Preparing for RTI

RTI may seem pretty scary but BrightPay will look after all the heavy lifting. We hope that you will be pleasantly surprised at just how easy and unintrusive you will find the whole RTI experience.

There are one or two things you need to consider in preparation for RTI.

Your first RTI submission, which will occur on or before your first payday in 2013-14 (but not before 6th April 2013) is known as your "first full payment submission" or first FPS for short. BrightPay, as with all RTI submissions, will prepare and submit this first FPS automatically for you, with your OK of course. The difference between the first FPS and subsequent FPS submissions is that the first FPS will include details of all employees whether or not they were included in your first payroll run e.g. if you operate both weekly and monthly payrolls for the same company, the first FPS, triggered by the first weekly payroll run, will include details of all your monthly paid employees (even though they will have zero in all the pay and tax fields). Subsequent FPS submissions will only include details for employees actually paid in the applicable payroll run.

Therefore it is important that all individuals currently in your employment are included in BrightPay before the first RTI submission is made.

Another thing to bear in mind is that each RTI submission will need to include information for temporary and casual workers and employees paid below the National Insurance Lower Earnings Limit. So, even though there are no deductions made from these individuals, they now need to be accounted for through BrightPay.

Finally, you will need to include new information in your payroll records, the main one being hours worked. This is not the actual number of hours but, instead, an applicable scale (a) Up to 15.99 hours per week (b) 16-29.99 hours per week or (c) 30 hours or more per week. For employees who are paid using an hourly rate, BrightPay will allocate this scale automatically. However, for employees paid a set amount each week or month, you will need to review the default scale which is set at (c) above.

One other new item is the "Irregular Employment Pattern Indicator" e.g. casual or seasonal employees (where the employment contract continues) or where employee will not be paid for at least a further 3 months but is still regarded as an employee e.g. maternity

If you are running a payroll bureau service, you need to consider procedural changes to ensure that the above issues are covered. Make sure that these changes are put in place well in advance of the 6th April.

Bright Contracts – Employment Contracts and Handbooks.
BrightPay – Payroll & Auto Enrolment Software.

Posted byPaul ByrneinHMRCPayrollRTI