Configuring wage calculations in Workforce.com empowers your front-line staff with the ability to forecast labor costs while building schedules and report actual labor costs when approving timesheets. Ultimately, employee wages will be paid as per the configuration in your payroll system. However, it is important to align costs between Workforce.com and your payroll system so the whole team, from payroll to operations, have the same understanding and insight into wage costs.

When aligning or comparing cost in Workforce.com with Cost in payroll, check:

The costs on timesheets are 'gross wages'. When comparing figures in Workforce.com to figures in payroll, ensure you are looking at gross wages rather than net wages (calculations including taxes or deductions) or wages with on-costs (calculations including superannuation or pension contributions, work cover, payroll tax).

When exporting from Workforce.com into a payroll system, you are exporting hours or units to a pay category. If you notice gross wages are not matching between the two systems, the first variable to check is the hours/units in your payroll system versus what is in Workforce.com.

If the hours/units match between Workforce.com and your payroll system, the next variables to check are multipliers/rates. These include:

Where should I look in Workforce.com when comparing costs?

A great resource for cross-checking costs is the Timesheet Export Summary, which can be found on an employee's individual timesheet or for all employers on the Timesheet Export Preview. This will show you the total cost (gross wage), hours, and rates for an employee.

Why is there no cost showing for an employee?

Cost is calculated by hours x (base rate x hourly rate). If any of these variables are missing, then cost will not be able to be calculated. If you see no cost on a timesheet line, check the employee has a pay rate, a date of birth if rates are determined by age, hour entered on their timesheet, and rules configured with a rate or multiplier.

What do I do once I've pinpointed the discrepancy between costs in payroll and costs in Workforce.com?

If you find a variable in Workforce.com does not align with a variable in payroll, we recommend you update the variable in Workforce.com or the payroll system depending on which is incorrect, and then recalculate the timesheet. You may need to re-export the timesheet if the variable is hours.

Why are figures in the Real Wage Cost report different from figures in payroll?

The Real wage Report is designed to get as close as possible to the real cost of your wages, including overheads such as leave accrued, pension contributions, and payroll tax.

However, as some of these variables require information which sits outside of Workforce.com or is dependent on external variables, the on-costs calculations in Workforce.com should be used as an indicator of real wage costs, with payroll being the ultimate source of truth.