We speak to Australian employers every day who love Xero but tell us they need Award Interpretation. Fairtime’s unique value proposition is all about Award Interpretation. That’s why we’re pleased to announce our integration with Xero.
What is Fairtime?
Fairtime is timesheet and payroll compliance software designed to help Australian business. We help employers pay staff at the right rate. Award Interpretation is the task of understanding the laws that apply to a particular employment relationship and applying them every time you pay your employee.
Our unique pay rate engine reads your employee timesheet and converts it into a payslip with one or two clicks. When you employ staff are under a Modern Award, there are a number of complex laws you need to comply with. Fair Work closely monitors businesses of all shapes and sizes to ensure things like timesheet records and payslips are kept so that employers can demonstrate compliance with the relevant Modern Award. Fairtime takes care of all of this so you don’t need to worry.
Award Interpretation is at the heart of what we do. We can save a business with 30 staff, as an example, up to 5 hours each pay cycle. Without Award Interpretation, the employer needs to manually count up staff hours and assign pay rates each and every pay cycle OR they pay an accountant or bookkeeper to do it for them. Rates change all the time so monitoring websites and staying on top of new laws is also very time consuming. Fairtime saves you the trouble of having to update your payroll systems because our software comes with current pay rate rules built in.
What is Xero?
Xero is the leading provider of small business accounting software in Australia. Xero technology has developed a reputation for assisting companies in all manor of industries across the country. Today, Xero offers a variety of different technical solutions and apps to help small business owners manage their financials quickly and easily. Nevertheless, accounting software solutions is the core value proposition.
Why does your business need Fairtime's Award Interpretation Software & Xero?
Consider this example.
“ABC Care Solutions” is a NDIS-registered disability support provider based in Brisbane. The business has 50 staff, the majority of whom are employed under the Schads Award. ABC Care outsources its payroll function to a suburban bookkeeper, “Bob’s Small Business Accountants” (Bob). Bob’s charges ABC Care $1000 per month to process payroll for its 50 staff. There are two pay runs each month and it takes the Bob’s team between 5-10 hours to complete each pay cycle. ABC Care uses Xero for timesheets and general small business accounting needs. Pay rates need to be updated at least once annually or whenever an update to the Schads Award is made. This takes Bob’s team at least 20 hours to update at least 140 different Schads Award pay categories by hand in Xero. ABC Care pays Bob $2500 as a one off each July when rates change.
ABC Care contacted Fairtime and explained its challenges around timesheets and payroll for its growing business. One of them is that Xero does not have Award Interpretation built into to its payroll function. This means Bob’s team counts up hours every pay cycle and cross references worked hours with pay rates under the Schads Award. Equally when rates change, someone from Bob’s team has to update Xero payroll settings, line by line, rate by rate.
This all changes with Fairtime. Fairtime sits neatly ‘in front’ of Xero and data passes quickly and easily between the two platforms. When your employee enters work hours into Fairtime our pay rate engine applies Award Interpretation and effectively reads the timesheet. With one or two clicks the manager or business owner can determine what the employee should be paid for those hours and this data is sent straight to Xero. ABC Care has reduced its payroll processing spend by 70% each month. No longer does it need to worry about manually updating pay rates whenever they change. Fairtime has built in pay rates that pass straight through to Xero from our central database.
Want to learn more about Fairtime's Xero Integration?
We’re very excited out this feature update and we know you will be too. To see Xero integration in action and learn more Book a Demo with our team today.
