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Are Casuals entitled to Sick Leave?

Nov 2nd, 2009 by

A common belief by employers, and employees, is that Casual Employees (see definition HERE) are not entitled to Sick Leave as they ‘ do not work 6 months continuously’.  This in fact is not the case as stated HERE by the Department of Labour.

Under the Holidays Act 2003 all employees are entitled to a minimum of five days paid sick leave a year after the first six months of continuous employment and an additional five days paid sick leave after each subsequent 12 month period.

The Holidays Act also provides sick leave entitlements after six months to employees whose employment is not continuous (including casual employees) if, during those six months, they have worked:

1. An average of at least 10 hours per week, and

2. At least one hour per week or 40 hours per month.

So as you can see, casual employees are entitled to the same 5 days sick leave per year as other employees provided they meet both of the above conditions.

The actual number of hours paid is based on the number of hours the employee would have worked (rostered hours) on the day they were sick.

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Payroller turned Winemaker

Oct 30th, 2009 by

The name Steve Nathan may or may not be known to you but he is someone who contributed quite a bit to the payroll arena.

Steve and his father, Peter, were the brains behind the successful payroll program called Comacc.  They used to be agents for the IMS payroll program but felt they could do something better and different.  The first version of Comacc Payroll was a DOS product (who remembers DOS then?) and I first came into contact with them when they had about four customers.

Steve and Peter continued the development into Windows and subsequently added Time & Attendance, Health & Safety and Human Resource modules to the mix.

Steve and his wife Bev eventually bought Peter out and Bev was responsible for setting up their Payroll Bureau and also managing a team of Payroll Temps who could look after your payroll on-site whenever you needed to go on holiday.

They eventually sold Comacc to MYOB in August 2006 and from there Steve & Bev moved onto winemaking.

They purchased a vineyard in the Hawkes Bay which was either named, or they named SALVARE (which in latin means save or rescue), a fitting name for a glass of wine after a hards days work.

Salvare produce a range of wines all of which you can read about on their website – Salvare.

You can also sign up to their newsletter in which you get advance notice of some great wine deals.   The newsletter sign-up page is HERE!

Who knows, maybe at some point we will see a wine called UnPaid Chardonay or Pinot Holiday Pay or how about Cabernet Payslip!!!!!!

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19 Road Rules Changes from November 1st

Oct 30th, 2009 by

Most people are aware that you can’t talk or text on your mobile from November the 1st, but do you know there are 18 changes in total.

You can read about all of them HERE!

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Employer’s November Newsletter

Oct 29th, 2009 by

You can read the latest Newsletter from Employers Assistance HERE!

Topic covered are:

  • Ban on the use of mobile phones while driving
  • Employers to have a say over Tea & Meal breaks
  • Employer Seminars
  • ACC rules due to change
  • Calculating payment of Public Holidays – relevant daily pay
  • NZ Public Holiday Dates for 2010 and 2011

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ACC – Employer Reimbursement Agreement

Oct 29th, 2009 by

It’s always a stressful time when an employee needs to go onto ACC due to an accident (work or non-work related) as after the first week its the responsibility of ACC to pay the employee 80% of their Normal Wages.

The process of getting this up and running involves the employee lodging a claim with ACC.  ACC assesses the claim and if valid approaches your employer with a request for your wage history over the previous four weeks.  From these figures ACC bases its 80% calculation and makes the payment.

The trouble with this is the uncertainty involved with ACC getting the information they need as quickly as possible, but I must say, that from experience they get onto it very quickly.

However, any employer can elect to pay their employee directly and then claim back the 80% (or any other ACC agreed, lesser percentage) directly from ACC.  This can greatly alleviate and stress upon the employee knowing that the payment will kick in straight away as it will just get processed through your payroll on its standard frequency.

If you want to know more about this service then click HERE and read all about it on the ACC website.

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ACC – Is it a Tax or Insurance?

Oct 29th, 2009 by

The first in a series of articles covering what ACC is all about and the services it provides to both Employers and Employees.

One of the biggest mis-conceptions is around the payments we pay as employees.  Currently all wage earning employees pay 1.7% of their Gross Pay to ACC.  This is called the Earner Premium and it is used by ACC to cover all non-work related accidents, of which there are many, with your home been the scene of the largest number of injuries.  The other big area is sport.

The Earner Premium is calculated with, and part of, your tax.  So when you select your tax code it includes the component for ACC, which is my view is a shame as I think most people the see it as a Tax whereas it’s a Insurance Premium, much like you pay for contents or car insurance.

It would be great if the Payroll Software developers out there split off the Earner Premium from Tax Calculations and showed it as an itimised deduction on your payslips so that you can see exactly how much you are paying towards Injury Insurance.

The last thing to note about the Earner Premium is that it is capped each year at a certain income level.  The level for the current 09/10 tax year is $106,473, which equates to $1,810.04 of Earner Premium per year, GST inclusive.

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Looking for a Payroll Bureau?

Oct 27th, 2009 by

There has been a lot of activity lately brought about by MYOB’s announcement that it was discontinuing its Payroll Bureau Service.

If you happened to be a client of MYOB you must now find yourself in a unfortunate position, but don’t despair.

Here at EzyPay we use the same software package as MYOB so all we need to get you going on our Bureau is a backup from MYOB, who are co-operating with us 100% in order to make any move as seamless as possible.  It was just a shame that MYOB did not solicit help from us before making the announcement as this whole issue could have been handled without causing so much anxiety to its bureau clients.

Anyway, EzyPay is a Christchurch based payroll bureau that has been in business for over nine years now.  We currently employ 3.5 staff and handle the payrolls for over 100 companies who are scattered all over New Zealand and some even based in Australia.

If you would like to discuss your Payroll Bureay requirements further then just give me, Paula, a call on 0800 399-729 (EZYPAY)

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Meal Allowances

Oct 22nd, 2009 by

The followings question has been asked by a subscriber:

If your employer pays $55.00 a day for away from home meal allowance has he the right to say how it is spent, eg Breakfast, Lunch, Dinner?

My initial response would be that the employer can make some recommendations but ultimately it was up to the employee what they spent the allowance on.

I assume that in this case the employee is not claiming for meals any other way.  I know my sister used to work for Air NZ as an Air Hostess and was given such an allowance and it was totally at her discretion what she spend it on.

So to be 100% certain I would look at the terms of your contract (which I assume you have), and if it does not outline anything the best thing would be to ring the Labour Department and ask them.

Perhaps others might have an alternative viewpoint.

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Changing Pay Frequency

Oct 22nd, 2009 by

It is a common question asked as to how a company goes about changing pay frequency.

The easiest part is the bit done by the payroll software as all you need to do is reset the employee to the new pay frequency and update their Standard/Normal pay to reflect the new frequency.

The hard part is that you have to get your employees to agree.  Changing pay frequency is possibly a change of the employees contract conditions so you must negotiate the change in good faith, and obtain the employees written approval to the change.

The other issue you will face, if moving from weekly to fortnightly or fortnightly to monthly is the financial impact it can have on your staff.  They may have to adjust automatic payments with their bank and in some cases you may need to advance money to your staff to get them through the first frequency change.

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Mobile Phones in Cars

Oct 21st, 2009 by

From November 1st, 2009 it will be illegal to use a cellphone while driving unless it is hands free.  Hands free does not mean you can sit a phone on your lap and turn the loudspeaker on as the phone must be secured in cradle.

This law is long overdue and hopefully everyone will play their part in enforcing it, especially if you see those morons who txt while they are driving.

Anyway, the new law will effect employment contracts so Employers Assistance have developed some suitable wording for inclusion in your contract.  You can download the content HERE!

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Posted in Payroll Comment | 2 Comments »

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