HR and payroll module questions
Will the ERP handle our local payroll and statutory rules?
Not out of the box, and no honest consultant will tell you otherwise. A global ERP ships a payroll engine that can calculate almost anything, but it does not arrive knowing your income tax slabs, your social insurance rates, your gratuity rule or your filing formats. Those come from a localisation pack, a partner-built module, or configuration we write for you. Before you commit, ask three questions: does a maintained localisation exist for your country, who updates it when the rules change, and is that update included in what you are paying.
Should we keep our existing payroll system and integrate it?
Often yes, and we say so even though it is the smaller piece of work for us. Keep the specialist system or the bureau when your country has heavy statutory complexity, when the ERP has no maintained localisation for you, or when a single compliance mistake carries real penalties. In that case the ERP owns the employee master and the general ledger, and payroll sends back a salary journal and payment file each month.
How does attendance actually feed payroll?
Through a cut-off date and a set of rules, not through a spreadsheet emailed on the last day. Shift patterns define expected hours, the attendance record captures actual hours from a biometric device, an app or a supervisor entry, and rules turn the difference into paid overtime at the correct multiplier, unpaid absence, or a leave deduction from an accrued balance. Everything approved before the cut-off goes into this run and everything after it goes into the next one, as arrears.
How does payroll post to the accounts?
As a single salary journal generated by the committed run, split the way finance needs to read it. Gross pay is debited to salary cost by department and cost centre, employer contributions are debited to their own expense lines, employee deductions and employer contributions are credited to statutory liability accounts until they are paid over, and net pay is credited to a salaries payable account that clears when the bank file settles. Add a monthly accrual for unpaid leave liability and for any bonus provision.
Who can see salary data, and how is that controlled?
Salary visibility is restricted by role, and this is the one area of the ERP where we recommend being stricter than feels comfortable. A line manager sees attendance, leave and performance for their team but not pay. HR operations sees pay for the population they administer. Finance sees the posted journal totals rather than individual payslips. Directors' pay is often ring-fenced to a named list of two or three people.
How do we switch payroll systems safely mid-year?
By parallel running, and we will not go live without it. Run the old and the new payroll on the same month's data for at least two cycles, three if you have complex shift or overtime rules, and reconcile every difference down to the individual employee rather than accepting a total that looks close. Year-to-date figures for tax and statutory contributions must be loaded and verified, because a mid-year switch that loses them produces wrong deductions for the rest of the year.
