Wage Subsidy Scheme Issues

PaybackPayroll

J9 submissions should be rejected by Revenue for pay dates on or after 1 September.

Just a couple of points to add for common queries that have cropped up for our customers.

The payslip you give your employee does not show any indication that EWSS is being applied. Where the Revenue guidance says about putting EWSS into ‘other payments’, this means the submission will have a 'Other Payments' section showing the EWSS claim. Your software should (probably) automatically put this in for EWSS submissions.

It is Revenue's view that if an employer submits a payroll with EWSS selected for an employee who is paid too little or too much to get the subsidy, then this is an offence. (Many payroll products now have had to put in a filter or warning for this at very short notice.)

blackwhite

Has anyone managed to find the "Sweepback" template that needs to be submitted by end of this week?

Haven't managed to find it anywhere on Revenue.ie so far

jos28

PaybackPayroll wrote: »

J9 submissions should be rejected by Revenue for pay dates on or after 1 September.

Just to confirm, I cannot submit a payroll due for payment on Friday for TWSS employees working a back week?
They will be switching over to EWSS for hours worked from today onwards.

Tow

blackwhite wrote: »

Has anyone managed to find the "Sweepback" template that needs to be submitted by end of this week?

Not published yet, they will extend the 5 September cut off.

Tow

jos28 wrote: »

TWSS employees working a back week?

Revenue base everything off when money is paid to the employees.

angela1711

Are we still getting a TWSS payment this Friday the 4th of September ? This is for employees who are getting their wages paid a week behind. If not I m totally screwed as I was only working a day up to two days per week during the whole duration of TWSS.

Irishdreamer

angela1711 wrote: »

Are we still getting a TWSS payment this Friday the 4th of September ? This is for employees who are getting their wages paid a week behind. If not I m totally screwed as I was only working a day up to two days per week during the whole duration of TWSS.

From what I understand, to avail of TWSS for this week you had to change your payment date to 31/08/2020 (yesterday) & the payment had to also leave your bank yesterday.

collsoft

No.

Revenue will not issue a TWSS refund for any payment dates after 31st August.

As TOW pointed out, Revenue work strictly on the Payment Date - not the dates you work.

angela1711 wrote: »

Are we still getting a TWSS payment this Friday the 4th of September ? This is for employees who are getting their wages paid a week behind. If not I m totally screwed as I was only working a day up to two days per week during the whole duration of TWSS.

collsoft

That is 100% correct

Irishdreamer wrote: »

From what I understand, to avail of TWSS for this week you had to change your payment date to 31/08/2020 (yesterday) & the payment had to also leave your bank yesterday.

Qprmeath

My employer will be entitled to the full €203 for me on the new EWSS scheme. So over 2 weeks €406. I am currently only working 20 hours over the 2 weeks. Actually one week off then 3 days the following week. Is there any stipulation as to what I get paid? Will I only get paid for the hours I work which might amount to €300 leaving my employer with the remaining subsidy?

collsoft

OK, so i might be misunderstanding you - so sorry in advance.

Your employer is only entitled to a subsidy of €203 for any week that he actually pays you €203 or more.

It sounds like you are only getting paid every second week.

If so, your employer will only receive a subsidy on the week you are paid.

He will not receive a subsidy for any week that you are not paid.

Have I understood your question correctly?

Qprmeath wrote: »

My employer will be entitled to the full €203 for me on the new EWSS scheme. So over 2 weeks €406. I am currently only working 20 hours over the 2 weeks. Actually one week off then 3 days the following week. Is there any stipulation as to what I get paid? Will I only get paid for the hours I work which might amount to €300 leaving my employer with the remaining subsidy?

Qprmeath

collsoft wrote: »

OK, so i might be misunderstanding you - so sorry in advance.

Your employer is only entitled to a subsidy of €203 for any week that he actually pays you €203 or more.

It sounds like you are only getting paid every second week.

If so, your employer will only receive a subsidy on the week you are paid.

He will not receive a subsidy for any week that you are not paid.

Have I understood your question correctly?

Yes it’s one week off then 3 days (20 hours)the following week. So having been on close to our normal wages on the TWSS we will now be only taking home €200 odd euro a fortnight. What a pointless scheme.

Kewreeuss

Qprmeath wrote: »

Yes it’s one week off then 3 days (20 hours)the following week. So having been on close to our normal wages on the TWSS we will now be only taking home €200 odd euro a fortnight. What a pointless scheme.

I don't understand you. Why is it pointless?
You should be getting the same pay now that you were getting before TWSS and PUP. Or are you working less hours now than you were in Jan/Feb?

Qprmeath

Kewreeuss wrote: »

I don't understand you. Why is it pointless?
You should be getting the same pay now that you were getting before TWSS and PUP. Or are you working less hours now than you were in Jan/Feb?

Was working full time hours n January/February. It’s aviation related. Now on 30% of normal hours.

Kewreeuss

Oh I see.
With TWSS you were getting your usual net pay and now you are only getting paid for the hours you are working, and paying tax on it too.
I sympathise with you. I hope things pick up for you eventually.

collsoft

OK, perhaps you can check this out with your employer.

I posted an answer that I had from Revenue last week regarding the new scheme for pubs that are still closed.

If you go back to my post you will see that Revenue have stated that there is no actual requirement that you are working in order for your employer to receive a subsidy.

If your employer was to actually pay you €203 on the weeks that you didn't work, then he would be entitled to a subsidy of €203 for that week also.

I would Syrongly suggest that you ask your employer to look into it.

Now I would add that the question that I asked was specifically about closed establishments. However the answer is very clear about there not being a requirement that an employee is actually working.

I sought this advice from Revenue as Chairperson of the Payroll Software Developers Association (PSDA) which is the representative body for all of the payroll software companies, and the answer was from Anne Dullea who is one of the Principal Officers in Revenue overseeing The new EWSS scheme.

Specifically the advice that Revenue gave me is as follows;



"Hi Jason

Further to our earlier call, please see below advices re the issue raised re payment of wages to employees of closed establishments.

There is no condition within the Employment Wage Subsidy Scheme (EWSS) that an employee must be ‘working’ in order for the employer to claim a subsidy in respect of that employee.  

The EWSS resumes normal operation of payroll for employers under the PAYE system. It re-establishes the requirement to operate PAYE on all payments to employees which includes the regular deduction and remittance of income tax, USC and PRSI at the normal rates. Where an eligible employer makes a payment of emoluments to a qualifying employee, the employer can a claim an employment wage subsidy in respect of that employee. The level of subsidy will be determined by the amount of gross pay paid to the qualifying employee in accordance with subsection (8) of the EWSS legislation.  

A qualifying employee is an individual who was eligible under the Temporary Wage Subsidy Scheme in relation to the employer, and, an individual who is on the payroll of the employer and receives a payment of emoluments during the qualifying period (01/07/2020 to 31/03/2021) but excludes connected parties not on the payroll of the employer at any time during the period 01/07/2019 to 30/06/2020 and proprietary directors eligibility conditions yet to be confirmed. 

Thus, where a business such as a pub remains closed from 1st Sept and the employer continues to pay employees, the payment of emoluments to the employees must be taxed accordingly under the PAYE system. Where employer and employee EWSS eligibility criteria are met, the employer can make a claim for an employment wage subsidy in respect of those payments of emoluments to employees and the of level of subsidy amount will be determined by the amount of gross pay paid to the employee."

Qprmeath wrote: »

Was working full time hours n January/February. It’s aviation related. Now on 30% of normal hours.

PickYourName

collsoft wrote: »

There is no condition within the Employment Wage Subsidy Scheme (EWSS) that an employee must be ‘working’ in order for the employer to claim a subsidy in respect of that employee.  0

I gather this quote was from a direct communication from Revenue to you?

Do you know if it has made this information more publically available? On the face of it, it seems to contradict their own guidelines, which state:

"Safeguards will be included to minimise abuse specifically to ensure employers are not laying off one employ ee to replace them with more than one employee earning a lower wage thereby maximising subsidy entitlement, and manipulation of payroll including deferring, suspending, accruing, increasing or decreasing gross wage that would normally be payable."

There has also been commentary in the media to the same effect, e.g. paying people who otherwise would be under the lower threshold more to bring them over the threshold and thus enable the subsidy to be claimed.

This is really important for us, as we were planning to continue to operate the way we had been under the TWSS, which under the EWSS mean we would be paying them €5.08/hour for the hours not worked (we've assumed a nominal 40 hour week).

It was only yesterday when I heard about these "safeguards" which on the face of it mean we won't be able to do this, but from what you're saying we will.

Help!

PickYourName

collsoft wrote: »

Hi PickYourName,

OK, so I am going to apologise in advance in case I have misunderstood your post.

If I have understood your message it seems like you are saying that "GovC19 WageSub" on the payslip is part of gross pay.

Firstly, apologies for the delay in responding to your comprehensive response (all of which I agree with, by the way), but I’ve only just seen it.

Secondly, you did misunderstand what I said and no, you don’t have to apologise for that as any fault is mine for not being clearer in what I was trying to say.

There are as you say many subtleties around what is gross pay, mainly related to its tax treatment, e.g. whether tax is due at all, tax is deducted at source or tax is payable later. As part of this, there is a very specific definition used when details of payments are submitted to Revenue and as you say, you need to get this right (we believe we have).

However, there is the overall definition of gross pay being the total payment from the employer to the employee. For the purposes of the relationship between the two, the TWSS payment is part of that. It’s not that relevant if the employee isn’t actually working, but if they working are it becomes relevant in that the TWSS amount is taken as part of their contracted wages (hence the references to “top-ups”). This in turn becomes important when determining if people’s wages have in fact been cut (probably without their agreement), or if they are being paid less than the minimum wage. If the TWSS wasn’t considered as part of people’s wages, pretty much everyone who is on it would most likely be on less than the minimum wage.

I hope that is a bit clearer in the point I was trying to make. The reason for making it is as part of drawing attention to those employers who are using the TWSS as a smokescreen for cutting people’s wages and/or paying less than the minimum wage.

3102derek

A query hopefully someone can answer.

So my company took me off the covid payment.
First payslip since it started so may payment is back to pre covid. so my normal pay.

Now when they used the Jan and Feb to get the average, it included commission i claimed in Jan.
So my covid payments were higher for the duration. So i have to pay tax at the end of the year on thois. this im fine with.

Now that im off the covid payment, i am about to claim for my commission for the last 6 months. But my employer is saying i have already got it, by way of the overpayments in the covid.

This can not be correct can it? As i will be taxed on this overpayment at the end of the year..
It has nothing to do with commission i built up for the last 6 months.

So i should be entitled to claim my commission now that my pay is back to normal.

PickYourName

3102derek wrote: »

Now that im off the covid payment, i am about to claim for my commission for the last 6 months. But my employer is saying i have already got it, by way of the overpayments in the covid.

This can not be correct can it? As i will be taxed on this overpayment at the end of the year..
It has nothing to do with commission i built up for the last 6 months.

So i should be entitled to claim my commission now that my pay is back to normal.

This comes to exactly the point I've been making about gross pay.

I am assuming from what you say that your "normal" wages are a fixed basic wage plus a commision on top, paid every six months?

If that's the case, whether or not you've been overpaid in the last six months depends on what your received during that period. That is, whether the sum of the wage subsidy plus any top-up payment is greater than or less than your basic wages. If it's less than or equal to, then you haven't been overpaid (there's a chance you've actually been underpaid).

So, does the total amount of all wage subsidy amounts and all top-up payments come to your basic wage for the last six months?

3102derek

My commission is not fixed, it based on callbacks and confirmed sales.
The value varies each month, so what i do is i normal let it build for a few months and then claim it. Sometimes that could be 2 months or it could be 6 months.
We are talking 250€ for this 6 months period.


Im on a Fixed basic wage every week. Then commission as and when i claim it.
I was over payed based on my Gross Pay for the entire period i was on the covid payment. Due to the no tax on the wage subsidy.

For the entire period of wage subsidy, i was overpaid by 940€

PickYourName wrote: »

This comes to exactly the point I've been making about gross pay.

I am assuming from what you say that your "normal" wages are a fixed basic wage plus a commision on top, paid every six months?

If that's the case, whether or not you've been overpaid in the last six months depends on what your received during that period. That is, whether the sum of the wage subsidy plus any top-up payment is greater than or less than your basic wages. If it's less than or equal to, then you haven't been overpaid (there's a chance you've actually been underpaid).

So, does the total amount of all wage subsidy amounts and all top-up payments come to your basic wage for the last six months?

PickYourName

3102derek wrote: »

For the entire period of wage subsidy, i was overpaid by 940€

Then it sounds like you probably aren't owed anything. If I were you, I'd ask for the detailed figures from your employer so you can check.

silent_spark

PickYourName wrote: »

Then it sounds like you probably aren't owed anything. If I were you, I'd ask for the detailed figures from your employer so you can check.

Yes. Look at all your payslips, add up the listed subsidy and listed top up payment - this is the equivalent of your basic pay. If they add up to the same as or less than your agreed basic pay, you should be due your commission as normal.

Ignore cash received for now - if you received extra cash into your account it could relate to tax back or paying reduced tax, neither of which has anything to do with your employer.

collsoft

Hi

Indeed it was an email to a specific question, but it was the advice that was circulated to all Payroll Software Vendors.

All I can say is that I have given you the answer from Revenue verbatim. This came from the person who is responsible for the EWSS guidance documentation, which is due to be updated tomorrow, and which will hopefully clarify this.

Specifically our initial question was in relation to wet pubs who were still closed and if they could just pay an employee €203 and claim the subsidy, even though the employee was not working.

The answer we were given is interesting for exactly the points that you raised.

Hopefully the new guide will clarify more

PickYourName wrote: »

I gather this quote was from a direct communication from Revenue to you?

Do you know if it has made this information more publically available? On the face of it, it seems to contradict their own guidelines, which state:

"Safeguards will be included to minimise abuse specifically to ensure employers are not laying off one employ ee to replace them with more than one employee earning a lower wage thereby maximising subsidy entitlement, and manipulation of payroll including deferring, suspending, accruing, increasing or decreasing gross wage that would normally be payable."

There has also been commentary in the media to the same effect, e.g. paying people who otherwise would be under the lower threshold more to bring them over the threshold and thus enable the subsidy to be claimed.

This is really important for us, as we were planning to continue to operate the way we had been under the TWSS, which under the EWSS mean we would be paying them €5.08/hour for the hours not worked (we've assumed a nominal 40 hour week).

It was only yesterday when I heard about these "safeguards" which on the face of it mean we won't be able to do this, but from what you're saying we will.

Help!

PickYourName

collsoft wrote: »

The answer we were given is interesting for exactly the points that you raised.

Hopefully the new guide will clarify more

Indeed. I hope Revenue realise just how stressful this is. I had thought we’d be OK and had told staff last week what to expect, but then I heard something on the radio and subsequently found that quote in the guidelines, which I’d missed previously.

Thinking about it some more, I don’t think it applies to our situation. All of our staff will still be getting less than they were back in January, so it’s not like we’re paying more to get them over that threshold; it’s just to try and give them a chance of survival by paying them more than just their hours actually worked. If we can't do this, the only reasonable alternative is to start making some people redundant, which is kind of the reason for having the scheme in the first place.

Just today we had one of our best people hand in her notice as she’d got a full-time job elsewhere. She didn’t want to leave (and was in tears), but we can’t offer her a full-time position; we don’t have sufficient physical space for the entire team to be in work at the same time.

Just to explain: when on the TWSS we paid a top-up for the hours people worked. Most were on a TWSS amount of €350 which is €8.75/hour for a notional 40 hour week. If they worked 20 hours, they’d get their regular rate for the 20 hours worked and €8.75/hour for the 20 hours they didn’t. It worked out quite well for everyone: it only cost us a limited amount (e.g. €3.25/hour for someone on €12/hour), yet their total was not far off their original full-time wage. We’re following through with this on the EWSS, except they’re now only getting €5.08/hour rather than €8.75/hour for the hours not worked.

jammiedodgers

On mobile at the moment so don't have a link, but it looks like revenue updated the guidelines earlier today and removed that paragraph you were referring to PickYourName. Or at least I couldn't find it.

PickYourName

jammiedodgers wrote: »

On mobile at the moment so don't have a link, but it looks like revenue updated the guidelines earlier today and removed that paragraph you were referring to PickYourName. Or at least I couldn't find it.

Thanks! They've definitely removed the relevant section. They've highlighted the additions, but not the deletions. I'll go through it to see if there's any clarification on the specific issue, but thanks again for the heads-up.

blackwhite

From one the Q&As that I (virtually) attended - the anti-abuse measures seem to be targeted specifically at flagrant abuse. Once you can demonstrate that any changes in pay from pre-covid times are for bona fide reasons (I.e. less hours, less commissions available, etc) then Revenue wouldn’t disqualify you from the scheme

Qprmeath

collsoft wrote: »

OK, perhaps you can check this out with your employer.

I posted an answer that I had from Revenue last week regarding the new scheme for pubs that are still closed.

If you go back to my post you will see that Revenue have stated that there is no actual requirement that you are working in order for your employer to receive a subsidy.

If your employer was to actually pay you €203 on the weeks that you didn't work, then he would be entitled to a subsidy of €203 for that week also.

I would Syrongly suggest that you ask your employer to look into it.

Now I would add that the question that I asked was specifically about closed establishments. However the answer is very clear about there not being a requirement that an employee is actually working.

I sought this advice from Revenue as Chairperson of the Payroll Software Developers Association (PSDA) which is the representative body for all of the payroll software companies, and the answer was from Anne Dullea who is one of the Principal Officers in Revenue overseeing The new EWSS scheme.

Specifically the advice that Revenue gave me is as follows;



"Hi Jason

Further to our earlier call, please see below advices re the issue raised re payment of wages to employees of closed establishments.

There is no condition within the Employment Wage Subsidy Scheme (EWSS) that an employee must be ‘working’ in order for the employer to claim a subsidy in respect of that employee.  

The EWSS resumes normal operation of payroll for employers under the PAYE system. It re-establishes the requirement to operate PAYE on all payments to employees which includes the regular deduction and remittance of income tax, USC and PRSI at the normal rates. Where an eligible employer makes a payment of emoluments to a qualifying employee, the employer can a claim an employment wage subsidy in respect of that employee. The level of subsidy will be determined by the amount of gross pay paid to the qualifying employee in accordance with subsection (8) of the EWSS legislation.  

A qualifying employee is an individual who was eligible under the Temporary Wage Subsidy Scheme in relation to the employer, and, an individual who is on the payroll of the employer and receives a payment of emoluments during the qualifying period (01/07/2020 to 31/03/2021) but excludes connected parties not on the payroll of the employer at any time during the period 01/07/2019 to 30/06/2020 and proprietary directors eligibility conditions yet to be confirmed. 

Thus, where a business such as a pub remains closed from 1st Sept and the employer continues to pay employees, the payment of emoluments to the employees must be taxed accordingly under the PAYE system. Where employer and employee EWSS eligibility criteria are met, the employer can make a claim for an employment wage subsidy in respect of those payments of emoluments to employees and the of level of subsidy amount will be determined by the amount of gross pay paid to the employee."

Employer has pretty much confirmed we will only get paid for our hours worked. This is clearly a scheme to safeguard employers not employees. The company gets the majority of their wages paid while we be better off on the PUP scheme. Also social welfare will be overrun with people trying to claim supports.

sixskittles

Hi everyone, this thread has been such a great help the last few months, thanks to you all. I'm just wondering if anyone submitted a spreadsheet to avail of the EWSS sweepback for employees that did not qualify for TWSS? I think the deadline was the 5th of September but I don't see any guidance as to exactly what information revenue require.