Summary of Key Changes for the Tax Year 2015/2016

New adult minimum wage increases from $14.25 an hour to $14.75. New entrants (16-17 year olds) minimum wage increases from $11.40 an hour to $11.80

Employment Law changes – Flexible working arrangements & Rest and meal breaks

Minimum Wage for Salaried Staff

Divide the gross salary (don’t forget to include house allowance) by the total number of hours worked for that pay period. Example:-Employee normally works 110 hours, this fortnight he has worked 115 hours Fortnightly Salary $1,500.00 House Allowance $ 150.00 Gross Salary $1,650.00/115 hours = $14.34 This shows that he has fallen below the hourly minimum wage

If the employee has done over and above their rostered hours and they fall below the minimum wage you will need to pay them “Extra-ordinary hours”. This can be at the minimum wage rate of $14.75 or a rate negotiated with the employee as long as it is not less than $14.75 an hour. Example: Fortnightly Wage $1,500.00 House Allowance $ 150.00 Extra ordinary hours (5) $ 73.75 Gross Salary $1,723.75/115 hours= $14.99

“Mondayising” Anzac Day.

This is the first year that Anzac Day will be “Mondayised” since the amendment to the Holidays Act 2003 was passed allowing Waitangi Day and Anzac Day to be observed on the Monday following when the actual day falls in the weekend. How does this affect your employees? If employee rostered to work Saturday April 25. If the employee works, they should be paid time and a half for the hours worked and be credited an alternate holiday. If they don’t work then they are to be paid a Statutory Holiday. If the employee works on Monday 27 April it is treated as a normal work day. If employee rostered off Saturday April 25. Anzac Day will be observed on Monday 27 April. If the employee works, they should be paid time and a half for the hours worked and be credited an alternate holiday

Public Holidays April – June

Good Friday – 3 April 15 Easter Monday – 6 April 15 Southland Anniversary – May be observed on 7 April 15 Anzac Day – 25 April 15 (Mondayised to 27 April 15) Queens Birthday – 1 June 15

IMS Payroll End of year procedures

In addition to the standard end of year reports that you save, we would recommend you also save the following reports in PDF format:-

– Total Leave Report – Terminated Value Selected – Annual Leave Report – Accumulator Option – Company Payroll Summary

Employment Relation Amendment Act 2014

There were some major changes to the Employment Relations Act that came into effect on the 6 March 2015.  Two of the changes included:

Extending the right to request flexible working arrangements to all employees. Previously only those employees with caring responsibilities were able to request flexible working arrangements. This has now been extended to all employees.

The 6 month qualifying period has been removed and employees are now able to make more than one request in any 12 month period.

The timeframe within which an employer must respond to a request has been reduced from 3 months to 1 month and requires that the response be made in writing and include an explanation of nay refusal.

 Rest and Meal Breaks. The amendment does not remove the requirement to provide rest and meal breaks, however it does provide more flexibility for employers. If it is not reasonable to provide breaks, the employee must be compensated for this and in all workplaces an employee may agree to forgo rest and meal breaks for compensation, keeping in mind health and safety obligations.

ABM CLOUD

Comprehensive Accounting and Business Management Software

ABM Cloud is a new initiative by ABM to provide a fully hosted service including ABM and all of the supporting software required for a reasonable price. The ABM Cloud service offers an advantage over standard Terminal Services implementations, with an advanced thin client application, which reduces data consumption and provides a better user experience as well as simplifying setup and improving security. In addition the hosted system is fully scalable with memory and drive space automatically allocated to the system as your needs grow, all for no extra cost. This is a different approach to that of many other hosting service providers who essentially rent you a server and will charge to increase resources available to it. Many articles have been published in recent years extolling the virtues and pointing out some of the hidden pitfalls of hosted systems. One of the problems that is often mentioned is the lack of clarity over who owns the data. Several other systems out there explicitly state that your data is open to interrogation by their systems, meaning that your customer list, product information or financial data may be being used for purposes other than what you intended. Furthermore, should you wish to stop using their hosted service, you immediately lose all access. Not so with ABM Cloud. Your data is yours and yours alone, no different to it being stored on your own local networks. ABM can arrange to have backups of your database automatically made available so that you always have a copy on hand should you need it. If at any point you wish to move the system back “in house” you can, simply by installing ABM on your own server, restoring your database and entering your ABM licence details. ABM Cloud also offers access via a web browser. Through this you can have the same access to the full ABM application but through the convenience of a web browser. This means you could access your data from anywhere, including from a non-Windows ™ device such as an iPad ™ or Android tablet. So if you are currently weighing up the cost of upgrading your network hardware to accommodate your growing needs and looking for potential alternatives please contact us on 03 2112589 to discuss.

Powerful, customisable and able to grow with you – ABM makes managing every aspect of your business a breeze.

Easter Opening Hours

We will close for business Thursday 2 April at 5pm and reopen Wednesday 8 April at 8.30am. We will be in touch with anyone with payrolls on Good Friday, Easter Monday or Tuesday 7th to arrange processing