1. Administering Payroll for the United Kingdom
  2. Employer Payment Summary Process

Employer Payment Summary Process

You run the Employer Payment Summary Process at the end of every statutory month to send information to HMRC about any adjustments that must be made against the employer's Tax and NI liabilities due to the statutory payments made to the employees.

This process produces an Employer Payment Summary (EPS) file for submission to HM Revenue and Customs (HMRC). It’s also used to calculate and report the Apprenticeship Levy amount due for the year-to-date. This process creates an archive, from which it creates the EPS file, and produces a Reconciliation Report. The process doesn't update employee records.

You can also specify Construction Industry Scheme amount suffered by your organization that reduces your liability to HMRC.

Use the Submit a Process or Report task to run the Employer Payment Summary for Tax Year Ending <year> process.

Before You Start

You must run the process with an action parameter group, with these two parameters:

  • Multithreaded XML generation must be set to N

  • Threads must be set to 1

If you're currently reclaiming, or have at any time in the current tax year reclaimed any amounts for statutory absence payments (such as maternity, paternity, and adoption pay), then the EPS must include year-to-date (YTD) totals for recovery and NIC compensation amounts. To calculate these amounts automatically in a payroll run, you must do one of these:

  • Manually calculate YTD recovery and NI compensation amounts, and then enter those values as overrides in the EPS archive file.

  • Perform the setup required so that payroll runs automatically calculate these amounts and feed the appropriate balances. If you select this method, the EPS retrieves the correct values from the recovery and NIC compensation YTD balances.

Process Parameters

Select the payroll statutory unit (PSU) for which to run the process. Optionally, you can select a tax reporting unit (TRU) within that PSU. The process includes these additional parameters:

Parameter

Description

Payroll Flow

Identifier for the process that's being run. You can enter a value each time the process is run.

PSU

Payroll statutory unit for which to run the process.

TRU

Tax reporting unit, within the selected PSU, for which to run the process.

EPS Date

Statutory month end date for this process.

Submission Type

Indicates whether the output file is for testing or Live.

If you select Test, the process inserts a test indicator in the file, which you can submit to HMRC for validation before submitting the live submission. Once you have verified the test submission, run the process again and select Live as the submission type. Only Live files can be sent to HMRC using the Outgoing XML Message submission to HMRC process. You should run it in test mode, examine it for errors and completeness, and proceed to a Live run when any issues are resolved. In test mode, the process doesn't update any employee data, but it completes the archive and generates the XML file and report.

Note: You can run the process multiple times in Test mode, but only once in Live mode for any tax reporting unit and EPS date, other than 5 April. If payment data for a specific TRU and EPS date was previously archived, the process doesn't include that data in the EPS. You must roll back the earlier live EPS process to re-archive or report the data for that tax reporting unit again.

Final Submission

Indicates whether this EPS is the final submission for the year or for a ceased PAYE scheme. If you're generating the final submission for the tax year, then this is a required parameter.

Select Yes, if this is the Final EPS for the year. You should submit either the final FPS or the final EPS with this set, but not for both submissions. So, if you send the EPS final submission, you don’t need to set the same option on the FPS.

Date Scheme Ceased

Date the scheme ceased, if this is the final submission for a ceased PAYE scheme.

Process Configuration Group

Determines the rules for processing, such as logging and number of threads.

Process Results

This process includes these tasks and outputs:

  • Archive Employer Payment Summary: Generates an archive file containing the payment data to include in the file.

  • View Employer Payment Summary Results: Enables you to view and edit the archive file to adjust balances, if necessary.

    To view the archive file, click Go to Task for this task on the checklist. Edit the balances in the archive file, as needed. Once you have completed this manual step, mark the task as complete so the process can continue.

  • Generate Employer Payment Summary Audit Report: Generates the audit report. The Audit report is a .XLS file. When you download the file, make sure you have enabled editing for the spreadsheet so that values are displayed correctly.

  • Generate Employer Payment Summary XML: Generates the XML file from the archive.

Note: If the test file is accurate, you must roll back the process and generate a Live file. You can only submit a Live file to HMRC using the Outgoing XML Messages Submission process.If you submit an EPS after the 19th of the month, the EPS will not be taken into account for that period and you'll have to pay the full amount due from your FPS. When the EPS is received, it’ll be taken into account against the next period.
XML File Download

Save the XML file to a location accessible to transmit the file to HMRC. (You perform the XML transmission outside of this process.)

Roll Back Process

If, after running this process, you determine that the archived payment data for one or more TRUs was incorrect, correct the data and then roll back the EPS process. Run the EPS process again to create a new archive and EPS file for the affected TRUs.

If you submit an EPS after the 19th of the month, the EPS will not be taken into account for that period, and you’ll have to pay the full amount due from your FPS. When the EPS is received, it will be taken into account against the next period.