There’s no question that Australia is faced with a widespread, systemic wage underpayment issue with a very real threat of legal consequences, including prosecution. Not only do we see this in the press, companies being audited by Fair Work Australia are listed publicly.
The payroll function is in desperate need of a leg up when it comes to putting the power back into the hands of the HR, payroll and finance teams. The industrial environment is incredibly complex and without having expertise in this space, it is incredibly difficult to stay on top of regular legislative changes. Empowering these functions is what we’re interested in at Workforce Analytics, we don’t believe in sprouting more fear. Instead, we’re interested in providing valuable support that will help payroll, finance and compliance teams to take control of wages.
You only need to do a quick google search on ‘wage underpayments’ to be filled with fear and anxiety as a payroll manager, without getting solid answers on what to do about it, and we know that fear breeds more fear.
So, what’s the solution?
What to do if you’re concerned there could be a payroll compliance issue within your organisation?
Oftentimes, payroll managers have every intention of proactively managing payroll, but often, due to disparate and manual data sources, they simply don’t have all of the information at hand, which makes it impossible to accurately measure underpayments and overpayments.
We also know that many organisations have traditionally felt stuck between a rock and a hard place, believing that the only way to get on top of this problem is to invest heavily into an external consultant. However, often payroll managers are afraid to go down this route out of fear of being publicly outed if something does in fact, show up. The reputational threat is very real.
This creates stagnancy inside the organisation as payroll and finance managers decide not to take action in the earlier stages when problems could be resolved internally, and only solicit the help of a large consultant or legal firm, when they absolutely have to. This creates hidden fear across the payroll and finance functions, and prevents the ability to proactively manage payroll and ultimately solve the systemic problem.
The truth is, you don’t need to spend significantly on large consultant fees (or build incredibly complex internal models) in order to respond to payroll concerns and manage payroll compliance effectively.
You can successfully and proactively manage payroll, discreetly, and on your own accord.
Data-driven wage insights
In order to manage payroll effectively (and discreetly) payroll managers need to know for certain that their data is providing them with accurate insights that can assure there is no immediate or future issue around wages.
When you have disparate data (i.e. various spreadsheets, payslip templates and paper based processes) it is virtually impossible to find the truth manually.
By centralising all of this disparate data, and automating the process, payroll will have the best chance at reporting back to the business, Fair Work Australia and legal counterparts, with a single point of truth that they can confidently stand behind.
The only way to do this effectively is with technology and systems that can do it for you.
Having access to a self-service tool that can do the investigation for you changes the game for payroll managers, finance leaders and executive teams. By having one centralised (ideally cloud-based) portal that analyses all of your excel spreadsheets, payslips and other sources of data, you can accurately determine if any wage underpayment or overpayment exists.
The Pay Review Self Service Portal
Workforce Analytics has been working with well-known brands, legal firms and large consultancies for over 5 years to refine its Enterprise grade Payroll Compliance self-service tool so that any Payroll Manager can use it.
The self-service tool resolves payroll underpayments discreetly and at a fraction of the cost of large consultancy fees, by taking disparate data sources and manual spreadsheets and presenting you with automated reports of the underpayment or overpayment gap across your entire organisation – from inside your organisation.
Having an internal self-service subscription-based license will allow you to have your own login (with multiple logins for all relevant stakeholders) where you can run through a number of expertly-defined checks to determine any issues.
The Pay Review self-service tool has been tried and tested with many well-known brands audited by Fair Work Australia, and given the tick of approval by legal firms across Australia.
Workforce Analytics and its expert payroll team has done the legwork for you by designing a self-service tool that factors in the nuances of wage compliance and Australian legislative requirements based on over 50 years of collective experience.
It’s important that from within the business, payroll managers feel they can monitor payroll as part of their day to day role, that way, they can confidently report back to all relevant stakeholders within and external to the organisation.
Want to learn more?
Schedule a demo with our specialist Payroll team today to learn how to resolve (and avoid) wage underpayments - we’ll show you how easy it can be.
For businesses who subscribe to Pay Review in the month of May, Workforce Analytics will waive the training and onboarding costs (up to $25k *conditions apply).
By scheduling your demo, you’ll learn how to proactively manage payroll yourself so you can get the data driven insights you need, in the matter of days.
Register your details here.
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