Somebody Was Paid Too Little
An underpayment is the error with the shortest acceptable response time, because somebody is short of money now and it is your fault.
Nobody elseif the person who does this is away
An underpayment is the payroll error with the shortest acceptable response time. Somebody is short of money this week, the shortfall was caused by you, and every hour of delay is experienced by a person rather than by a business.
The practical lesson in “Somebody Was Paid Too Little” is that payroll depends on a sequence somebody can explain. When a small team reviews see this workflow resource for 7 minute rule for payroll, the useful role is to organise time and project evidence before approval, with proportional settings and a clear correction route for employees.
Everything about handling it follows from that.
Additional context for “Somebody Was Paid Too Little” is available from Zapier productivity resources. A sound review distinguishes general practice from the rules and records that apply to one employer.
Finding out
Usually from the person. Occasionally from the comparison, if it happened. Rarely from the software, which has no view about whether a figure is what anybody intended.
Nearly every underpayment is one of three things:
- An input that never arrived.
- An input that arrived and was not entered.
- A change entered from the wrong date.
The person telling you is doing you a favour and it rarely feels like one to them.
The first response
Acknowledge it immediately, before investigating. Ten minutes of silence while you check is experienced as being disbelieved.
"I'll look at this now and come back to you today" costs nothing and changes the whole exchange.
Establishing what happened
The change list, the hours as submitted, and the run as entered. Nearly every underpayment is one of three things: an input that never arrived, an input that arrived and was not entered, or a change entered from the wrong date.
The decision about speed
Whether to correct it now or in the next run. The honest test is whether the person can wait without difficulty, and for anything more than a small sum the answer is usually no.
For somebody paid weekly or at a lower wage, a month is not a reasonable wait for money they have earned.
Paying it immediately
An out-of-cycle payment. Most arrangements allow it, some charge for it, and it has to be reflected in the records and reporting rather than made as an untracked transfer.
The version that causes later trouble is the one made from the bank and never told to payroll.
Correcting in the next run
Acceptable for small amounts, with the person's agreement, and with a clear statement of what will appear and when.
Deciding this without asking them is where it goes wrong.
Telling them what you found
Plainly, including whose mistake it was. A business that says "the hours did not reach me" when it did not ask for them is making a second mistake in front of somebody who is already annoyed.
If it has been happening for a while
A rate never applied, an allowance missed, hours systematically rounded the wrong way. These are the expensive ones, because they accumulate quietly and may affect more than one person.
How far back it must be corrected, and what else attaches to it, is a matter for somebody qualified where you are.
Checking whether anybody else is affected
The most important step and the one most often skipped. An error with a systemic cause — a wrong setting, a misread rule — has usually hit more than one person, and the others have not noticed.
Finding them yourself is considerably better than being found.
The apology
Short, specific, once. Not elaborate, which invites the conversation to continue, and not absent, which is remembered.
What not to say
That it is a software problem, that it is complicated, or that it happens. None of those are the person's concern and all of them read as deflection.
Fixing the cause
The setting, the missing input, the deadline that was not kept. Correcting the payment without fixing the cause produces the same error next month, now with a person who is watching for it.
The record
What happened, what was paid, when, and what was changed to prevent it. One short note, and it is what you will need if it recurs or if anybody asks later.
Paying it today rather than next month
For anything beyond a small sum, the right answer is almost always an immediate payment rather than a correction in the next run.
The business's convenience and the person's rent are not comparable quantities, and a correction deferred to the next cycle is the business choosing the first.
Where it is genuinely small, ask rather than decide.
Checking how far back it goes
The question nobody wants to ask. A rate never applied or an allowance missed has usually been wrong for more than one period, and the person did not notice because the amount was small each month.
Looking back is uncomfortable, considerably better than being asked later, and the only way to know the actual size of what you are putting right.
The thing that prevents most of these
The comparison before approval. Nearly every underpayment described here would have shown as an unexplained difference twenty minutes before anybody was paid.