Payroll for Salary and Hourly Employees

[LabMonkey]

I'm a newbie to Peachtree Accounting 2003 and wanted to know if anyone can answer a few questions for me.

When filling out the Pay Info screen for a new employee, which fields do you need to fill out if they are (1) salary and (2) hourly. The Salary is a manager position and the Hourly is for a server (restaurant). I noticed the Pay Method field gives me three options. I chose Salary for the manager and Hourly - Hours Per Pay Period for the server. Is that correct?

Under Salary Rate - is that the field they get paid per hour or the total pre-tax amount per pay period (say $1,500 total bi-weekly)? On that same screen, it has a field called Hourly Billing Rate. What does that field want?

As for the Hourly - Hours Per Pay Period. Is that same Hourly Billing Rate field necessary? Can I just use the hourly and overtime custom fields below?

I don't want to sound like a knowledge mooch, (asking what's probably a basic question) but I've read both the Peachtree manual and the Beginners Guide and I find both very frustrating. Any suggestions on a better "Idiots" guide?

I appreciate the help anyone can give.

[dringstrom]

Two better beginners guides are Peachtree for Dummies (http://www.acctadv.com/go.mv?id=pcd) (bad title, great book) and Learn Peachtree Accounting (http://www.acctadv.com/go.mv?id=lpa). You set up your employees correctly. The hourly billing rate is for service firms that bill out for their time.

[lustbergcpa]

If you are paying the employees directly through the Payroll Module, don't worry about the hourly billing rate. This is only relevant if you are paying employees through Peachtree's billing system.

Just make sure you select "Hourly per Pay period" for you hourly employees and set-up their hourly rate in the system. The Salary rate you set-up for your salaried employees is for their Gross pay.

When you pay the employees you can change the number of hours for hourly employees, or the Gross amount for salaried employees. It will change it for that pay period and keep your default amounts for those employees.

[LabMonkey]

Thanks for everyone's responses.


"The Salary rate you set-up for your salaried employees is for their Gross pay."

Gross yearly pay? So, if the person is making 35K a year, would 35000.00 go into that field?

[dringstrom]

No, you'd put the amount for a pay period. If you pay twice per month, divide 35000 by 24 and use that number.

[LabMonkey]

Got'cha. That's the impression I was under, but I wanted to be sure.

Thanks!