PAYE Real Time Information - your thoughts/experience?

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PAYE Real Time Information - your thoughts/experience?

Downsizer Forum Index -> Small Business Questions, Ideas and Advice

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wildfoodie

Joined: 05 Apr 2005
Posts: 2169

Posted: Thu Jan 03, 13 1:19 pm Post subject: PAYE Real Time Information - your thoughts/experience?

is anyone here using PAYE for employees?
you may know that the IR are moving to a real time system come april, which as far as I can see requires yet more administration and accountability from employers and less flexibility with how the employer manages payroll.
In addition to 2 salaried staff members ( paid monthly), we have a handful of students at various stages of education, who we employ in busy periods for anything from a couple of days to a few weeks at a time and a couple of saturday staff also in full time education. Come April their working hours and proposed pay will have to be submitted to IR BEFORE they can be paid -
seems to me that these weekly paid staff are going to cost me a lot of extra time and effort, and what about if I go on holiday - how can I manage payroll for staff whose hours and pay is not known until it happens? I think I'm going to have to pay our temp staff monthly in future as I'm the only one who does payroll....
has anyone got experience or reccomendations for payroll software?

sean
Downsizer Moderator

Joined: 28 Oct 2004
Posts: 42223
Location: North Devon

Posted: Thu Jan 03, 13 1:26 pm Post subject:
I thought that you were exempt if you have fewer than 9 employees. I haven't checked closely though because I don't have any payroll responsibilities. It does seem totally daft though.

vegplot

Joined: 19 Apr 2007
Posts: 21301
Location: Bethesda, Gwynedd

Posted: Thu Jan 03, 13 1:39 pm Post subject:
I don't think there are any exceptions not in the info I've read so far. We've been outsourcing payroll since May of last year. The small amount it costs us is well worth the stress/time it takes to do.

joanne

Joined: 28 Oct 2004
Posts: 7100
Location: Morecambe, Lancashire

Posted: Thu Jan 03, 13 1:44 pm Post subject:
I know we use Sage Payroll and it has RTI integration because I sit near our Accounts person and she is on the phone to Sage quite often and they are very very helpful - We also get out wageslips sent to our email rather than being printed out which saves the company money

wildfoodie

Joined: 05 Apr 2005
Posts: 2169

Posted: Thu Jan 03, 13 2:16 pm Post subject:

vegplot is right - there are no exceptions. if you pay employees, irrespective of whether they are below the NIC or tax thresholds, you will have to register them and use the RTI PAYE system from April 2013. Before that date everyone I've talked to about this is strongly suggesting that you ensure your employee info is bang up to date.

Sage are after me for buying their payroll software, at £210 plus vat and carriage it is a sizeable outlay for us but probably better than toughing it out with the IR freeware package 'Basic PAYE Tools' ...
This is soooooo slooooow I actively consider alcohol and drugs when using it...
I'm not even sure that it will be useable come April....

sean
Downsizer Moderator

Joined: 28 Oct 2004
Posts: 42223
Location: North Devon

Posted: Thu Jan 03, 13 2:58 pm Post subject:
Sorry, my mistake. Still a daft idea though. Private Eye has been banging on about how unlikely it is that the systems will be ready in time and what the chances are of the data actually being kept secure.

wildfoodie

Joined: 05 Apr 2005
Posts: 2169

Posted: Thu Jan 03, 13 3:17 pm Post subject:
I agree Sean, it's completely rubbish. the reason - 'so there will be fewer tax code errors' is imho a thinly veiled strategy for getting employers to do even more of the IR's work.

john of wessex

Joined: 18 Jun 2007
Posts: 2130

Posted: Thu Jan 03, 13 8:38 pm Post subject:
I work in Housing benefit and we are preparing for the introduction of 'Universal Credit' It is dependant on the RTI system working - even our payroll wasnt that impressed by it and your comments from the sharp end are fascinating........... See, for example https://www.guardian.co.uk/politics/2013/jan/01/universal-credit-computer-failures

Nicky cigreen

Joined: 25 Jun 2007
Posts: 9938
Location: Devon, uk

Posted: Fri Jan 04, 13 10:56 am Post subject:

wildfoodie wrote:

sage payroll is pretty good, you will be tied into paying for upgrades every year too - but I think it would be worth it.

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