SYMPTOM

I created an Attendance Class with default details. Then, I created a Pay Structure with two calculated Heads of Pay (HOP). The first one (named ‘TA’ – Transport Allowance) pays employees @10.0 dollars per day has a formula: PERIODDAYS()-(ABSOUTPAY()+ABSWITHPAY())*10.0. The second one is an HOP dependent on the first one. I created an employee, attaching the Pay Structure providing the normal details. Since there is nothing to enter as such, I proceeded for payroll generation through the menu option Payroll / Generation / Payslip.

Now, I proceeded for a Payroll View. I observe that the System shows zero values for all HOPs. I added some adjustment entry to one of the calculated fields, expecting to view the figure. I still observed that the System shows all zero values as before. I, now, proceeded for the Payroll / Generation / Payslip option, where I found generation status as ‘FAIL’.

It is clear to me that if generation fails, Payroll View can not show any specific figure. Hence, it displayed zero. However, why should payroll generation fail is not clear to me.

CAUSE

In practice, it is possible that because of some error, data were not entered into PERKS for some employee, but the user proceeded for Payroll Generation. As a very unlikely case to occur on a regular basis, PERKS considers this scenario as an error, when it can not find any payroll entry against a particular employee for the Period concerned.

In this instance, because of the constitution of the Pay Structure, the System cannot find any payroll entry at the time of generation. Hence, it concludes that, proper entries have not been made for the employee.

In practice, it is very rare, if not impossible, to find a System implemented solely with the help of calculated fields.

STATUS:

The previous section explains that this is an intended behaviour, which ultimately adds to data security - against accidental data entry errors in real life scenarios.

Modify the Pay Structure. Add a ‘dummy’ HOP with Valuation as ‘Entered Once’. The utility of the ‘Entered Once’ type HOP is that you need not enter payroll data explicitly for each Period after you have made entries for the first period, i.e., you only need to enter data once. The amount gets copied from the previous Period to subsequent Period automatically. Therefore, the issue described above (in the SYMPTOM section) will also not arise. You may also resolve the issue by using an HOP with Valuation as ‘Entered Always’. However, you will need to save the data explicitly for each Period. This will be additional work especially for a ‘dummy’ HOP.