What to Look At Before Approving
Approval is where a run stops being provisional. Six things are worth looking at first, and they take about three minutes between them.
Nobody elseif the person who does this is away
Approval is the point where a payroll run stops being provisional and becomes the thing that will be paid, filed and seen. Six checks are worth making before it, and together they take about three minutes.
The practical lesson in “What to Look At Before Approving” is that payroll depends on a sequence somebody can explain. When a small team reviews explore the official Monitask resource for how to call out of work, the useful role is to organise time and project evidence before approval, with proportional settings and a clear correction route for employees.
They are not a substitute for the comparison described separately here; they are the things that comparison does not cover.
As a separate reference point for “What to Look At Before Approving”, see Personio HR lexicon. Current legal, tax and employment requirements should still be confirmed for the organisation’s location.
One: the number of people
Does the run contain the number of people you expect to pay. A count is instant and catches a leaver still in, a starter missing, or a duplicate record.
| Check | Catches |
|---|---|
| Headcount | A leaver still in, a starter missing |
| Total gross | A systemic error |
| Anybody at zero | An input that did not land |
| Anybody unusually high | The expensive direction |
| New bank details | The error that cannot be undone |
| The payment date | A month where the date moved |
Two: the total
Gross for the period, as one figure, against what you expected. Not precise — within a few per cent is the test.
A total that is wrong by a lot is wrong for a reason that is easy to find now and awkward to find after the money has moved.
Three: anybody at zero
A person in the run with nothing against them. Sometimes correct — a full period of unpaid absence — and usually an input that did not land.
Four: anybody unusually high
The reverse, and the more expensive direction. A payment far above what a person normally receives is worth thirty seconds of confirmation, because recovering an overpayment is considerably harder than preventing one.
Five: the bank details on new entries
For anybody added this period, that the account details are what was supplied, read character by character once.
A wrong account number on a first payment is among the worst errors available here, and it is entirely preventable at this moment.
Six: the payment date
That the run is dated for the date you intend, which is not always the default, particularly in a month where the date has moved for a holiday.
What approval usually does
Locks the period, in many packages, and enables the filing and the payment file. Reversing it ranges from a button to a telephone call depending on the product.
Knowing which yours is, before you need it, is part of the software note here.
Who should approve
Ideally not the only person who keyed it. In a business where that is impossible, the next best thing is a gap: key it, leave it, approve it later with fresh attention.
The second pair of eyes that is realistic
Not a review of the whole run. One person looking at three figures — the count, the total, and anything that moved a lot — which takes two minutes and provides most of the benefit of segregation.
When to approve
Not at the end of a long day, not while being asked questions, and not in the last available hour.
The approval made under pressure is the one that is regretted, and the pressure is usually self-inflicted by a late start.
What to do if something looks wrong
Do not approve. A run held for a day is a minor inconvenience; a run approved, paid and filed wrongly is three separate corrections.
Recording that you approved
A note of who approved what, and when. In a one-person payroll this feels absurd and matters anyway, because the question "who approved this" is asked after things go wrong rather than before.
Why six and not more
Because a longer list is not performed. Six checks at thirty seconds each survive a compressed month; a fifteen-point review does not, and the month it is abandoned is the month it was needed.
The six chosen here are the ones that catch failures the comparison does not: absence from the run, a wrong date, a wrong account, and a total that is wrong in a way no individual difference explains.
The order they are in
Count first, because it is instant and catches the worst category. Total second, because it catches the systemic. The individual checks afterwards, because they are only worth doing once the shape is right.
A list performed in the wrong order spends its attention on detail before establishing that the run contains the right people.
Writing them where they are used
On the written sequence, at the approval step, as six lines.
A set of checks that lives in somebody's head is performed when they are unhurried and skipped when they are not, which is the opposite of what a check is for.
The one that costs most when skipped
New bank details, read character by character. It is the only check here whose failure is frequently unrecoverable, and it takes fifteen seconds.
Everything else on this list produces a correction; this one produces a payment that is gone.
The one-line version
Count, total, zeroes, outliers, new bank details, date. Three minutes, before the step that cannot easily be undone.