Payroll Update 4 February 2022
Kia ora koutou
In this Payroll Update:
- Key dates
- Start of Year 2022
- Start of Year restart job tab should be zero – reminder
- Our website has a new address
- Salary assessments for 2022
- Pay Period 23 will include the end of the 2021 annualisation
- Annualisation top-up will be in pay period 24
- Annualisation 2022 – EdPay 24nt now available
- Teacher aide increments
- Improved print to PDF for EdPay’s Activity History screen
- Leave reversals in EdPay
- Stop pay facility is being discontinued later this year
- 2021 audit reports available now
Key dates
- 4 February – SAAR and Leave Liability Reports available in EdPay
- 7 February – second draft SUE report for PP23 (includes termination pay)
- 9 February – pay day for PP23
- 23 February – annualisation top-up paid
- 25 February – Start of Year screen closes
Start of Year 2022
The Start of Year (SOY) screen opened in EdPay on Wednesday 8 December 2021.
The green SOY Tool Box on the website home page contains links to guides and training including:
Start of Year restart job tab should be zero – reminder
Restart job tab counter
Please check to make sure that you have restarted all your term-time-only employees and fixed-term teachers for the 2022 school year. You can check if there are any jobs remaining in the Start of Year restart job tab.
Click the Add employee to be restarted box to see which employees still have jobs to be restarted.
Term-time-only employee start dates
Use your employee's actual start date for term-time-only employees. Please note they cannot start on a weekend or a public holiday.
Term-time-only employees who do not return at the school's start date also need to have LWOP booked from 7 February 2022 until the day before the employee is due to return. Not completing this step could result in overpayments.
Returning teacher start dates
Regardless of what date the school opens for instruction, if a returning fixed-term teacher is employed at your school, 28 January is their start date in the Start of Year screen. If a fixed-term teacher is starting after your school's start date, please see page 6 of the Start of Year Guide 2022 to see whether leave should be booked.
Note: in order to make changes to an employee's hours, allowances, funding etc, you must first submit their start and end dates in the Start of Year screen.
Employees not returning
If any employees who have left your school are still showing in the Add employee to be restarted box, please use EdPay to terminate their job.
Our website has a new address
As part of retiring Novopay, we’ve changed our website address from www.novopay.nz to www.edpay.govt.nz. The new address still has much of the content from the previous site, including the very popular forms page, and your saved links should still redirect you to the right place.
We’ve been making regular updates to the site, including refreshing the look and feel, adding guides and videos to the training page and progressively updating the content.
To get directly to the new address, you can save the pages you use regularly as a favourite:
Salary assessments for 2022
Please submit any salary assessments for new teachers as soon as possible. Thank you to everyone who sent in applications last year for new teachers in 2022 – early applications mean we can give you better service.
Please note:
- salary assessments can be submitted even if the employee doesn't yet have a Ministry of Education number, IRD number or NZ bank account number
- your brand new teachers will be started on the minimum grade and step by default, if they have not been salary assessed before they start at your school
- salary assessment may require several supporting documents, so it's good to allow plenty of time to gather them all.
- the salary assessment page has more information about these requirements, and how the assessment is done.
Pay Period 23 will include the end of the 2021 annualisation
Any employee who was annualised for the 2021 year and has chosen to be annualised for 2022 will need to be aware of the split that will occur in Pay Period 23 (26 January – 8 February).
Annualisation for the 2021 year was complete on 30 January 2022. Annualisation for 2022 is effective from 31 January 2022. For pay purposes, this will result in:
- 5 days at the 2021 annualisation rate
- 9 days at the 2022 annualisation rate.
Note: for any employee who has not been previously annualised, the above will not apply.
Annualisation top-up will be in pay period 24
Any 2021 annualised employees who completed the annualisation period (which ends 30 January 2022) and are owed a top-up amount, will receive it in pay period 24 (pay day 23 February). Top-up amounts may include a holiday pay top-up for additional hours worked throughout the year, or a percentage of gross earnings for pay periods 19 to 22 if someone was term-time-only in 2020, but annualised in 2021.
Annualisation 2022 – EdPay 24nt now available
The EdPay24nt – 2022 Annualisation Agreement Change of Hours/Pay Rate (Excel) is now available on the forms page of the website.
Teacher aide increments
Please note that teacher aides are entitled to an automatic yearly increment as part of the Teacher Aide Pay Equity Claim. If the teacher aide has not met performance standards, OR is not eligible to progress from Grade BC step 5 to step 6 (as their work remains within matrix Grade B), please defer it by completing the school attestation report and sending it to the School Account Team. Schools must discuss a deferral with the teacher aide two months before it is to be applied.
Improved print to PDF for EdPay’s Activity History screen
EdPay’s print function from the Activity History screen has been improved to make it more legible for the user. The default view is portrait mode.
Leave reversals in EdPay
Leave bookings can be now reversed from the Leave History screen within EdPay. If a leave booking is eligible to be reversed through EdPay, you will see a red minus button to select when reversing.
Stop pay facility is being discontinued later this year
We are streamlining some aspects of our fortnightly pay cycle as our bank is discontinuing the ‘stop pay’ facility. We are targeting pay period 03 (20 April 2022) as the first streamlined pay cycle without stop pays and will let you know the key details of this change, so you and your school can be prepared. In the meantime, the current ‘stop pay’ process still applies.
2021 audit reports available now
The 2021 audit reports, which schools require in order to complete their financial statements, are now available.
The following reports can be downloaded from EdPay:
- School Annual Accrual Report (SAAR)
- Leave Liability Reports.
The following reports will be available for download from the Ministry's Secure Data Portal soon:
- Overpayments Error Schedule
- Stop Pays Error Schedule
- Funding Code Error Schedule.
Key audit dates
- 4 February – reports are available in EdPay
- 31 March – financial statements should be with auditors
- 31 May – annual reports to be submitted to the Ministry.
For more information about audit reports, check the Audit requirements for payroll records page on the website.
The Ministry of Education is preparing a detailed instructions document, which you will be able to download from its website soon.
If you need help with these instructions or have specific questions about preparing the 2021 annual financial statements, contact your regional Ministry school financial advisor:
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Education Payroll