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Legislative Changes and Upgrade Status 2003
 Legislative Changes  Website Development
 Ace Payroll Changes  Upgrade Despatch
 Allowances Deductions & Direct Credits  Support Issues
Legislative Changes


From 1st April 2003 the maximum gross for ACC earner premium increases to $88,728 per annum.


From 1st April 2003 the annual student loan threshold increases to $15,964 per annum.


The income that part-time or part-year borrowers may earn and still have interest on their loans fully written off rises to $25,909.


The threshold under which the IRD automatically releases income tax refunds to wage and salary earners who have been issued a personal tax summary is to rise from $50 to $200 for the 2002-03 and future years.


From 24 March 2003 the adult minimum wage rate increases from $8.00 per hour to $8.50 and applies to all workers aged 18 years and over.


The youth minimum wage rate, applying to 16 and 17-year-olds, increases from $6.40 to $6.80 at the same time.


Where appropriate, the above changes are included in the latest Ace Payroll version.

Ace Payroll Changes
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Aside from the tax changes effective 1st April, we have made a large number of changes to Ace Payroll in the past year, adding many new features, and improving the help system and general ease of use.


We added the facility to print payslips from any historical period.


You can produce a zip backup, which requires approximately one third the disk space.


A facility has been added for the deletion of employee notes, whilst maintaining an audit trail of the deleted notes.


We improved a large number of the help messages, and in many cases, included links to more detailed information about the subject in question.


You can now set a maximum sick leave accumulation.


KiwiBank account number validation has been added.


You can produce the Leave Owing report by department, and also choose to have casual employees displayed on the report.


We updated the sick and lieu day setup screens, and converted them to the new graphical format.


We rewrote the coin split methods, and converted to the new graphical format.


We added an export method to the new Quantum Windows version.


An automatic data file backup system has been added to assist clients that neglect to backup their data.


Additional error checking has been added when restoring data files.


Printing methods have been enhanced to automatically print to the correct paper size and orientation irrespective of the Windows settings.


We added additional diagnostic utilities that can be used when liasing with our help desk.


We added back as an option the old style management report for clients that either do not have a graphical printer, or alternatively email the report.


We at last managed to fix the "spaceman font" issue, where some reports are printed in a strange font on some printers.


We added a parental leave report to assist with completing IR880 and IR881 paid parental leave forms.


We reintroduced the pay calculation tabbing, making it easier to calculate a regular payroll without using the mouse.


And as usual, we fixed, tweaked and improved hundreds of finer points, mainly at the request of some very observant clients. A full technical listing of all changes is available

Allowances Deductions & Direct Credits
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During the last 18 months we have spent considerable time extending the allowances, deductions and direct credits, and the way they relate to each other.

These changes are now fully tested, and installed on over 4000 sites. They are ready for general release.


You can specify an end date for an allowance or deduction. The deduction is not made if the pay date is later than the end date.


You can set a reducing balance for a deduction. The deduction is not made once the reducing balance is repaid.


You can link a deduction to a bank account. This is especially useful for attachment orders.


The code, reference and particulars fields can be specified for employee bank accounts.


Allowances and deductions can be calculated as a percentage of total gross, or a percentage of worked gross that does not include holiday, sick, lieu pay etc.


All dynamic allowance calculations can be overwritten.


Allowance payment histories per employee are available on all screens where an allowance is used. This allows you to view previous allowance payments for an employee without having to go to the reports section.

Website Development
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The Ace Payroll website is updated daily, and well established as New Zealand’s leading source of employment related information.

As well as daily updates, we completed the following major projects


Parental Leave - we published the Parental Leave Act and added a tutorial to assist employers with their obligations.


Wages Protection Act - we published the Wages Protection Act and linked various legal articles related to the Act.


Holiday Pay - we added tutorials to assist employers understand their obligations, and updated the Holiday Pay Act already published.

Upgrade Despatch
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  • Casual Support - we have posted newsletters to all clients that use our casual support service, with the last being posted on Friday 14th February. Processing of orders received in response to these newsletters is up to date, with all upgrades being despatched within 24 hours of our receiving the response form.

  • Support Contracts - we have despatched upgrades to all clients with a support contract expiring on or after 1st April 2003.

  • Leased Programs - upgrades for all leased programs have been despatched.


Summary

We have now despatched upgrades to every client we possibly can. Clients not yet upgraded are in one of the following categories

Casual Support - these clients received a newsletter in February and have not yet responded.

Support Contract - upgrades have not been despatched to clients with support contracts expiring prior to 1st April. A first renewal notice is sent six weeks before expiry, and a reminder four weeks after that.

Overdue Account - we do not despatch orders to clients with accounts past due.

We urge these clients to take some sort of action to avoid a last minute rush.

Support Issues
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I just upgraded my Ace Payroll to the new 3.19A I received today. When I look at the employee notes, all the old ones have gone! The new ones I've added recently seem to be there, but all the notes I've made over the years are not. What has happened?

  • In version 3.19A, we changed the way the notes display. In earlier versions the notes display in date order (in other words, the oldest ones first). Because many companies have been using Ace Payroll for over a decade, some of them had several pages of notes to scroll past before getting to the recent ones.

  • Because of this, in 3.19A we started displaying notes in reverse date order (in other words, the newest ones first).

  • This has caught a couple of clients out - after years instinctively scrolling past all the old notes to get to the new ones, the presence of the new notes right at the top has made them think the old ones are not there, so they have not scrolled down, instead calling us because at first sight, it looks like a serious problem!

  • All of your old employee notes are still there, but in reverse date order - the newest notes now appear at the top of the screen.

Why Have The Tax Rates Not Changed?

The annual deluge of calls from clients advising they have installed the upgrade but the tax rates have not changed has started.

Ace Payroll contains tax rates for this current financial year, together with the new rates from 1st April.

The tax rates automatically change on 1st April based on the pay period end date. Accordingly it is correct for the tax rates to have not changed for pay periods up to the 31st March.

We include both sets of tax tables so you can install the upgrade well before the end of the financial year.

We suggest the upgrade is installed as soon as possible, as our help desk gets very busy in the weeks either side of 31st March. In the unlikely event there are problems, it is best to get them sorted out now rather than at the last minute.

To check the new tax tables effective from 1st April, use the Tax Ready Reckoner from the Utilities menu.

You may also like to look at our FAQ on this subject.

We have a file server, and three work stations. We installed the upgrade on the server, but when run from the server Ace Payroll detected some sort of error.

After having installed the Ace Payroll upgrade, the installation instructions ask you to run the program in the normal manner - and this is unlikely to be directly from the file server. You would normally run the program from a work station.

When originally installing Ace Payroll, your network administrator would have set the command line of the Windows shortcuts on each work station to specify the location of the program and data files, and accordingly when run from a work station you will have no problems. It is unlikely a similar setting was made on the server, and this is why an error message is reported. The solution is to do as our instructions suggest - run the program in the normal manner from a workstation.


More On Installation and Registration
 Timing of upgrade installation  Registering your program
 Locating program folder  Tax rates wrong after installation
 Installation stops half way  Multiple companies
 Transferring to another computer  Function keys
 Data entered during evaluation  Password entry
 Direct credit problems after changing computers  Networking Ace Payroll
 Checking version and serial numbers  Diskette upgrade installation
  Alphabetical Index FAQ Questions FAQ Contents Back to top
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Updated: 2nd April 2006
Published: 20th February 2003
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Unless otherwise indicated this document is the original work of Ace Payroll Plus Ltd, and is copyrighted accordingly. This copyright is protected under New Zealand and international law. Infringement or attempted dilution of these intellectual property rights will be prosecuted to the fullest extent possible.