Wage Subsidy Scheme Issues

mogilvie

LuasSimon wrote: »

I have a daughter ( Leaving cert) who took up a part time job circa 10 hours a week in local restaurant after they reopened in early August after shutdown.
Is she now entitled to seek a covid type payment as they are shutting for the 3 weeks (initially of level 3)??...she wasnt working prior to this so wouldnt have been entitled previously...

Take a look at citizens advice
Your daughter might be eligible for PUP, depending on her age. (18-66)
If she is still going to be paid by the employer over the shutdown then they can claim EWSS and use that to subsidise her payment, but if they're fully shutdown then this may not be possible.

At any rate, best to check out Citizens Advice at link above.

Regard
Mark
Parollla

tina1040

mogilvie wrote: »

It depends on your software.

Speaking for ourselves, we sent all the data to Revenue at the time of payslip submission.

As for the early data (before Revenue were able to accept the covidy subsidy amount) we simply resubmitted the users payslips over a weekend. There's no CSV upload required and no input from our customers either, it was done in the background.

If you can generate a report, then you can just submit every TWSS subsidy payslip using the template file from Revenue. Link to template csv is here:
https://revenue-ie.github.io/paye-employers-documentation/PIT4/Screens/TWSS_Reconciliation_CSV_Example.csv

You can upload multiple CSV files to Revenue, they just take the latest version of the employee based on their PPSN and Employment ID. So there won't be double ups with information already submitted via your software. You will be able to check for those later on.

Regards,
Mark
Parolla

On thesaurus payroll there's an option in the reports menu for a TWSS report. It creates a csv file which can be uploaded on ROS on the TWSS Reconciliation.

PickYourName

mogilvie wrote: »

It depends on your software.

Speaking for ourselves, we sent all the data to Revenue at the time of payslip submission.

It certainly does depend on your software.

None of this is possible with Sage. Not only that, all previous payroll submissions have to be ammended and re-submitted. There's a huge amount of work involved.

collsoft

We released an update to our software over the weekend for this.

It scans all J9/TWSS payments in the system and checks what was filed, any that require filing are then marked and can be easily reported through the software.

We have already been reporting these to revenue since the end of April and 90% of the J9 payslips in our system were already reported.

So, for most of our users there is not much to do, but it is important that they install the update and let the software verify the reporting status of each payslip.

The only real problem we are seeing are cases where the user manually edited the payslip on ROS. This breaks the link to the payslip in the software and means that the software cannot update that payslip on ROS.

A lot of people don't realise that Revenue do not allow payroll software to read back a payslip from ROS, and therefore if a user changes it on ROS the software cant see what was changed.

As Mark mentioned it would be very useful if Revenue did provide the CSV file as mentioned so users could double check. This has been pointed out to Revenue by the Payroll Software developers, but as yet we dont know when the file will be ready.

Likewise we would urge users to log a ticket on MyEnquiries

mogilvie

PickYourName wrote: »

It certainly does depend on your software.

None of this is possible with Sage. Not only that, all previous payroll submissions have to be ammended and re-submitted. There's a huge amount of work involved.

As it sounds like you might have to amend and resubmit, then you may not have to do the CSV process at all. The submission should include a field (introduced in April) that tells Revenue how much subsidy was paid.

Log into ROS and one of your last TWSS submissions. View Payroll, choose an active payslip. If it contains a value for Other Payments called "GovCov19 WageSub" on the bottom right of the page then your submissions are transmitting the data to Revenue.

Also check that the value of the other payments actually matches what was passed to the employee!

Resubmitting the earlier dates may be all that is required.

Ask your provider if this would be suitable for you/them.

Regards
Mark
Parolla

PaybackPayroll

We went the CSV file route for both our desktop and Cloud payroll.

We did consider doing a bulk ROS update in the background for Cloudpay. However, we could not guarantee that there wouldn't be some mismatches or mistakes. We also did not want to access ROS accounts without explicit instruction.

Our software cross references each CSV entry with ROS to make sure our software and ROS are in synch. It is also handy to have the CSV file for reference and to make edits to (if you really want to!)

No need for any re-submits etc.

PickYourName

mogilvie wrote: »

As it sounds like you might have to amend and resubmit, then you may not have to do the CSV process at all. The submission should include a field (introduced in April) that tells Revenue how much subsidy was paid.

Correct. It's not an option to use CSV process, as Sage to not generate the file

mogilvie wrote: »

Log into ROS and one of your last TWSS submissions. View Payroll, choose an active payslip. If it contains a value for Other Payments called "GovCov19 WageSub" on the bottom right of the page then your submissions are transmitting the data to Revenue.

Also check that the value of the other payments actually matches what was passed to the employee!

Yes, I can do this. The problem is there's 25 weeks worth of payroll with about 25 employees. That's about 600 individual items to check, and they do all need chacking as they all have to be re-submitted after ammending each payment manually. It's crazy stuff.

mogilvie wrote: »

Resubmitting the earlier dates may be all that is required.

That in itself is a massive task, which is my problem. Every single payment for every single employee for every payrun has to be ammended before re-submitting.

mogilvie wrote: »

Ask your provider if this would be suitable for you/them.

I have and they've confirmed that this all has to done and they won't be providing any additional suppport.

The_Chap

PickYourName wrote: »

Correct. It's not an option to use CSV process, as Sage to not generate the file



Yes, I can do this. The problem is there's 25 weeks worth of payroll with about 25 employees. That's about 600 individual items to check, and they do all need chacking as they all have to be re-submitted after ammending each payment manually. It's crazy stuff.



That in itself is a massive task, which is my problem. Every single payment for every single employee for every payrun has to be ammended before re-submitting.



I have and they've confirmed that this all has to done and they won't be providing any additional suppport.

It all depends what Sage software you are using, Micropay Professional (previous name) does have a csv output that can be uploaded?

Seve OB

RandomViewer wrote: »

Funny one yesterday, child sent home from school with temp and sore throat, school says she needs tested,
call the doctor who arranges test, call work as can't go in if family member suspected virus case,
Work tells me to contact SW, call SW who tell me your work is there for you , not our problem, Losing a couple of days pay which I'll get over but how many have called SW first ,been told the same and went to work anyway?

might be better on different thread, this one is about the wages subsidies

PickYourName

The_Chap wrote: »

It all depends what Sage software you are using, Micropay Professional (previous name) does have a csv output that can be uploaded?

Using the Web-based Sage Business Cloud Payroll.

No support whatsoever for TWSS Reconciliation. :mad:

TitianGerm

Has anyone had any dealings with the EWSS?

We have a number of clients who won't meet the 30% for July-September and as such won't be entitled to claim the EWSS for September.

Looking at October they will be down the 30% for July-October as trade will now be stopping for three weeks.

Revenue are telling me I need to deregister the clients from the EWSS today so they won't get the subsidy for September and reregister them on Friday or Monday so they can get the subsidy for October.

Clearly this is going to create so much work for everyone involved. We thought from reading the original EWSS document that there would be a simple tick box option for each month that basically said "I confirm I meet the conditions to claim the EWSS subsidy shown above". If you didn't tick this box then no subsidy.

blackwhite

TitianGerm wrote: »

Has anyone had any dealings with the EWSS?

We have a number of clients who won't meet the 30% for July-September and as such won't be entitled to claim the EWSS for September.

Looking at October they will be down the 30% for July-October as trade will now be stopping for three weeks.

Revenue are telling me I need to deregister the clients from the EWSS today so they won't get the subsidy for September and reregister them on Friday or Monday so they can get the subsidy for October.

Clearly this is going to create so much work for everyone involved. We thought from reading the original EWSS document that there would be a simple tick box option for each month that basically said "I confirm I meet the conditions to claim the EWSS subsidy shown above". If you didn't tick this box then no subsidy.

The test is down 30% for the total period from July-December 2020 - not for July-September or July-October.

You need to assess the 6 month period as a whole (not month-by-month) to determine eligibility, and re-assess the whole period on the last day of every month.

collsoft

That is 100% correct, and it is the bit that most employers find hard to understand.

You must base your assessment of the full 6 months from 1st July to 31st December to see if you meet the 30% threshold.

DO NOT just look at July - October in isolation because you will likely do yourself out of a subsidy incorrectly.

If you are checking your figures now, you will be basing it on actual figures for July, August and September, combined with your projections for October, November and December, and you asses your downturn based on the whole 6 months taken together.

The bit that confuses people the most is that you are required to review your assessment at the end of each month. But that review is based on the whole six months again factoring in the new actual figures that you have.

So you review the whole six month period at the end of each month and this determines whether you stay in the scheme or exit it.

blackwhite wrote: »

The test is down 30% for the total period from July-December 2020 - not for July-September or July-October.

You need to assess the 6 month period as a whole (not month-by-month) to determine eligibility, and re-assess the whole period on the last day of every month.

jos28

We ran weekly J9 payrolls from end March to Mid May when we reopened. I submitted the payroll to ROS every week. In June I checked all payments received against each employee in our ROS statement and everything matched up. We were asked to submit information for a random review, did this and were told everything was in order.
I rang Revenue this morning about the TWSS reconciliation and was told that I don't need to submit anything as all the information was included in the payroll submissions I made. I was told there was no need to upload a spreadsheet. Does anyone know if this is true? Should I submit a query through My Enquiries just to cover myself

mogilvie

jos28 wrote: »

We ran weekly J9 payrolls from end March to Mid May when we reopened. I submitted the payroll to ROS every week. In June I checked all payments received against each employee in our ROS statement and everything matched up. We were asked to submit information for a random review, did this and were told everything was in order.
I rang Revenue this morning about the TWSS reconciliation and was told that I don't need to submit anything as all the information was included in the payroll submissions I made. I was told there was no need to upload a spreadsheet. Does anyone know if this is true? Should I submit a query through My Enquiries just to cover myself

That is correct. Revenue updated their real-time reporting system in April to allow payroll software to report J9 subsidy values at the time of submission. However, there was a period from mid march to end of april that wasn't able to be reported because the Revenue software wasn't able to accept the field.

Some software vendors resubmitted those early J9 payslips. Meaning that revenue now have all the details of J9 submissions YTD. So no need to do the CSV upload file.

Note that if you had paid someone a TWSS subsidy, but it was not submitted as J9, then there may still be a mismatch.

It would be worthwhile reviewing your total subsidies paid out against the Revenue records when they issue those.

Regards,
Mark
Parolla

jos28

mogilvie wrote: »

That is correct. Revenue updated their real-time reporting system in April to allow payroll software to report J9 subsidy values at the time of submission. However, there was a period from mid march to end of april that wasn't able to be reported because the Revenue software wasn't able to accept the field.

Some software vendors resubmitted those early J9 payslips. Meaning that revenue now have all the details of J9 submissions YTD. So no need to do the CSV upload file.

Note that if you had paid someone a TWSS subsidy, but it was not submitted as J9, then there may still be a mismatch.

It would be worthwhile reviewing your total subsidies paid out against the Revenue records when they issue those.

Regards,
Mark
Parolla

Thanks a million Mark, much appreciated

radharc

mogilvie wrote: »

That is correct. Revenue updated their real-time reporting system in April to allow payroll software to report J9 subsidy values at the time of submission. However, there was a period from mid march to end of april that wasn't able to be reported because the Revenue software wasn't able to accept the field.

Some software vendors resubmitted those early J9 payslips. Meaning that revenue now have all the details of J9 submissions YTD. So no need to do the CSV upload file.

Note that if you had paid someone a TWSS subsidy, but it was not submitted as J9, then there may still be a mismatch.

It would be worthwhile reviewing your total subsidies paid out against the Revenue records when they issue those.

Regards,
Mark
Parolla

Is there any indication of next steps and timelines after Revenue have received all submissions?

mogilvie

radharc wrote: »

Is there any indication of next steps and timelines after Revenue have received all submissions?

Re-submissions are due 31st October, Stage 2 is to follow in November.
Revenue will just be getting their heads around the potential scale of any adjustments that may be required as the submissions come back.
Adjustments to employee tax positions, and employer subsidy refund/recovery, is likely to require individual review by case workers.
So I don't think that they can be too definitive at this stage.

MrBulb

Hi all,

Thank you for taking your time to read this long post. Apologies for some grammar mistakes. English is not my first language.

Company that I work for had us on TWSS from April- August. We all had received letters last week that we have been overpaid money from our employer, during that period of time. Me personally, they say that I have been overpaid by €6235 over 5 months! They are proposing it for me, to pay it back over 3 months.

Due to nature of work we do, we have higher wages during the winter months.

My basic salary is €2,500 a month and then there is commission, overtime and meal allowance which is non-taxable. In this case we need to ignore meal allowance as this does not come into calculations for TWSS.

I was paid my net pay average for those five TWSS months (April- August). Average was made out of my January and February net wages. I have outlined my wages below.

January
Basic = 2,500
Overtime = 625
Commission = 870
Total gross = 3,995
Net pay ignoring meals = 2,950


February
Basic = 2,500
Overtime = 161
Commission = 935
Total gross = 3,596
Net pay ignoring meals =2,758

2,950+2758=5708
5708÷2= 2854

So, from April- August during TWSS period my payslips showed those numbers.
Covid Payment 1516.60
Company Top Up 1337.41
=2854
Tax deductions 11.73
Total net: 2842.28

This is what he said:
“Basic pay does not change each month. Your overtime/commission January and February is 2,591 (625+870+161+935)
Average is €1,247 per month (2,591 divided by 9 weeks x 52 weeks divided by 12 months)
5 months = 6,235”

Because I had earned Some commission and overtime from April- August they have deducted that from overpayment sum.

Commission April to August = 1,535. Plus, overtime of 389 = 1,924

6,235 overpayment-1924 commission/ overtime= €4311

The difference is €4311 and they propose to take it back over 3 months from my wages.

I understand where he is coming from. But is that legal? The worst thing that out of 30 colleagues no one understands this. Nobody was explained properly what way it will work.

We all understood that for instance €2842.28 that I had received during TWSS. Will be received as net, but treated as gross as there will be tax liability at the end of the year.

I though all that time, my basic is 2,500 and I’m receiving 2842.28. I’m only overpaid by 342.28. Because I knew that I will have commission earned over those 5 months It should have balanced out. Then I would have unpaid taxes for those 5 months which I can pay at the end of the year to the revenue.

If he says that I was overpaid 1247 per month and he was making top up of 1337 for those five months. Does this mean that he only topped up my wages by €90 for the full month?

I don’t even know how they got that TWSS support as we were flat out for the first 2 months compared to last year and then it was quite like any other summer.

Thanks again for reading my post. I hope to get some answers.

collsoft

Dear MrBulb,

There is an awful lot of data in what you posted, it is complicated and it is likely that I will have made multiple mistakes in my answer - so please allow for that in my answer.

Ok, so lets look at things another way.

Your employer has told you that you have been overpaid by a total of €6235 over 5 months.

On what basis have they said that you have been overpaid?

Did they pay you the incorrect rate of pay (from your employment contract)?

Did they pay you for work that you did not do?

Were you absent from Work?

Did they make a mistake?

Basically, how did they estimate that you have been overpaid by that amount?

Now, I will give you a theory that may or may not be true - it would appear to me that your employer wants to fully recoup the top-up amount that he paid you over the 5 months and leave it that you are only paid TWSS by the State (i.e. all of us other tax payers).

I would suggest that your employer, or some "smart" advisor has decided that he was not obliged to pay any top-up and he now wants to claw it back.


Look at the numbers another way. In January and February your total Net Pay was €5708 for 9 weeks, which means that your "Average Revenue Net Pay" (ARNWP) was €634.22 per week (or thereabouts).

With that figure of ARNWP you would be entitled to €1516.67 TWSS per week so thats pretty much what he was paying you.

The employer was also able to pay you €1,231.62 per month without any loss of subsidy.

€1,231.62 for 5 months = €6158.10 which is pretty close to the figure you mentioned.

To me, it looks like your employer wants to claim back all of the "Top Up" that he paid you during the scheme.

Is it legal, well I cant say because I am not a Judge.

But I would say this - check your employment contract.

If you have worked full time as per your contract then you are entitled to be paid according to your contract.

I dont know if you agreed to amend your contract with your employer, but on the face of it, it looks like your employer wants to have you work full time and not pay you.

There is an argument that some employees have made is that TWSS is not wages, and as such their employer did not pay them as per contract.

By the same token, there are honest employers who have been hit hard by Covid and TWSS was the lifeline that kept people in jobs, so there is a balance to be made.

But, if your emloyer is saying that he overpaid you, he needs to have a really good explanation about how he managed to do that with your wages for 5 months, as well as any other employees.

Sounds dubious to me - but I dont know all the facts.

You wont find your answer on the internet, but ask your employer for a written explanation and then go and see an employment lawyer

MrBulb wrote: »

Hi all,

Thank you for taking your time to read this long post. Apologies for some grammar mistakes. English is not my first language.

Company that I work for had us on TWSS from April- August. We all had received letters last week that we have been overpaid money from our employer, during that period of time. Me personally, they say that I have been overpaid by €6235 over 5 months! They are proposing it for me, to pay it back over 3 months.

Due to nature of work we do, we have higher wages during the winter months.

My basic salary is €2,500 a month and then there is commission, overtime and meal allowance which is non-taxable. In this case we need to ignore meal allowance as this does not come into calculations for TWSS.

I was paid my net pay average for those five TWSS months (April- August). Average was made out of my January and February net wages. I have outlined my wages below.

January
Basic = 2,500
Overtime = 625
Commission = 870
Total gross = 3,995
Net pay ignoring meals = 2,950


February
Basic = 2,500
Overtime = 161
Commission = 935
Total gross = 3,596
Net pay ignoring meals =2,758

2,950+2758=5708
5708÷2= 2854

So, from April- August during TWSS period my payslips showed those numbers.
Covid Payment 1516.60
Company Top Up 1337.41
=2854
Tax deductions 11.73
Total net: 2842.28

This is what he said:
“Basic pay does not change each month. Your overtime/commission January and February is 2,591 (625+870+161+935)
Average is €1,247 per month (2,591 divided by 9 weeks x 52 weeks divided by 12 months)
5 months = 6,235”

Because I had earned Some commission and overtime from April- August they have deducted that from overpayment sum.

Commission April to August = 1,535. Plus, overtime of 389 = 1,924

6,235 overpayment-1924 commission/ overtime= €4311

The difference is €4311 and they propose to take it back over 3 months from my wages.

I understand where he is coming from. But is that legal? The worst thing that out of 30 colleagues no one understands this. Nobody was explained properly what way it will work.

We all understood that for instance €2842.28 that I had received during TWSS. Will be received as net, but treated as gross as there will be tax liability at the end of the year.

I though all that time, my basic is 2,500 and I’m receiving 2842.28. I’m only overpaid by 342.28. Because I knew that I will have commission earned over those 5 months It should have balanced out. Then I would have unpaid taxes for those 5 months which I can pay at the end of the year to the revenue.

If he says that I was overpaid 1247 per month and he was making top up of 1337 for those five months. Does this mean that he only topped up my wages by €90 for the full month?

I don’t even know how they got that TWSS support as we were flat out for the first 2 months compared to last year and then it was quite like any other summer.

Thanks again for reading my post. I hope to get some answers.

je551e

The overpayment received while on TWSS , will revenue request this from the employer or must you contact revenue yourself as an employer?

Pistachio19

je551e wrote: »

The overpayment received while on TWSS , will revenue request this from the employer or must you contact revenue yourself as an employer?

I thought the TWSS reconciliation deals with this? We owe just over €1k as they gave €410 per employer in April and that wasn't due to us. I'll wait and see if they come looking for it.

Pistachio19

With that figure of ARNWP you would be entitled to €1516.67 TWSS per week so thats pretty much what he was paying you

Per month as opposed to per week - otherwise you'd end up paying back a lot more. I agree with collsoft - looks like they may be trying to claw back their top up which is a pretty sh*t move.

collsoft

Thats what you get trying to type while drinking a beer!

Pistachio19 wrote: »

With that figure of ARNWP you would be entitled to €1516.67 TWSS per week so thats pretty much what he was paying you

Per month as opposed to per week - otherwise you'd end up paying back a lot more. I agree with collsoft - looks like they may be trying to claw back their top up which is a pretty sh*t move.

collsoft

You need to report to Revenue what TWSS you paid to each employee before the 31st October.

If you are using Payroll software you will be able to either report directly through the software, or by creating a CSV file from the software that you can then upload through ROS.

This will tell Revenue exactly what you paid each employee on each payslip and Revenue will be able to work out what you owe them.

make sure and check if there are any updates for your Payroll Software - Most (if not all) software packages have an update for this.

If you don't use Payroll software you must log into ROS and report the amounts manually on each payslip

je551e wrote: »

The overpayment received while on TWSS , will revenue request this from the employer or must you contact revenue yourself as an employer?

Green Mile

collsoft wrote: »

You need to report to Revenue what TWSS you paid to each employee before the 31st October.

I’ve manually resubmitted TWSS data to Revenue for each period. I’m comfortable all is correct now.
I don’t think I need to do a TWSS reconciliation now? The TWSS is only for those who can’t resubmit the data?

Seve OB

collsoft wrote: »

You need to report to Revenue what TWSS you paid to each employee before the 31st October.

ive had my eyes a little off the ball lately due to the fact that work has been cut to feck all hours and I still a full weeks work to get through!

So last week I got the letter through my enquiries and answered their questions. They came back fairly quickly and have closed it off as they are happy we are compliant.
They mentioned that they will be reconciling the overpayment in the coming months, but said there was nothing further we need to do now.

Are you saying I have to do something?

collsoft

Hi Seve OB,

We are seeing that this is causing a lot of confusion among employers.

Basically there are two parallel Revenue processes going on at the moment;

1) TWSS Compliance Checking (where you get the letter asking for copies of payslips and other things) which has to be completed within 5 days of being asked.

2) TWSS Reconciliation

Seve OB, you have completed item 1, but you may yet have to complete item 2.

TWSS Reconciliation has 3 distinct stages

Stage 1: Employer reporting - Employer reports to Revenue the amount of TWSS paid to each employee payslip by payslip. This is either done directly through your software, or by creating a CSV file from your software which you then upload to ROS. This lists all payments made to your employees line by line

Stage 2: Revenue Reconciliation Calculation: Revenue takes the data that you supplied in Stage 1, compares it to what they paid the employer and tallies one against the other. This identifies any overpayments that Revenue made to you in the early stages of TWSS where they paid you €410 per week regardless of what you paid your employees.

Stage 3: Employer Accepts Reconciliation - This closes off the process and the employer pays any monies due to Revenue


So you may have already completed Stage 1 of Reconciliation - but its not the same as the compliance check that you already had.

Seve OB wrote: »

ive had my eyes a little off the ball lately due to the fact that work has been cut to feck all hours and I still a full weeks work to get through!

So last week I got the letter through my enquiries and answered their questions. They came back fairly quickly and have closed it off as they are happy we are compliant.
They mentioned that they will be reconciling the overpayment in the coming months, but said there was nothing further we need to do now.

Are you saying I have to do something?

collsoft

Well Stage 1 is complete.

Now you need to wait for Revenue to send you your reconciliation calculation in November.

This will show if you have to repay any money back to Revenue

Green Mile wrote: »

I’ve manually resubmitted TWSS data to Revenue for each period. I’m comfortable all is correct now.
I don’t think I need to do a TWSS reconciliation now? The TWSS is only for those who can’t resubmit the data?

Green Mile

collsoft wrote: »

Well Stage 1 is complete.

Now you need to wait for Revenue to send you your reconciliation calculation in November.

This will show if you have to repay any money back to Revenue

Thank you, I’ll await and see what revenue comes back with.

I used the wage subsidy calculator on your website www.collsoft.ie during the period. It was a great help so thanks for sharing that.