Payroll Program Headaches

[Aeromedic]

The number one problem with working in a small (under 10 employees) service is the double/triple duty you end up pulling. It just so happens I am the IT department for my service (among other things) and now, after a lot of adding machine tape from our old-school office manager, I have been tasked with creating (yes, creating, the techno-inept assume if you can do fancy things on a computer, you can program)a program to track employee hours. A seemingly simple task, Full time rotation of 6 on, 3 off for our 2 full time staff and casual staff picking up the rest. Where the fun kicks in is with the pay scale. We work 24 hour shifts and have 2 different pay rates, On Duty and On Call. We get on Duty pay for 5.5 hours a day and on call for the other 18.5. Nice and simple so far... until you throw in the call outside the normal 5.5 hour window (0900-1430), then we go back up to duty pay, but drop the on call pay for that time period. Add in Partial Shift Coverage and it turns into a jumbled mess. As of right now, our pay stubs and cheques are done by hand on a ledger book. and now that year end has come up and the Ministry of Health wants to know the hours worked total/on call/per person.... it has become a flurry of adding machine tape, headaches and me being VERY glad I just fix the computers and run calls.

So... Here's my thing, does anybody know of a program (preferably free) that will take care of this for me or any pointers as to a programming platform to learn to do this?

[JakeEMTP]

Aeromedic,

We use the EMSmanager programme for our time sheets. It is the responsibility of the employee to enter their time correctly, then checked by the supervisor and forwarded to payroll. Due to your different pay rates, it might not work for you, however I think the programme is flexible in it's use.

I know it's not free, but I don't think the cost is exorbitant either. I do think they have a free trial period for you to try it first.

Sorry I couldn't be more helpful.

[Aeromedic]

Thanks Jake. I did kinda gloss over something completely (that somebody pointed out in a PM) that a Spreadsheet may be the easiest way to do it. After finding out more what she wants me to do with it, it is less about payroll and more about simply keeping track of hours over the year for the purposes of provincial surveys etc... The split pay rate is the biggest pain in the rear, so I think the formula table for my spreadsheet is going to read like a university calculus text.

[Happiness]

So my day job is a bean counter. We use a program called Paydirt. This is a Canadian program that interfaces with my main program Adagio.

http://www.qlabsystems.com/

They may have an american version or maybe able to stear you in the right place.

Spread Sheet are great but unless you have good knowledge of how they work you may become frustrated.

Also on our canadian revenue agencey site there is a little program that you can download my friend who has a small bussiness uses it. Maybe your government has the same sort of thing.

good luck