Wage Subsidy Scheme Issues

Seve OB

collsoft wrote: »

Funny Seve_OB I was in a meeting with Revenue today where we briefly touched on why Social Welfare Benefits are taxed on a "When Earned" basis rather than on a "When Paid" basis - and I can see the logic in the approach now.

Basically there are often cases where there might be a dispute between the department and an individual over the amount paid for a particular benefit.

Take for example a Pension. The amount paid may be on some sort of graduated scale depending on the average number of insurable weeks per year over a persons working life.

The individual may dispute this and may have their benefit increased.

This might include a back dated increase going back over a number of previous years.

In order to be fair to the individual the tax calculations are based on the years to which the benefit apply, and if the person has unused tax credits in those years they would soften the blow.

If the tax was calculated on when the benefit was paid then it would all land in the same tax year and would be unfair to the individual.

I can now see the logic behind their thinking!!!!

Totally get that logic. And it is correct. And payroll should be the same.
I mean how is it any different to getting paid in January let’s say for commission earned in December, or it might be commission earned for a quarter.
They need to standardise things and make it the same across the board.

shatners bassoon

Can an employer just pay the employee directly by bank transfer / cheque provided they keep a paper trail showing that the payment relates to their TWSS tax liability?

Tow

shatners bassoon wrote: »

Can an employer just pay the employee directly by bank transfer / cheque provided they keep a paper trail showing that the payment relates to their TWSS tax liability?

Yes

Seve OB

So EWSS extended to end June by the sounds of it

I Was VB

I’m being sent home and put on the ewss, looks like until the end of the year.

Could I get another job as I don’t fancy staying home for months at end when I could be productive.

Would I have to sign myself off the ewss to start a new job or could I still claim my ewss from my old job and work another job?

Thanks for any replies, gonna call the revenue on
Monday to clarify either way.

Tow

EWSS is a payment to employers. If they want to keep you on the books, then their is nothing stopping you from having another job.

SCOOP 64

Can a employer claim the EWSS and also have employee working full time?

Seve OB

SCOOP 64 wrote: »

Can a employer claim the EWSS and also have employee working full time?

Yes

Seve OB

I Was VB wrote: »

I’m being sent home and put on the ewss, looks like until the end of the year.

Could I get another job as I don’t fancy staying home for months at end when I could be productive.

Would I have to sign myself off the ewss to start a new job or could I still claim my ewss from my old job and work another job?

Thanks for any replies, gonna call the revenue on
Monday to clarify either way.

First thing you need to understand is that YOU are not on the EWSS, your employer may claim the subsidy and it really has nothing to do with you. At the moment, the subsidy is only available till the end of June so you may have issues after that date if they are no longer getting subsidised.
You can sign on for temporary lay off. You will get paid just over 40 per day, but it depends how much your employer is going to continue paying you. For example if they pay you one days normal wages you can get €160 from the social, €120 if you are getting 2 days pay etc. This is not a taxable payment.

You may seek alternative employment instead of going on the social and that employer can also claim the EWSS with no impact on you personally

PickYourName

I Was VB wrote: »

I’m being sent home and put on the ewss, looks like until the end of the year.

Something doesn't quite add up about that statement.

EWSS is a payment to employers, not employees.

I take it that your employer will be paying you to sit at home? Why would they do that?

If they are paying you, one would expect you'd be working for it.

If they are not paying you, are they making you redundant? or putting you on a temporary lay-off?

First thing I'd do is ask for clarification (i.e. statement in writing) about your exact status, and then take it from there.

SCOOP 64

But according to revenue a employee does not have to be actively working for a employer to claim EWSS, so a employee can be at home and employer claiming the wages on EWSS ?

PickYourName

SCOOP 64 wrote: »

But according to revenue a employee does not have to be actively working for a employer to claim EWSS, so a employee can be at home and employer claiming the wages on EWSS ?

True, but the employer also needs to be careful they don't fall foul of provisions implemented by Revenue to prevent abuse.

Specifically (quoting from the latest EWSS guidelines):

"Section 28B (6) (b) (i) refers to manipulation of payroll to include instances where contractual gross pay which would otherwise have been paid is deferred, suspended, increased or decreased. This does not extend to instances where eligible employers retain eligible employees during periods where they are not partially or wholly occupied, and pay them gross pay equivalent to what they would have received if they were to make a claim for the PUP. "

Then there's the issue of employers changing employees terms and conditions without their explicit consent.

So, if an employee is still on the payroll and being paid but not working, they must have agreed to it and they can only be paid up to what they'd otherwise get with the PUP. That's my reading of it, anyway.

Seve OB

PickYourName wrote: »

I take it that your employer will be paying you to sit at home? Why would they do that?

Why wouldn’t they?

Employer can pay you €204 and claim €250 EWSS!

They are quite allowed to do that. Part of the aim of the scheme is to get employers to keep their employees on the books so that when business picks back up their jobs will be still there.

PickYourName

Seve OB wrote: »

Employer can pay you €204 and claim €250 EWSS!

They are likely to fall foul of the anti-abuse measures if they do that, unless they can prove it's not contrived (e.g. the employee had been on €204 prreviously).

If they were previously on more than €203, you'd have to question why an employee would agree to it, when they would get more with the PUP.

Seve OB

PickYourName wrote: »

True, but the employer also needs to be careful they don't fall foul of provisions implemented by Revenue to prevent abuse.

Specifically (quoting from the latest EWSS guidelines):

"Section 28B (6) (b) (i) refers to manipulation of payroll to include instances where contractual gross pay which would otherwise have been paid is deferred, suspended, increased or decreased. This does not extend to instances where eligible employers retain eligible employees during periods where they are not partially or wholly occupied, and pay them gross pay equivalent to what they would have received if they were to make a claim for the PUP. "

Then there's the issue of employers changing employees terms and conditions without their explicit consent.

So, if an employee is still on the payroll and being paid but not working, they must have agreed to it and they can only be paid up to what they'd otherwise get with the PUP. That's my reading of it, anyway.

You are finding problems that aren’t there. The employer is clearly not deferring a payment. There doesn’t seem to be any manipulation of the payroll from what we have been told.

No issue either if the employer pay an employee more than €400 as long as they are within the threshold. They will only get €350 subsidy from DEASP.

Seve OB

PickYourName wrote: »

They are likely to fall foul of the anti-abuse measures if they do that, unless they can prove it's not contrived (e.g. the employee had been on €204 prreviously).

If they were previously on more than €203, you'd have to question why an employee would agree to it, when they would get more with the PUP.

See my point about dropping to one days pay or something.

In my Same point, they wouldn’t get more on the pup if they claimed short time

PickYourName

Seve OB wrote: »

You are finding problems that aren’t there. The employer is clearly not deferring a payment. There doesn’t seem to be any manipulation of the payroll from what we have been told.

I said they potentially would run the risk of comliance issues, not that they definitely would.

Seve OB wrote: »

No issue either if the employer pay an employee more than €400 as long as they are within the threshold. They will only get €350 subsidy from DEASP.

If that's the case, it emphasises my point: the employer is paying for the employee to sit at home, as they are only getting part of it back. Why would they do that?

I'm not saying they wouldn't, just questioning it. Maybe I'm overly suspicious, but it sounds odd to me.

Seve OB

PickYourName wrote: »

I said they potentially would run the risk of comliance issues, not that they definitely would.



If that's the case, it emphasises my point: the employer is paying for the employee to sit at home, as they are only getting part of it back. Why would they do that?

I'm not saying they wouldn't, just questioning it. Maybe I'm overly suspicious, but it sounds odd to me.

Why?
As I’ve already said, keep them on the books as was one of the goals of the scheme and it is not going to cost them to much..... if anything. I’ve just pointed out that they could make a few quid, but that doesn’t necessarily mean they will. They may send the employees home, but maybe check in every so often or give them an odd project to do. They might not want to loose the employer to another job. Plenty more reasons I’m sure also

SCOOP 64

If there is absolutely no work for the employer then no point in being there unlike my employer who has me in 3/4 days a week under EWSS, now he is going mad on the phone and pushing all jobs to be done asap as for him its free labour at the moment and he is doing quite well.

I Was VB

Thanks for the reply’s.

Some clarification, my employer is putting me on the ewss I’m not putting myself on it.

As far as being paid for sitting at home, I guess it would cost my company less than it would be for me to be made redundant.

Seve OB

I Was VB wrote: »

Thanks for the reply’s.

Some clarification, my employer is putting me on the ewss I’m not putting myself on it.

As far as being paid for sitting at home, I guess it would cost my company less than it would be for me to be made redundant.

You still don’t seem to understand.

You cannot be put on the EWSS and it has nothing to do with you. Your employer may claim it alright.

From your point of view you just keep getting paid as you normally would/should. Perhaps some agreement is made that you get reduced pay for whatever reason, but you need to agree

RandomViewer

Seve OB wrote: »

You still don’t seem to understand.

You cannot be put on the EWSS and it has nothing to do with you. Your employer may claim it alright.

From your point of view you just keep getting paid as you normally would/should. Perhaps some agreement is made that you get reduced pay for whatever reason, but you need to agree

I would get days/weeks off now and again, low orders but don't want to lay anyone off, you get paid a reduced rate and are on call, as in can be asked to work at short notice

Seve OB

So we have our TWSS reconciliation available now, what's that.. 5 months late

Anyway, there is a difference and i'm just wondering what people are doing in cases where they have similar. is it a simple case of just writing it off to the P&L or do we have to process it through the payroll?

there is a download file where you can reconcile the difference.

i'm not sure why i have differences

per my rec, we owe €10,000
per revenue rec we owe €10,500

about 75% of the difference relates to one employee who retired middle of last year, remaining differences relates to 3 employees

mogilvie

There are going to be guidance documents issued by Revenue later this week to outline what to do with the reconciliation.
I suggest you wait until then, as the required action will depend on the nature of the difference.

Seve OB

thanks

PickYourName

Seve OB wrote: »

So we have our TWSS reconciliation available now, what's that.. 5 months late

Anyway, there is a difference and i'm just wondering what people are doing in cases where they have similar. is it a simple case of just writing it off to the P&L or do we have to process it through the payroll?

there is a download file where you can reconcile the difference.

i'm not sure why i have differences

per my rec, we owe €10,000
per revenue rec we owe €10,500

about 75% of the difference relates to one employee who retired middle of last year, remaining differences relates to 3 employees

We're very smilar. Luckily, we're only out by a couple of hundred. Part of me thinks I should investigate and try and resolve every little detail with them, but the other (much larger part) thinks I've had enough and am starting to loose the will to live with this whole exercise, just pay what they're looking for, ask our accountant to fix up the accounts however they like and move on.

mogilvie

PickYourName wrote: »

We're very smilar. Luckily, we're only out by a couple of hundred. Part of me thinks I should investigate and try and resolve every little detail with them, but the other (much larger part) thinks I've had enough and am starting to loose the will to live with this whole exercise, just pay what they're looking for, ask our accountant to fix up the accounts however they like and move on.

Here's one for the books. But Revenue are not that interested in the small differences either. They have advised that they're going to consider anything with +/- 500 euro as effectively balanced. You may not actually have anything to repay.
Wait for the guidance doc's and don't stress about any minor differences.

PickYourName

mogilvie wrote: »

Here's one for the the books. But Revenue are not that interested in the small differences either. They have advised that they're going to consider anything with +/- 500 euro as effectively balanced. You may not actually have anything to repay.
Wait for the guidance doc's and don't stress about any minor differences.

That’s interesting - thanks. To be honest, I’m just relieved it’s so close to what we were expecting. It was an absolute nightmare having to do the whole process, mainly down to the shortcomings of Sage Payroll.

Will definitely wait for the guidance and regardless of what those say, it is one less thing to stess about.

Seve OB

PickYourName wrote: »

We're very smilar. Luckily, we're only out by a couple of hundred. Part of me thinks I should investigate and try and resolve every little detail with them, but the other (much larger part) thinks I've had enough and am starting to loose the will to live with this whole exercise, just pay what they're looking for, ask our accountant to fix up the accounts however they like and move on.

lol, im same, would like to reconcile it properly, but at this stage its gone on so long i cant even remember what it was all about!
i had an excel file which had my workings...... password protected..... password forgotten!!!

not really sure why there are differences
2 people had the same subsidies for the first few weeks, till the changes came in may.
Revenue only allowed a lower subsidy for these 2 people in the first week for some reason.... i've no idea why.
other person seems to have a wrong amount set up, but i went from whatever the payroll told me....again all the info is in the locked excel file!

so yes, like yourself at this stage i just want to move on!

blackwhite

We've 3 companies here, grand sum of €1.51 error across the three of them.

Payroll manager will certainly not be getting any instructions to attempt finding that difference!