Simulating Payroll

Payroll accounting is the calculation of payment for work performed by each employee.

Payroll accounting includes the following activities:

The calculation of employee payments includes two main steps:

• Calculation of remuneration elements, which consists of all wage types calculated during a payroll period (such as basic pay, shift premium, gratuities, leave, and bonuses)
• Statutory and voluntary country-specific deductions (such as tax, employment insurance, pension, loans, and benefits)

Both remuneration elements and statutory and voluntary deductions, which consist of individual payments and deductions that are calculated for an employee during a payroll run.

Payroll areas are used in SAP HCM to group together employees for whom payroll is run in the following ways:

• At the same payroll time
• At the same date of payday
• At the same period parameter

A payroll area determines the date of the payroll period and the exact date of the payment. Payroll accounting is usually performed separately for different groups of employees. For example, you run payroll for one group of employees at the end of the month for the current month, while for another group, you run payroll on a weekday for the previous week.

Typical period parameters are:

• Monthly
• Bi-weekly
• Weekly

Employees are assigned to a payroll area on the Organizational Assignment infotype (0001).

Payroll Process (error-free)

The following process steps describe the payroll process (error-free) in general:

1. Release Payroll

   Locks master data for employees in the selected payroll area for the current payroll period as well as past payroll periods (to allow for the calculation of retroactive adjustments). Master data and time data infotypes are read during the payroll process and this requires the locking of master data records.

2. Start Payroll

   The personnel numbers to be included in the payroll run are selected by specifying a payroll area on the payroll driver selection screen. The payroll period is transferred directly from the payroll control record to the payroll program. Payroll is executed during this step.

3. Run Payroll Check
4. Exit Payroll

   Once the payroll has been verified and is correct, the payroll is completed and exited for the period processed. Master data records are unlocked.

Subsequent activities

After the payroll has been completed, further activities such as creating reports (for example, pay slips), posting in the accounting department and creating payouts are required.

0. Simulation

Each process step can be carried out via a transaction. Before you actually release and start payroll, you simulate payroll. Simulations help you identify the most common errors and eliminate them in advance. A simulation run corresponds to a regular payroll run with the following restrictions:

• The results of a simulated payroll run are not saved on the data base. You can view and print the results in the payroll log.
• The system does not lock any master data.

You can simulate payroll for individual employees before performing the regular payroll run for all the employees in your enterprise. This can be a good idea, for example, if you make complex changes to an employee’s master data, which can lead to far-reaching changes in his or her payroll results. In this way, you recognize sources of errors in time to make corrections before the regular payroll run.

You can even simulate payroll for individual employees, at any time during the regular payroll process, to trace the cause of any errors.

1. To start the payroll simulation, on the SAP Easy Access screen, choose Human Resources→Payroll→Country e.g. International→Payroll→Simulation or use the transaction, PC00_M99_CALC_SIMU.

   The number in the transaction after the 'M' stands for the personnel country/region grouping. In this example, the value is 99 that stands for 'International'. You access the initial screen of the payroll program. The Test Run (No Update) check box is set and cannot change.

2. Enter the following data and choose Execute:
   1. Payroll area
   2. Period
   3. Payroll schema
   4. Test run check box that is set automatically
   5. Display log

Displaying the Payroll Log

The payroll log gives you clear, detailed information on the payroll run and its results. It is divided into different levels that you can display depending on the amount of detail required.

The General Data level gives information on the processed data and shows the payroll schema used by the system. Successful personnel numbers and Personnel Numbers Rejected include processing of the schema for each personnel number. The rejected personnel numbers level is always expanded. At the end of the log tree, you can see possible messages and clear statistics.

To display lower levels, click on the structure node belonging to the level that you want to open.

In the payroll log, you can search for errors or use the search to find out what happened during the process. You can, for example, trace the processing of a wage type in the payroll process. You can either search in the log tree or in the detailed view of the log.