Changes for the New Year
As the new year 2024 rolls in, payroll officers have to factor in end-of-year processes. These include both legal changes, such as increments of the COLA salary, as well as operational factors, such as carrying over leave and submitting end-of-year files.
In this article, we'll go over the key aspects of what changes you need to factor, and how to do that on Buddy (if you need to take action):
- COLA Salary Increase
- New Minimum Wage Legislation
- Updated Social Security and Sickness/Injury Benefit Rates
- Leave Carryover
- Changes to Leave Entitlement
- End-of-year Tax Submissions
Cost of Living Adjustment and Minimum Wage
All employers have to increase salaries of their employees to reflect the Cost of Living Adjustment. In addition, the new wage cannot be lower than the minimum. This is not optional.
To assist with this process, our COLA Review feature has been updated.
If the new salary including COLA is less than the Minimum Wage, Buddy will change the new salary to the minimum wage. This minimum will also include the additional rate for employees who have been in continuous service more than 1 or 2 years.
More information can be found here: Adding the Cost of Living Adjustment on Buddy
New Social Security Rates
The social security rates, as well as the injury and sickness benefit rates have been updated to reflect the rates communicated by the official authorities.
These rates are updated yearly to reflect an increase proportionate to the new minimum wage.
Carrying Over Unutilized Leave
Your employees may have leave from 2023 that has not been fully used up. Based on agreements or company policies, you may want to carry forward or pay these leave balances.
If so, check out the instructions here: Carryover or Pay Leave Balances from Previous Year
Changes to Leave Entitlements
Annual Entitlement
Each year, leave entitlement is dynamically updated based on the employees' schedule. In particular, the entitlement is composed of the base entitlement, along with the Public Holidays that fall on their off days. The latter part automatically changes each year.
In addition to this, Buddy is making a few changes for 2024. A few changes are minor updates to how leave is calculated to ensure all years (including leap years) are consistent.
Removing the 40-Hour Per Week Cap
The more important change is that employees with more than 40 weekly hours in their Salary Details will be entitled to leave for all their weekly hours. Previously, we had capped this to the first 40 hours, based on some traditional agreements.
For those of you who have employees who work more than 40 hours per week, you may not need to change anything. However, if these hours reflect non-basic hours (such as overtime), you should update the Salary Details accordingly to reflect a more accurate picture.
For the complete set of changes, read our Release Notes (22nd December, 2023)
FSSXpress™: End of Year Submissions
As soon as the Commissioner for Revenue allows submissions for the year 2023, you can submit these through Buddy.
On the 22nd of December, our team has introduced new tool for Bulk Submissions. This will help advisors to manage, validate and submit all their clients' submissions through a single page!
What to Prepare Before Submitting
We advise everyone to plan ahead! Here are some things you should do before coming to the end-of-year submissions:
-
Make sure you have registered access to submit the company's data through the Commissioner for Revenue portal
-
Plan a reconciliation, such as comparing payroll reports, FS5s and FS3s.
-
Plan to submit before deadline! Some difficulties require time to resolve, such as correct Tax Numbers or Surnames.
Accessing Assistance
Throughout 2023, our team has proven incredible service, with remarkable satisfaction ratings and response times (averaging 14 second first response to live chats)! We are confident that we'll continue you to deliver in this front.
Regardless, we'd like to point out that during January and February, our team receives a much higher proportion of tickets. As we continue to serve customers on a first-come first-serve basis, we encourage you to make use of our Help Centre, which has over 250 published articles.
These articles contain information and instructions which may answer your queries. If you would like to get in touch with our support team, the Help Centre is also the preferred channel of communication and managing tickets: Manage Your Requests Through the Help Centre.
On behalf of our team, I would like to thank you for your continued trust and wish you all the best for the new year!