HR 5.3.2

Marlin HR 5.3.2

Released:29/8/23

HR-1048: Remove the Leave Balance (Days) value from Pay Advices and Leave Entry screen.
HR-1050: Provide additional and updated Hint text.
HR-1052: Enhance the text instructions on the GL Reconciliation Report.
HR-1054: Correct OTE and Allowance calculation on Employee YTD Report.
HR-1056: For new sites coming directly onto STP-2 version, the Opening Balance for leave is not being included in the Balance figure on Leave page.
HR-1058: Displayed YTD figure for After Tax Deductions on Pay Advices is only including post STP-2 deductions.
HR-1061: In PostConversion section of v5.3.2 installation, run an Allowance Stats recalc.
HR-1063: Update the Postgres version of HR from 5.3.1 to 5.3.2.
HR-1064: Restrict entry of special characters in name and address fields that cause ATO rejection of STP submissions..
HR-1066: Enable system re-calculators to be triggered by a Marlin HR update installation when required.
HR-1069: Add the 2023-24 Tax Scales and new Super Guarantee Rate of 11.00%.

Feature Highlights

Leave Balances no longer shown in "Days"

All calculations in Marlin HR regarding leave (i.e. leave accruals, leave entries, leave balances, leave payouts etc) are done in hours as this affords the finest and most precise granularity. All stored values are in Hours, never in Days, as a working day is often variable over time.

For some time, at the bottom of the Leave Entry screen and Pay Advices, we have provided an indication of what the leave balance hours figure is in Days. This was simply to provide a more friendly indication of how much leave an employee has accrued, as 30.53 Days means more to most people than 232 Hours for example. Although some employees work a "standard" 7.6 or 8 hour day, others work completely different hours per day or week. Some work Monday to Friday, some work 2 or 3 days a week, some work hours on weekends at their standard base rate whilst others are paid overtime if they work on weekends. Some employees even work a different number of hours and/or days each week.

In addition, the system cannot know in advance what days of the week an employee will take off as leave days. So, if the payroll officer has set up the employee incorrectly, or the employee works different hours on different days, the system cannot accurately convert the leave balance in hours to work days. Also, if you change the number of hours normally worked each week or the number of days that are normally worked, the leave balance in hours will remain correct but the number of work days balance will change. For these reasons, it is not possible for Marlin HR to guarantee that an employee's leave balance shown in Days will be correct.

Some customers have contacted us to say that they and their employees are confused when the leave balance in Hours and Days doesn't seem to match up. Despite the Hours figure being the "source of truth" and the Days figure being shown in parenthesis as an indication only, there have been cases reported where employees have argued that they are entitled to the figure shown in Days. As the Pay Advice is an official document, and to prevent employers from being put into this situation, we have erred on the side of caution and for now removed the Days figure from Pay Advices and the leave balances screen.

If you have a strong desire to see employees' leave balances also displayed in Days, please contact us to let us know why. If there is sufficient interest we may review the situation in future.

Tax Scales for 2023-24

This update includes the new tax scales for the 2023-24 tax year.

After completing your EOFY close-off, opening the payrun screen will pop up a prompt asking whether you would like to apply the new tax scales. Just click on Yes and the new scales will be applied. If you respond No, the update prompt will re-appear each time you open the payrun screen until you respond Yes.

Most of the scales are unchanged from 2022-23, only the STSL tables (Student Tertiary Support Loans) have changed as they are indexed differently each year.

Superannuation Guarantee Rate for 2023-24

From 1st July 2023 the SGR (Superannuation Guarantee Rate) will increase from 10.5% to 11.0%.

After completing your EOFY close-off, opening the payrun screen will pop up a prompt asking whether you would like to apply the new SGR. Just click on Yes and the new rate will be applied. If you respond No, the update prompt will re-appear each time you open the payrun screen until you respond Yes.