The Payroll Setup > Check Templates feature is divided into two main sections:
- On the left, there is a collapsible sidebar displaying a list of check templates, as well as a search field, a filter icon, and a collapse icon. The list is divided into custom and system check templates.
- On the right, there is the section displaying the selected check template configuration.
The toolstrip contains the following buttons:
- Save: Saves all changes to edited entries in the list.
- Refresh: Refreshes the list.
- Problems: Expands or collapses the Problems section.
- Add: Adds a record.
- Copy: Copies the selected entry in the list as a new entry.
- Delete: Deletes the selected entry in the list.
- Localize: Opens a dialog box with the cultures your instance is configured to use.
Click Filter to expand the filter section, which has two buttons: Add a Filter (which loads a dialog box with two choices: Employment Type and Gross Up) and Reset to Default.
In the section to the right, the details about the selected check template, contain the following sections:
- General: Configure general details about the check template.
- Exclusion Options: Configure eligible generated earnings, deductions, taxes and disbursement methods that can be applied to payments and quick entries.
- United States Taxation: Configure taxation parameters for US payments and quick entries.
- Canada Taxation: Configure taxation parameters for Canadian payments and quick entries.
- Gross Up Options: (Only displayed if the Gross Up checkbox of the General section is selected.) Configure which eligible deductions and taxes are included in the gross up calculation or withheld from the remaining disposable earnings. Choose which earning the grossed-up portion of the calculation is applied to.
| Parameter | Description |
|---|---|
| General | |
| Name | Enter the name of the check template. |
| Description | Enter a description of the check template. |
| Sequence Order | Enter a unique positive integer to define the processing order of this check template when calculating multiple quick entry checks for an employee with different check templates. The check templates are processed in ascending order, starting with 1, and then 2 and 3, and so on. |
| Reference Code |
Enter an xref code for the check template. Xref codes are used, for example, to export data from Dayforce to other applications. |
| Debit Deduction Arrears |
Select this checkbox and the amounts deducted from unscheduled checks are treated as payments for new amounts due. When you clear this checkbox, the amounts deducted from checks are considered as payments for past arrears, rather than for new amounts due. Moreover, if there aren’t enough funds to cover the amount, then the arrears balance does not increase. This checkbox only impacts deductions that the application automatically calculates from earnings, and not manual deduction entries that you add in Payroll. See Check Templates and Check Types. |
| ESS Earning Statement Offset Override (Days) |
Enter a number (positive or negative) in the field to set an offset (in days) before a check is displayed to employees in Employee Self Service. The value 0 makes statements available at 12:00 on the pay date, -1 makes statements available one day before the pay date, and 1 makes statements available one day after the pay date. This setting overrides the same setting made at the pay group level and at the client properties level. |
| Employment Type |
Select the employment type for the check template so that US employees with that employment type can be paid as a different one and receive the appropriate year end tax form for each type:
|
| Gross Up |
Select this checkbox to treat earnings that use this check template as target disposable income rather than gross payment. The system then performs a gross up calculation increasing the gross payment needed to cover items included in gross up such as mandatory taxes based on the additional configuration settings defined. Selecting this checkbox causes the Gross Up section to load on the setup screen offering additional configuration options. |
| Exclusion options | |
| Eligible generated earnings | Select generated earnings that can be included with payments or quick entries that use the check template. Leave cleared, and all generated earnings will be eligible unless selected in the Ineligible generated earnings field or you exclude all. Do not use this field if it is preferred to define the ineligible generated earnings for this check template. |
| Ineligible generated earnings | Select generated earnings to be excluded with payments or quick entries that use this check template. Leave cleared, and all generated earnings will be eligible by default unless specific selections are made in the Eligible generated earnings field (in which case, non-selected eligible generated earnings are considered ineligible). Do not use this field if it is preferred to define the eligible generated earnings for this check template. |
| Exclude all generated earnings | Select this checkbox to exclude all generated earnings from payments or quick entries that use the check template. By excluding all generated earnings, you are configuring the application to not calculate and pay any generated earnings for payments or quick entries that use the check template unless a payroll entry is specifically added. |
| Eligible deductions | Select deductions that can be included with payments or quick entries that use the check template. Leave cleared, and all deductions will be eligible unless selected in the Exclude selected deductions field or you exclude all. Do not use this field if it is preferred to define the ineligible deductions for this check template. |
| Exclude selected deductions | Select deductions to be excluded with payments or quick entries that use this check template. Leave cleared, and all deductions will be eligible by default unless specific selections are made in the Eligible deductions parameter (in which case, non-selected eligible deductions are considered ineligible). Do not use this field if it is preferred to define the eligible deductions for this check template. |
| Exclude all deductions | Select this checkbox and the application excludes all deductions from payments or quick entries that use the check template. By excluding all deductions, you are configuring the application to not calculate and pay any deductions for payments or quick entries that use the check template unless a payroll entry is specifically added. |
| Exclude all garnishments | Select this checkbox and the application excludes all garnishments from payments or quick entries that use the check template. By excluding all garnishments, you are configuring the application to not calculate and pay any garnishments for payments or quick entries that use the check template unless a payroll entry is specifically added. |
| Exclude all taxes | Select this checkbox and the application excludes all taxes from payments or quick entries that use this check template. By excluding all taxes, you are configuring the application to not calculate or withhold any taxes for payments or quick entries that use the check template unless a payroll entry is specifically added. |
| Disburse to special account only | Select this checkbox to first disburse an employee's net pay that is associated with this check template to a direct deposit account that is designated as the employee's account for special disbursements. |
| Exclude all employee taxes | Select this checkbox and select and the application excludes all employee taxes from payments or quick entries that use this check template. By excluding all employee taxes, you are configuring the application to not calculate or withhold any employee taxes for payments or quick entries that use the check template unless a payroll entry is specifically added. |
| Exclude all employer taxes | Select this checkbox and the application excludes all employer taxes from payments or quick entries that use this check template. By excluding all employer taxes, you are configuring the application to not calculate any employer taxes for payments or quick entries that use the check template unless a payroll entry is specifically added. |
| Exclude direct deposit accounts from disbursement | Select this checkbox and the application issues a live payroll check or disburses through payroll card when applicable for payments or quick entries that use this check template. Do not use this field if disbursing to a remainder account only. |
| Exclude payroll card accounts from disbursement | Select this checkbox and the application issues a live payroll check or disburses through direct deposit when applicable for payments or quick entries that use this check template. Do not use this field if disbursing to remainder account only. |
| Disburse to remainder account only | Select this checkbox and the application issues payments or quick entries that use this check template to the direct deposit or payroll card account indicated as the employee's remainder account. |
| Exclude calculation of employee WC | Select this checkbox and the application does not calculate or withhold employee workers' compensation deductions to payments or quick entries that use this check template. |
| Exclude calculation of employer WC | Select this checkbox and the application does not calculate or withhold employer workers compensation deductions to payments or quick entries that use this check template. |
| Exclude all deductions except deferred compensation | Select this checkbox and the application excludes all deductions except for the ones marked as deferred compensation from payments or quick entries that use the check template. |
| United States Taxation | |
| Eligible tax categories for USA | Select US tax categories to be included with payments or quick entries that use this check template. Leave cleared and all US tax categories will be eligible unless selected in the Ineligible tax categories for USA field or you exclude all, employee, or employer taxes. Do not use this field if it is preferred to define the ineligible tax categories for USA for this check template. |
| Ineligible tax categories for USA | Select US tax categories to be excluded with payments or quick entries that use this check template. Leave cleared and all US tax categories will be eligible by default unless specific selections are made in the Eligible tax categories for USA field (in which case, non-selected US tax categories will be considered ineligible). Do not use this field if it is preferred to define the eligible tax categories for USA for this check template. |
| Exclude Additional Tax Amounts | Select this checkbox and the application excludes any additional tax amounts that an employee has elected to pay, above the regular federal and state tax amounts. |
| Disable Auto Adjust For All Employee Taxes | Select this checkbox and the application disables the auto-correction of certain employee taxes such as Social Security, Medicare and state unemployment under or over withheld out of balances, commonly due to miscalculations on a manual check, from payments or quick entries that use this check template. This checkbox is used typically for cases where it would be more appropriate for the adjustment to be included on the employee’s next regular pay. |
| Disable FICA Auto-Adjust | Select this checkbox and the application disables the auto correction of employee Social Security and Medicare year-to-date under or over withheld out of balances, commonly due to miscalculations on a manual check, from payments or quick entries that use this check template. This checkbox is used typically for cases where it would be more appropriate for the adjustment to be included on the employee’s next regular pay. |
| Disable SUI Auto-Adjust | Select this checkbox and the application disables the auto-correction of employee state unemployment under or over withheld out of balances, commonly due to miscalculations on a manual check, from payments or quick entries that use this check template. This field is used typically for cases where it would be more appropriate for the adjustment to be included on the employee’s next regular pay. |
| Disable Multi Jurisdiction Allocation Split for USA | Select this checkbox to ignore multi jurisdiction splits that are defined for an employee in the Multi Jurisdiction Allocation % and Telecommuter % fields in Work > Work Assignments in the People feature, on any payment or quick entries that are assigned this check template. |
| Payment Frequency | Select a pay frequency to override the number of pay periods per year the application uses in tax calculations. See Check Templates and Check Types. |
| Allow Flat Tax | Select this checkbox to allow the check template to be configured as part of a flat tax amount or percent override for a US employee in the Flat Tax section of the Payroll > Tax Definitions screen in People. |
| Tax Method | Select an override tax method if payments or quick entries that use this check template are supplemental in nature such as bonuses or off-cycle payments. Leave blank and the system will take into account the person’s pay amount and frequency when determining the appropriate tax bracket. See Check Templates and Check Types. |
| Taxation for Deceased Employees |
Role feature access: Payroll Setup > Payroll Setup > Deceased Taxation Select this checkbox for Dayforce to apply the appropriate federal taxation to deceased employees' pay. If the deceased employee's wages are paid in the year of death, Dayforce applies Medicare and Social Security taxes and reports these totals in Boxes 3-6 of Form W-2. The taxable income is reported in Box 3 of Form 1099-M, issued to the beneficiary of the employee. If the deceased employee's wages are paid in the following year, Dayforce does not apply any taxes or W-2 mappings, and issues only a 1099-M form to the employee's beneficiary. For 401(k) plans that support posthumous deductions that would require W-2 mapping to box 12D in the following year, it is recommended that a memo be configured, mapped, and entered in a regular manual check to trigger the Form W-2 for the next year. To configure the check template for a deceased employee, you must enter their date of death in the Date of Death field in the Quarterly/Annual Reporting Parameters tab of the Payroll > Tax Definitions screen in People. |
| Special Code |
Select an option to be used by the application to determine tax calculation and tax form generation. For example, if a contractor needs to receive both a Form 1099-MISC and a Form 1099-NEC, you can configure the check template to use one or the other of these specific tax forms to ensure that the employee receiving the payment gets the necessary tax form as a result of your using this check template. The tax form that you select overrides the setting in the profile of the employee in the People feature. Options include the following:
|
| Enable Resident Taxation Based on Business Date | Payroll uses the employee’s resident address to calculate residential taxes when applicable. Dayforce applies the address that is effective on the business date of the check. When this option is selected, the checkboxes Gross Up and Taxation for Deceased Employees are grayed out. This setting is only available when you select the option Allow Resident Taxation Based on Business Date in Check Template, located in System Admin > Client Properties, in the Properties tab, in the Payroll section. |
| Canada Taxation | |
| Eligible tax categories for Canada | Select Canadian tax categories to be included with payments or quick entries that use this check template. Leave cleared and all Canadian tax categories will be eligible unless selected in the Ineligible tax categories for Canada field or you exclude all, employee or employer taxes. Do not use this field if it is preferred to define the ineligible tax categories for Canada for this check template. |
| Ineligible tax categories for Canada | Select Canadian tax categories to be excluded with payments or quick entries that use this check template. Leave cleared and all Canadian tax categories will be eligible by default unless specific selections are made in the Eligible tax categories for Canada field (in which case, non-selected Canadian tax categories will be considered ineligible). Do not use this field if it is preferred to define the eligible tax categories for Canada for this check template. |
| Exclude Additional Tax Amounts | Select this checkbox and the application excludes any additional tax amounts that an employee has elected to pay, above the regular federal and provincial tax amounts. |
| Apply CPP/QPP exemption | Select this checkbox and the system applies the standard CPP/QPP exemption per check to the new check template. Clear it, and the application does not apply the exemption to the check template. |
| Allow Flat Tax | Select this checkbox to allow the check template to be configured as part of a flat tax amount or percent override for a Canadian employee in the Flat Tax section of the Payroll > Tax Definitions screen in People. |
| Apply normal taxation | Select this checkbox and the system applies taxation to the check template as though it was a regular pay period payment. When this checkbox is cleared, the system applies taxes for the pay run type. |
| Gross Up options | |
| Included Deductions in Gross Up | Select one or more deductions that are offset as part of the grossed-up earnings. Eligible deductions not selected to be included in gross up will be withheld from the remaining disposable earnings. |
| Excluded Taxes in Gross Up |
Select tax types to be excluded from the grossed-up calculation and withheld from the remaining disposable earnings. Available options are as follows:
|
| Include Garnishments in Gross Up | Select this checkbox to offset the amount of all garnishments as part of the grossed-up earnings. If unselected and garnishments aren’t excluded on this check template, all calculated garnishments will be withheld from remaining disposable earnings. |
| Gross Up Top Up Earning | Select the earning code the grossed-up portion of earnings is to be applied to. This can be the same earning code used to record the target net earnings or can be a different earning code to show each portion of the calculation separately. |