Paid Parental Leave

Setting up and managing Paid Parental Leave

The Australian Government funds the Paid Parental Leave scheme, which offers eligible primary caregivers of newborn and recently adopted children up to 20 weeks of Parental Leave Pay at the national minimum wage rate.

  Please note: It is recommended that Paid Parental Leave be established as a leave entitlement and added to each employee's profile as needed.

In this article, we will cover:

• Creating a Paid Parental Leave entitlement.
• Applying the entitlement to individual employee profiles.
• Managing the leave application.
• Managing reduced rates for the leave entitlement.

  Looking for information on how to add new or edit existing leave entitlements? Then see our Leave Entitlements help guide here. 

Create a Paid Parental Leave entitlement

Within the platform, you have the ability to create leave entitlements at any time that suits your needs.

This feature can give you greater control over employee leave management, allowing you to better manage your workforce and ensure that everyone has the time off they need.

To create a Paid Parental Leave entitlement: 

1. From the main menu, navigate to Payroll Settings > Leave Rules.
2. Click Add New.
3. Fill in all the details relevant to the new entitlement you're creating. For a detailed explanation of all settings, please refer to the Leave Entitlements article. 
   Some specific fields worth noting for Paid Parental Leave:
   
   • Title - This is what the entitlement will be called and will be visible to the employees on their payslips. 
   • Reportable Leave Type - Set this to 'Paid Parental Leave'.
   • Can employee apply for this leave type - Set this to 'No'. This will mean employees are unable to apply for the leave type through their Employee App and an admin will be required to do this on their behalf.
   • Apply any other relevant settings. 
4. Save the new entitlement.
   
   

   

Assign Paid Parental Leave entitlement to employees

The Paid Parental Leave entitlement can be added to employees as the need arises. There's no need to apply this entitlement in bulk.

To add a leave entitlement to an individual's profile:

1. Locate the relevant Employee Profile via Approved People or via the global search bar. 
2. Navigate to the Employee Card > Employment Type and select Add New Entitlement.
   
   
   
3. From the drop-down menu, select the Paid Parental Leave entitlement.
4. Update the accrued amount to set your starting balance for the employee.
5. If the employee is electing to take their leave at half rate, enter the halved rate into the 'Pay rate override' field.
   
   
6.  Select Add & Review Entitlement. 
7. Select Save.
   
   
   

  Please note: Unlike other leave entitlements, employees on paid parental leave may not be entitled to their normal paid public holidays. In this instance, you would want to pay the employee their parental leave, not for a day of work. 

To do this:

1. Hover your mouse over the work pattern on the employee's primary position and select Edit.
2. At the bottom of this menu, enable the toggle Deduct Leave. 
3. Click Next, review any issues and then Continue. 

• With the Deduct Leave toggle disabled, on a public holiday, the leave application will default to 0 hours. 
• With the Deduct Leave toggle enabled, on a public holiday, the leave application will default to the hours specified in the work pattern. 

Manage parental leave

Paid Parental Leave is an entitlement that would be best managed by an admin user. This will save the employee having to apply for and adjust their leave dates as things change during their pregnancy & subsequent leave.

Some key things to remember:

• Have the employee contact an admin with their proposed leave dates. 
• As an admin, submit the leave application on behalf of the employee based on the dates they provided to you.
  
    You can read more about submitting leave on behalf of an employee here. 
  
  

  

• If the start date of the Paid Parental Leave changes (early or late - it happens!), edit the leave application and adjust the dates. 
• If the end date of the Paid Parental Leave changes, edit the leave application and adjust the end date. 
  
    You can read more about managing (and editing) leave applications here. 
• Remember you can always create additional leave applications if it's easier to manage. 

  Please note: If you have processed payslips with a different leave type before the Government Paid Parental Leave became available, you will need to edit those payslips and swap out the old leave type with the new one, ensuring that the gross and net amount align. It is recommended that a comment is added to the payslip, specifying the change and date for auditing purposes.

Once the leave types have been corrected in the relevant payslips, the balance for the prior leave type will be credited back to the employee's leave balances under their Entitlements in their Employee Profile.

Managing reduced rates for Paid Parental Leave

Your employees may request to take their paid parental leave at half rate to extend their leave time. This can be managed easily by overriding the pay rate on the entitlement.

• Follow the steps in the accordion 'Assign Paid Parental Leave entitlement to employees' above to add a new entitlement. Ensure to add a halved value in the 'Pay rate override' field. Make sure that you double the 'Accrued Amount' value too. 
  
  
• While not mandatory, you could also create a second Paid Parental Leave type for the half-pay. The benefit to this approach would be that you could easily see, at a glance, which employees have taken full pay and which have taken half. It would also make the payments more descriptive for employees on their payslips.