Real smooth: Recruiters avoid payroll change glitches
11 April 2013
The first week of a new era of payroll reporting requirements has gone smoothly for recruiters, despite reports to the contrary.
Thu, 11 Apr 2013The first week of a new era of payroll reporting requirements has gone smoothly for recruiters, despite reports to the contrary.
A story in The Daily Telegraph earlier this week suggested problem with the new Real Time Information (RTI) online reporting. HM Revenue & Customs insisted that some small glitches were experienced, but that this was because of non-related routine maintenance, with a spokesperson telling Recruiter “basically it’s all working fine”.
The market appears to agree. Pete Taylor, the operations director of technical and blue-collar recruiter Encore Personnel, says: “Initially the reviewing of our payroll administration procedures was time consuming and challenging, however when completed it revealed that little change was needed to our robust processes to ensure compliance.”
As reported last week by recruiter.co.uk, George Willis, the managing director of construction recruiter gm recruitment had put in place a manual back-up system in case issues were discovered.
He says the company has delayed its first payroll until next week (companies have until the 5 May to complete this) to be doubly sure no issues with HMRC would flare up. “Once it’s up and running it will be fine,” he says today. “It’s just another bit of red tape.”
Similarly, Cathy Bateman, HR and process director at industrial recruitment agency gap personnel, describes the firm “preparing for RTI since the introduction of AWR [the Agency Workers Regulations, in October 2011]”.
“RTI has had a bit of a bad press, but on balance we actually see it as a good thing,” she tells Recruiter.
Matthew Brown, managing director of professional umbrella employment provider giant, agrees that the new system will increase accuracy and simplicity in time, and has found transition “a smooth process so far. This, however, is largely down to the impact of our previous reporting method. We’ve actually been using electronic submissions with HMRC for a few years now so this hasn’t been a huge change in our normal routine”.
A story in The Daily Telegraph earlier this week suggested problem with the new Real Time Information (RTI) online reporting. HM Revenue & Customs insisted that some small glitches were experienced, but that this was because of non-related routine maintenance, with a spokesperson telling Recruiter “basically it’s all working fine”.
The market appears to agree. Pete Taylor, the operations director of technical and blue-collar recruiter Encore Personnel, says: “Initially the reviewing of our payroll administration procedures was time consuming and challenging, however when completed it revealed that little change was needed to our robust processes to ensure compliance.”
As reported last week by recruiter.co.uk, George Willis, the managing director of construction recruiter gm recruitment had put in place a manual back-up system in case issues were discovered.
He says the company has delayed its first payroll until next week (companies have until the 5 May to complete this) to be doubly sure no issues with HMRC would flare up. “Once it’s up and running it will be fine,” he says today. “It’s just another bit of red tape.”
Similarly, Cathy Bateman, HR and process director at industrial recruitment agency gap personnel, describes the firm “preparing for RTI since the introduction of AWR [the Agency Workers Regulations, in October 2011]”.
“RTI has had a bit of a bad press, but on balance we actually see it as a good thing,” she tells Recruiter.
Matthew Brown, managing director of professional umbrella employment provider giant, agrees that the new system will increase accuracy and simplicity in time, and has found transition “a smooth process so far. This, however, is largely down to the impact of our previous reporting method. We’ve actually been using electronic submissions with HMRC for a few years now so this hasn’t been a huge change in our normal routine”.
