Payroll Onboarding

This article will guide you through the information we require to get you set up for payroll

Steven Anderson avatar
Written by Steven Anderson
Updated over a week ago

Jump to the most relevant part of this article:

Already registered as an employer

Below is a list of all the information you need to get fully set up in Ember.

All information can be sent to [email protected].

HMRC Information:

  • What we need

    • HMRC credentials (username and password for HMRC online services)

    • Employer PAYE reference

    • Accounts office reference number

  • Where can I find this?

    • You should receive this information when you create a tax account with HMRC and on the letter that you first receive when registering for payroll

  • What if I don't have this?

    • If you don't yet have an HMRC account, please create one here

    • You will need your Employer's PAYE reference and accounts office reference number to continue. If you don't have these then you might not be registered for payroll. You can register here.

  • What to do with this information?

    • Add the information to your payroll settings section in Ember here

Pension scheme information (If applicable)

  • What we need

    • The name of your pension scheme provider

    • Which employees are opted in / out

    • Employee and employer contributions %'s

  • Where can I find this?

    • Check your pension scheme portal or ask your scheme provider with assistance

  • What if I don't have this?

    • If you don't have a pension scheme, you have up to 3 months to create one and enrol your employees to stay compliant with auto-enrolment

  • What to do with this information?

Payroll Information (If you have previously processed a pay-run)

  • What we need

    • Year to date figures in current employer (for all employees)

    • Year to date figures in previous employment(s) (for all employees)

  • Where can I find this?

    • Ideally we would have access to all the following documents:

      • Most recent payslips for every employee. If you plan to run your first payroll in Ember in June, then we would need the May payslip.

      • P45s for all employees who started in the most recent tax year

      • P11s (Your previous accounting software or accountant can provide these)

  • What if I don't have this?

    • Year to date (YTD) refers to the total sum / accumulated amount of the payroll figures as of your latest payroll since the tax year started (i.e. YTD tax paid in June onboarding means the total tax paid from April to May.)

    • Please note that figures from the current employment and previous employment need to be provided separately.

  • What to do with this information?

Not yet registered as an employer

There are a few things we need to do to get started.

In summary, you are going to need to:

Register as an employer

  1. Go to this link and follows the steps to register

  2. After this, you will be mailed an activation code to activate PAYE for employers

  3. Once you have activated PAYE for employers, your PAYE reference number and Accounts office reference number should appear when you sign in to HMRC account

  4. Enter your PAYE reference number, Accounts office reference number and HMRC login credentials within Ember by going to Settings > Payroll

Set up a pension scheme

In the UK, auto-enrolment regulations state that employers need to enrol qualified staff who normally work in the UK into a qualifying pension scheme. You could be fined if you fail to enrol qualified staff within 3 months of them starting with the company.

Qualifying staff are normally:

  1. Anyone (excluding directors who are paid irregularly) earning at least £833 per month / £10,000 per year

  2. Is between the age of 22 and 65 (state pension age)

  3. Normally work in the UK

Setting up a pension scheme:

  1. Select a pension scheme (Nest works best with Ember, but please see advice from the regulator here on choosing a scheme)

  2. Go to their website and set up your pension scheme

  3. Give Ember delegated access to your pension scheme (to [email protected])

  4. See to it that eligible employees are opted into your pension scheme

  5. Make a declaration of compliance with the regulator

  6. Once set up - please make us aware by contacting [email protected] so that we can reflect this in your payroll

Setting up employees

Once you've inputted all the required information within Settings > Payroll please follow the below steps to get your employees up and running.

Log into Ember and head over to the Payroll tab. Click the below button + Complete Setup to set up your first employee.

You will see there is an employee in draft ready to be set up. If you click into this tile you will be able to add the required information for this first employee.

Populate the following tabs with all the required information. All fields are required to fully set up an employee. If you are missing information for a new employee, you can ask them to complete a starter checklist, and then send this over to you.

Note: The email address for your employee will be used to send their payslip at the end of the month. If you wish to send these manually, then we recommend using another email address here.

Repeat this process for all required employees.


Other Useful Resources

Video Tutorial

We've also prepared a quick video tutorial on everything you need to do in order to be able to set up your payroll in Ember.

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