Overview of Elements
Elements are the building blocks of payroll and benefits.
Use payroll elements to determine the payment of base pay, benefits, absences, and other earnings and deductions.
Use the Elements task to create additional elements and the associated objects required to support their processing.
You can create as many earnings and deduction elements as you require.
Before You Start
Before you create elements for payroll processing, use the Features by Country or Territory task and set the country extension to Payroll, so that you use the appropriate template that generates all the items required for payroll processing. If the country extension is set to Human Resources or None, you use a basic template that generates the elements only.
Predefined Elements
Your implementation may include a few predefined elements, usually for legislative tax deductions. Predefined elements are specific to your country or territory. You can't make any changes to these predefined elements. However, you must create eligibility records for them.
Element Classifications
Element classifications, which vary by country or territory, control the element template questions you answer to define the element.
Primary Classifications
Primary classifications, such as Involuntary Deductions, control processing including the sequence in which elements are processed and the balances they feed. They are designed to meet legislative requirements of your country or territory, and you can't change them.
Secondary Classifications
Secondary classifications are subsets of the primary classifications and are used to manage wage basis rules for deductions and taxes. You can't remove or change any predefined secondary classifications nor disable any of the predefined balance feeds created for them. However, you can define secondary classifications to feed your own user-defined balances.
Element Subclassifications
Subclassifications provide a way to feed balances. Elements can have only one primary and secondary classification, but multiple subclassifications. Create subclassifications or use the predefined ones. You can specify that a subclassification automatically applies to every element in the primary classification.
Each subclassification belongs to one primary classification only. If you reuse a subclassification name under different primary classifications, it's treated as a separate subclassification. And you must create separate balance feeds for each subclassification.
Element Category
When you create an element, either a default value is selected in the Category field, based on the selected primary classification, or you can select a category from a list of values that are determined by the primary classification.
The element category indicates whether the element is maintained using the standard element feature or the payroll calculation solution.
Element Templates
When you create an element, your selection of the element classification and category determines the questions on a predefined template. Use the element template to create an element. The template includes questions that prompts you for information that's used to create the element and the necessary payroll objects associated with the element. Submitting the template generates an element, which you can edit, as required.
The exact scope of each element template, including the questions displayed on the Elements page, is controlled by several factors, such as, the country extension and payroll license status of the user.
If you select an element classification, such as Standard Earnings, Supplemental Earnings, Direct Payments, or Taxable Benefits, the basic template creates input values for Amount, Periodicity, and Full-Time Equivalent.
Configure any of the generated items to match your specific business requirements. For example, you can add input values, edit the formulas, or add a status processing rule to use a different formula for certain assignment statuses.
Create at least one element eligibility record for all predefined and newly created elements.