Available for the following Payroll classic plans: Standard, Premium
Available for the following user access levels: Admin
Opening balances allows you to transfer your employee entitlement information, from your previous payroll platform over to your Employment Hero Payroll platform. Thereby creating a seamless transfer of your employee entitlement data when migrating over to our payroll platform.
The Opening Balances feature allows to import in bulk your employee's opening balances and export this information if needed as well. You can also use this feature to configure your organisations initial tax year to suit your business needs.
Getting started
The below premise will walk you through how to add your organisation's initial tax year.
- Click the Business Settings menu.
- Click the Payroll Settings submenu.
- Click the Opening Balances button.
- Select the Tax Year from the Tax Year drop-down box.
- Click the Save button.
Maintain
The below will walk you through how to import and export your organisation's opening balances.
- Click the Business Settings menu.
- Click the Payroll Settings submenu.
- Click the Opening Balances button.
- Click the Export button.
- Click the Business Settings menu.
- Click the Payroll Settings submenu.
- Click the Opening Balances button.
- Click the Import button.
- Click the Select File button.
- Click the Confirm Upload button.
Helpful Hint
After the importing process finishes, a summary appears on your screen outlining what data successfully uploaded and what errors occurred.
Further information
The list below explains what each column represents. You will find further clarification of the information provided on the opening balances page of one of your employee's records. Columns A to J are always constant regardless of your payroll setup.
| External ID. | Relates to an employee ID you may be using that comes from another external platform and is captured from the External Id field in the Employee's Details page. |
| Column B: National Insurance Number. | Captured from the Tax and NI Details option in the employee profile in the National Insurance Number field. |
| Column C: Payroll Id. | The Payroll ID is an identifier that you can give to an employee and you will send through to the HMRC. An employees payroll ID will follow them between jobs, payroll software and even via their pension provider to identify them. For an employee being migrated over, you can enter the employee identifier from the old system. |
| Column D: Employee Name | Captured from the employee's Preferred Name, Middle Name, and Surname fields in the employee's Details page. |
| Column E: Total Hours | Only required if you want to add Total Hours worked in the initial financial year, up to the day before the period start date of the first pay run in this payroll system. Refer to the Earnings tab on the Opening Balances page of the employee's record. |
| Column F: Gross Earnings |
Total gross earnings paid in the initial financial year, up to the day before the first pay run in the EH payroll platform. We display this at the bottom of the Earnings tab on the opening balances page of the employee's record. You can just enter a total gross earnings figure in this column if you wish, but if you choose to enter amounts for specific pay categories, do not enter a total here. The platform will calculate the total of all of the Pay Category columns in the spreadsheet once imported and so will automatically calculate the total for this column. |
| Column G: PAYE |
The total PAYE deducted from gross earnings paid in the initial financial year, up to the day before the first pay run in the EH payroll platform. We display the field on the Pension and PAYE tab on the Opening Balances page of the employee's record. |
| Column H: Student Loan |
If there is a student loan, it will be in this column. |
| Column I: Post Grad Loan Amount. |
If there is a post-grad loan amount, it will be in this column. |
| Column J: Tax Relief Pension Amount |
You would enter the tax relief pension amount in this column. |
| Column K: Employer Pension Contribution Amount |
You will add the employer's pension contribution amount in this column. |
| Column L: Employee Pension Contribution Amount. |
You will add the employee pension contribution amount in this column. |
The following column numbers will vary for each business and depends on the business setup, but the category orders are the same for everyone. They are as follows:
| Leave Categories. |
The next group of columns represents all the leave categories set up on your Leave Categories page in the Payroll Settings module. In the template they are labelled as LC; then a number which is the platform-generated ID code for the leave category; then the name of the leave category, example LC262968_Annual Leave. In these fields you will enter the employee's leave balance in the relevant unit type that the leave category has been configured to; for example, if the leave category has been set up with the unit type = days, then the balance entered must be in days. If the employee does not have a leave balance or the leave category is not set to accrue, then leave the figure as 0. You would enter negative leave balances as -12.65. |
| Deduction Categories. |
The next group of columns represents each of the deduction categories set up in your Deduction Categories page in the Payroll Settings module. In the template they are labelled as DC, then a number which is the platform generated ID code for the deduction category, then the name of the deduction category, example DC141225_Member Voluntary Pension. |
| Pay Categories. |
The next group of columns represents each of the pay categories set up in your Pay Categories page in the Payroll Settings module. In the template they are labelled as PC, then a number which is the platform generated ID code for the pay category, then the name of the pay category, for example PC959199_Ordinary Hours. In these fields, you will enter the employee's pay category breakdown as a sterling amount. You only need to enter amounts in these columns if you:
Otherwise, entering an employee's total gross wage in Column F GrossEarnings is enough. |
Explore related content
- Payroll platform opening balances: Employee leave balances This feature allows you to select an employee file and enter their accrued Year to Date (YTD) leave balances.
- Payroll platform opening balances: Employee earnings This feature allows you to select an employee file and enter their existing Year to Date (YTD) earning amounts.