Before you change an employee's pay group, you need to consider several items, which we've summarised below.
There would be several reasons as to why an employee's pay group will need to be changed, such as:
Changing pay frequency (monthly, weekly, etc.).
Different payment type (wages/salary).
Moving to a different tax jurisdiction.
Change in an employee's contract.
It is important to first take the below into consideration before doing so.
User access
You can only change an employee’s pay group if you have access to it. If you don’t have access, you will see the following error message:
"Error: This Pay Group has not been allocated to your Username."
To manage the pay group access, follow the steps in the relevant section below.
Portal
Click Settings then click Pay Group Access.
Back Office
Click Corepay, then click Reference.
Click Pay Users.
Check with your payroll supervisor to confirm your access.
Auditing (Amendments)
During the PAY300 Control report update process, all details regarding employee gross pay, tax, and PRSI are transferred to the new pay group.
This change will appear in the amendments column of the payroll control report, which may lead to mismatches in opening and closing balances.
Timing
Always move employees to a new pay group at the start of a payroll cycle to ensure correct handling of cumulative values.
Avoid making changes during active payroll cycles.
Move to a different company
If the new pay group belongs to a different company, all data will transfer to the new company’s previous pay, including cumulative values for the new period. You may still see historical details for both companies.
Before changing pay groups across companies, process the employee as a leaver and ensure they are marked as dormant. Only rejoin them after completing the pay group change.
Move from weekly to monthly
When changing a pay group between weekly and monthly schedules, manually update all periodic allowances and deductions to ensure accurate payroll calculations.
These values are configured for either a weekly or monthly schedule and need to be adjusted accordingly. However, if the annual allowance indicator is set to 'Y' for the pay group, no changes are necessary.
Move to a different tax jurisdiction
When transferring a pay group to a company in a different tax jurisdiction (e.g., from IRE to UK), treat this as two separate employments.
Create a new employee record in the new company instead of processing the employee as a rejoiner.
Matching payroll periods
The payroll period of the new pay group needs to match or follow the current pay group’s period. You cannot transfer an employee to an earlier payroll period.
If you attempt this, you will receive an error stating 'Employee cannot be moved to a pay group with a payroll period that is the same or before the current pay groups completed update.'
For information, check how to change an employee's pay group and move employee to a different company.