Applying Paid Parental Leave
Employees are entitled to paid parental leave paid for by the Department of Human services as long as they meet the following criteria:
- be the primary carer of a newborn or newly adopted child
- have individually met the income test in the last financial year
- not be working during your Parental Leave Pay period
- have met the work test in the 13 months before the child’s birth or entry into care.
1. Payroll > Manage Payroll > Payroll Settings > Pay Categories
Create a pay category "Paid parental Leave” and tick “Fixed”, as it will be a fixed amount that will be paid every week or fortnightly depending on the Pay Schedule. Then press Save.
2. Set the Super rate to 0 and tick the “Payroll Tax Exempt” checkbox. Usually, there is no SG (Superannuation Guarantee) applicable.
3. Go to the employee’s payroll profile who is going on leave and then go to Pay Rates under their profile.
4. Next, untick the “Show In Pay Run” from their usual “Pay Category” they are paid under
5. Paid parental leave is a fixed amount and a recurring payment that will happen every week or fortnight until a specified date. It can be added as “Additional Earnings” under the “Pay Rate Inclusions” menu in the profile.
6. Map the Pay Category to the pay category that you created in Step 1, add the Units and Rate per Unit and override the super rate to 0 (if no super is paid on this pay category).
7. The
Units field represents the number of weeks paid in the pay run like 1 for a weekly pay run, and 4.33 for a monthly pay run.
In the earnings line, please select the All Pay Runs until the Maximum Amount Has Been Reached option. Then enter the weekly amount multiplied by 18 (the number of entitlement weeks) under the Maximum Amount that can be paid.
8. The next step is to Add a New Pay Run and you should see an earnings line for the parental leave, but because you set it up as a Fixed Pay Category, please make sure that there are zero hours. This is to be expected, as the gross earnings will still be correct. For the last pay run, you will find a pro-rata amount that the platform will calculate, so that it does not overpay the employee.
