Create Payroll Schedule
The process has 5 steps, and you can save and finish later during any stage.
If you’re just starting to use the Payroll Calendar feature or need to add additional pay schedules for different groups of employees, use the Create Pay Schedule wizard, which is accessed from the Payroll Calendar page.
In Step 1, you enter a name for the schedule, how frequently employees are paid, if the employees track time online, and a date range for the pay schedule.
Schedule Name: Enter a name to identify this pay schedule. It needs to be unique, and from 2–60 characters long.
Pay Frequency: Choose from weekly, bi-weekly, semi-monthly, or monthly from the drop-down.
Employees track time online? Choose Yes or No from the drop-down.
Schedule Start Date: Manually enter a date for the pay schedule to start or pick one from the calendar drop-down.
Schedule End Date: This field is automatically populated to end on the closest payday a year from the start date based on the pay frequency. For example, if you choose weekly pay frequency and a start date of March 4, 2019, the end date will be set to March 1, 2020.
You can change the End Date. Depending on the start date and pay frequency you’ve selected, only certain days can be used as End Dates. If you manually enter a date that doesn’t work with your schedule, an error message displays to let you know why.
In Step 2 you’ll set different deadlines based on the options you chose in Step 1.
You set specific deadline dates for the first pay period. The number of days between those dates are used to set all the deadlines for the pay period. For that reason, if you need to adjust the deadlines for the first pay period, wait until Step 4.
Tip
For online weekly timecards, you want each of the deadlines to be two days apart as a general rule for the entire pay schedule.The first pay period ends on January 11, so on Step 2 you set January 13 as the Employee Deadline, January 15 as the Supervisor Deadline, and January 17 for the Payday. But this year Martin Luther King Jr. Day falls on January 15, and you want to give supervisors an extra day to approve timecards. Instead of changing the date to January 16 on this step, wait until Step 4, where you can adjust the individual pay periods without affecting the entire schedule.
Once you set the initial deadlines but before you save, a summary of your choices displays. You can click on the informational icon to see details about how the deadlines for the entire schedule will be set based on your choices here.
Available dates are limited based on other criteria (e.g., the Employee Deadline can’t be after the Supervisor deadline or before the end of the pay period). If you use the calendar drop-down to set the dates, the available days display in blue.
Employees Track Time Online
Required fields include
Employee Deadline: the number of days after the pay period ends that employees have to finalize their timecard
Supervisor Deadline: the number of days after the employee deadline that supervisors have to approve the timecards
Tip
You also need to set a time for the employees and supervisors to finalize and approve the timecards. You can enter a time manually, but it’s probably easiest to choose from the drop-down because your choices are limited to valid entries.
Payday: the number of days after the supervisor deaadline when employees are paid
Employees Track Time Offline
When employees track time offline, you don’t need to enter Employee or Supervisor Deadlines.
Enter a Payday: number of days after the pay period ends that employees are paid.
Employees Track Time Online
Required fields are
Employee Deadline: the number of days after the pay period ends that employees have to finalize their timecards
Supervisor Deadline: the number of days after the employee deadline that supervisors have to approve timecards
Tip
You also need to set a time for the employees and supervisors to finalize and approve the timecards. You can enter a time manually, but it’s probably easiest to choose from the drop-down because your choices are limited to valid entries.
Payday 1: specific date each month that employees are paid
Payday 2: specific date each month that employees are paid
Tip
For example, if you pick January 15 and 30 here, employees will always be paid on the 15th and 30th of the month.
Employee Track Time Offline
When employees track time offline, you don’t need to enter Employee or Supervisor Deadlines.
Payday 1: specific date each month that employees are paid
Payday 2: specific date each month that employees are paid
Employees Track Time Online
Required fields are
Employee Deadline: the number of days after the pay period ends that employees have to finalize their timecards
Supervisor Deadline: the number of days after the employee deadline that supervisors have to approve timecards
You also need to set a time for the employees and supervisors to finalize and approve the timecards. You can enter a time manually, but it’s probably easiest to choose from the drop-down because your choices are limited to valid entries.
Payday: specific date of the month when employees are paid
Employees Track Time Offline
When employees track time offline, you don’t need to enter Employee or Supervisor Deadlines.
Payday: specific date each month that employees are paid
The pay groups you see here are limited by permissions and if there are active employees in them.
Choose Pay Groups to assign to this pay schedule. You don’t have to assign pay groups here before advancing to the next step, but you won’t be able to publish the pay schedule until at least one pay group is assigned.
Step 4 displays a list of all the pay periods in the pay schedule. Each pay period’s dates are calculated based on the dates you chose in Step 2. You can adjust the dates for individual pay periods here (e.g., if the supervisor’s deadline falls on a holiday at your school, you might want to give them an extra day to approve the timecards).
Tip
If you need to make a change to any of the dates in a pay period, click the Edit button at the end of the row.If you leave Step 4 (e.g., go back to Step 2 to make a change or continue on to Step 5 but realize you need to go back to Step 4 to edit a pay period), and come back, you’ll need to re-enter all your edits.
Step 5 displays a detailed list of all the pay periods in the pay schedule. You can’t edit the pay periods here, but you can go back to any step in the process and make changes.After you have reviewed the pay periods, click confirm and finish to save the pay schedule in draft form.
Tip
You’ll still be able to make changes from the Payroll Schedules page until you publish the schedule.
When you view the full list of pay periods in Step 4, click the Edit button at the end of the row to change any of the dates in that particular pay period.
If there is a holiday in a pay period, a blue informational icon displays in the pay period column on Steps 4 and 5. Click the icon to see details.
Creating different pay schedules allows you to pay your employees in different ways. For example, you could customize these two different types of pay schedules:
Faculty members get paid once a month and track their time online. You know that you will always have faculty members, so you set that pay schedule length for a full year.
You need to hire a group of temp workers for a summer event. Their pay schedule only needs to last 3 months, they get paid weekly, and they don’t track their time online.
No. At any step of the process you can save the draft and finish it later.
Yes. Click the green button at the top of the wizard to go back to any previous step.
Tip
If you’re on Step 4 and navigate back to a previous step, when you return to Step 4, you’ll need to reenter any edits to individual pay periods.
This is the date when employees need to finalize their timecards.
The date when supervisors need to approve the timecards and send for payroll processing.
There are a number of reasons a date or time might not be valid (e.g., paydays can’t be before supervisor deadlines, or maybe the date or time was in the wrong format). The best solution is to use the drop-down to choose the date or time, because that way you can only chose valid dates or times.
Step 4 of the wizard shows you a list of all the pay periods in the pay schedule. You can edit individual dates there.
Tip
If the pay period has a holiday in it, an informational icon displays in the pay period column. You can click the icon to see which holidays fall in that pay period.
The pay schedule is saved in a draft form and you’re returned to the Payroll Schedules page.
Tip
You can make additional changes from the Payroll Schedules page until you publish the schedule.