Personnel management systems can help avoid costly payroll mistakes

Implementing a solid and reliable personnel management system can help firms of all sizes avoid costly payroll mistakes, which cost UK employers more than £700 million in the last financial year, according to fresh research from accountancy firm UHY Hacker Young.

The investigation found that HMRC collected £737.3 million from investigations into employer compliance, much of it relating to self-employment. This included cases where businesses had declared individuals to be self-employed. When HMRC decided they should count as employees, the firms became liable for national insurance payments and, in some cases, higher tax charges than they would have paid if they had initially declared them as employed.

SMEs were particularly affected by the crackdown on payroll tax deductions, accounting for about half of the cash collected — despite being responsible for only a tenth of UK payroll. Umbrella companies — which employ outsourced personnel on a fixed-term basis, often offering a cheaper alternative to employing full-time staff — have been a particular problem for SMEs when it comes to payroll tax.

Helen Hargreaves, associate director of policy and research at the Chartered Institute of Payroll Professionals, said the research findings showed the need for employers to use qualified payroll practitioners. "With increasingly complex government legislation, as well as HMRC's greater focus on compliance, it is unsurprising that more issues are being discovered," she said.

Streamline personnel management and avoid costly errors with help from the Tensor personnel management systems

Tensor plc is a market leader in the workforce management solutions' segment. We supply an extensive range of systems designed specifically to help HR departments record accurate data regarding the employee's activity, their performance, as well as their attendance.

Our flagship WinTA.NET integrated workforce management solution incorporates a dedicated Absence Planning and Entitlement Management feature.

WinTA.NET is a web enabled, mobile / wireless technology based Time & Attendance systemdesigned for those companies employing 20 people to 10,000+. The solution provides total control over the creation of working rules, Access Control, Job Costing and System Security and has specifically been designed for multiple companies, each managing multiple sites.

Our comprehensive, yet user-friendly software comes pre-loaded with graphical calendar charts that provide a colourful way of viewing an individual's or a department's absence records.

WinTA.NET supplies the relevant managers with information on employee's absences through warning email notifications or via hardcopy reports. After that, the system would rapidly identify missing employees that are expected to be at work and then informs you via automatic email reporting reports distributed by email.

If you'd like to find out more about the Tensor workforce management solutions, just contact our team or Book a Demo, we'll be more than happy to answer all of your questions and queries.