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2. Determine any outstanding entitlements

AccountRight Plus and Premier

This is task 2 of 7 for processing a final pay (see previous task or an overview of all tasks).

After you've paid the employee's final standard pay, you can work out how much paid leave they're owed so you can pay it out.

To do this, you can run the Entitlement Balance Detail report as at their final pay date.

To run the Entitlement Balance Detail report

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  1. Go to the Reports menu and select Index to Reports. The Index to Reports window appears.

  2. Click the Payroll tab and select the Balance Detail report (under the Entitlements category).

  3. For the report's date range, enter the employee's final pay date in the To field and any earlier date in the Dated From field. For example, if their final pay date is 15 January, enter the date range of 1 January to 15 January.

    Employees final pay date

  4. Click Display report. The report appears.

  5. In the Filters tab, type or select the employee’s name in the Employees field. The report display changes to show only the selected employee's entitlements.

  6. Check the Available Hours column to determine the total hours outstanding for each entitlement category (you'll need to know this when you record the employee's final pay). The total recorded in the employee's card, such as an opening leave balance, is displayed (Card balance), as well as the leave the employee has accrued in pay runs (Hours from pays). These amounts should match, and the Difference field should show 0.00. This example shows the employee is owed 23 hours of annual leave and there's a zero Difference.

    Example balance details report with available balance and difference highlighted

    If an amount appears in the Difference field, this means an amount has been entered in the pay history of the employee card for the entitlement. You will need to work out if the amount was entered in error, or if the amount should have been included in a previous pay run. You will then need to correct the error before processing the termination pay. 

  7. Print or save the report for your records.

  8. Proceed to the next task: Create payroll categories for termination payments.

FAQs

What if the employee has a negative leave balance?

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Generally, a negative value for an entitlement means the employee has taken more leave than they have accrued. When you record the employee's final termination pay, enter the leave hours as a negative value against the unused annual leave payroll category.

Here's an example:

Negative leave amount entered in a pay

This will reduce the final pay's net amount to reflect the negative leave balance.

If you're facing this scenario, we recommend speaking to the ATO, your accounting advisor, or Fair Work Australia as it might also impact the employee's PAYG and superannuation.