Payroll periods

What are payroll periods for?

A payroll period defines the interval of time over which Shyfter calculates the hours and prepares the salaries: a calendar month, a fortnight, or any other range. It is a structuring landmark: as long as you have not framed your periods, the hours totals "float"; once the periods are in place, Shyfter groups everything at the right rhythm, exactly that of your real payroll.

The benefit is twofold. First, the reconciliation with your payroll office becomes simple: Shyfter's totals cover the same range as the payslip, so the figures compare directly. Second, it frames the counters and exports: overtime, absences and performance are stopped over a clean period, with no overlap or omission between two cycles.

Go to Reports → Payroll periods.

The list of periods

The periods are grouped into two blocks: the upcoming periods (current or future) and the past periods. Each period displays:

• its title: the month concerned or the date range,
• the date range: from the start day to the end day,
• the creation date,
• the statuses concerned: the user categories included in the period,
• the calculation method: smoothed or full, depending on whether the contractual hours are distributed uniformly or taken in full.

Clicking a period opens its detail, where you find the data per employee over the interval.

Creating a period

Click Create a period at the top right. You then define:

• the range covered (a month or custom dates),
• the user categories concerned,
• the calculation method for the contractual hours (smoothed or full).

The period then appears in the list and feeds the calculations over the chosen interval.

Understanding the calculation method

The choice of method changes how the contractual hours are distributed over the period:

• Smoothed: the contractual hours are distributed uniformly over the period. This is useful when the pay is monthly: a full-timer "smooths" their volume of hours over the month, whatever the real distribution of the weeks.
• Full: the period takes the hours in full over the interval, without smoothing. To prefer if your payroll reasons in whole weeks or in hours actually owed over the range.

In case of doubt, align yourself with the method your payroll office uses: this is what guarantees that your totals and its count coincide.

Editing or deleting a period

From each period, you can reopen it to edit it or delete it if it was created by mistake.

Set your periods on the exact cycle of your payroll office (calendar month, fortnight, etc.) so that the hours totals match what goes to payroll.