen informing you of how many timesheets were included. You can go to the Edit Batch window and click Print to view the included timesheets.

If a mistake was made, we can easily reset this batch by returning to Payroll Batch Entry and clicking the red Reset Batch button. This will return all included timesheets to an unbatched state, allowing them to be edited again. Note that if the payroll batch has been exported to the payroll system, the situation becomes more complicated and an administrator must be aware of where the data is in both systems before attempting to change data with Utilities.

Option to Summarise Payroll Exports:
Use setting “Summarise Payroll Export” which, if true, will export Timesheets for Payroll in a summarised way: EmployeeNo, PayrollCode and TimesheetDate rather than the standard EmployeeNo, PayrollCode, TimesheetDate and TransactionDate.

Next Steps:

Now that we have the desired timesheets in a batch, we can export the batch using the Export Control screen. The exact method of data transfer will depend on the payroll software you use, and can range from seamless transfer from Workbench to the software or involve the creation of a .csv file that is manually imported into the payroll system. Speak with your consultant if you are not sure how to proceed.