Pay/Bill Rules
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Pay/Bill Rules |
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Pay/Bill Rules allow you to automate control of Bill Rates and/or Pay Rates under specific circumstances. Rather than having to manually adjust the rates on individual shifts, Pay/Bill Rules let you setup the parameters and have them change automatically. In order to effectively use Pay/Bill Rules, you must be able to clearly define the circumstances under which the change will happen, and exactly what happens if the criteria are met. Applying to individual Payment Obligations
To setup Pay/Bill Rules, from the main Rosemark screen, go to File->Configuration->Pay/Bill Rules.
Figure 216: Pay/Bill Rules Pay/Bill Rules are power tools with a great deal of flexibility. The necessary complexity that goes along with them may make them a bit difficult to understand at first. You may find it easier to start with some specific examples of how they are used, rather than working through all the details. You can see some step-by-step examples in the Pay/Bill Rules Examples section. Each Pay/Bill Rule consists of a name and a type. The name must be unique among all Pay/Bill Rules, regardless of type. The Type of the rule governs what elements are used to match Shifts. The examples shown here are of type Duration, which matches based on how long the Shift is. It is important to understand the difference between a rule and instances of that rule. An individual rule is defined at the global level. It can then be turned on or off at any level, and its matching criteria and effects can be changed by putting in different instances of the rule, with specific effective dates. In other words, any individual Pay/Bill Rule can have different settings with different effective dates. Tip: Use the Add Rule button to add a new named rule. Use the New Effective Date button to add a new instance of an existing named rule.
Rule Types define what kinds of parameters can be specified to match shifts. For example a Type of Duration will allow you to put in the maximum and minimum durations that will be considered, while a Type of Day of Week will allow you to choose which days will be considered. Duration Duration lets you put in the minimum and/or maximum duration of a Shift. A common use of this would be when short shifts are paid or billed differently. Day of Week lets you specify which days should be treated differently. This is especially useful for controlling weekend rates. You can indicate whether a shift should match if it starts on a given day, falls mostly on the day or intersects the day at all.
Figure 217: Day of the Week Pay/Bill Rule Handling Holidays A common use of the day of week rule type is to handle holidays. The simplest way to handle a holiday setup is as follows: 1) Setup a Day of Week rule with an effective date on the date of the holiday. 2) Put in the parameters you want (e.g. time and a half). 3) Add New Effective Date for the day following the holiday and select Turn Off. That way, the rule will only be in effect on the day of the holiday.
To add a new Pay/Bill Rule, just click the Add Rule button above the list pane. You will be prompted to enter the name of this new rule. Then choose the type and effective date for the new rule.
Figure 218: Adding a new Pay/Bill Rule Configuring Pay/Bill Rules Now let's look at the different parts of the Pay/Bill Rules screen and how to use them. The top pane lets you add, rename and delete rules. Below that is the list of the rules that have been added along with the effective date, Type and a summary description of the matching and effect each is having on Pay and Bill. Notice that, if a rule is turned off, there is a black X, rather than a green check mark and the description. The details about the selected one show up below that. This is also where you can add and remove instances of the selected rule by clicking New Effective Date or Remove, respectively.
Figure 219: Top of the selected Pay/Bill Rule The body of the selected Pay/Bill Rule is where you actually define the match criteria and the effect that the rule will have on matching shifts. The Pay and Bill sides are independent, so you can have a different criteria and effects on the two different sides. You can even have one side turned off while the other one is active. On or Off To make one side or the other active, the Override radio button must be lit up. At the top (global) level, this just means that it is turned on. At lower levels, this means that it will override this rule, which would otherwise have been inherited from above. Match Below the off and on switches is the Match area. This is where you define what criteria must be met in order for the rule to take effect. This area will be different depending on what Type of rule you are working with. The example here shows the Duration match. For this Type, you can put in either the minimum, the maximum or both ends of the range of durations that will match.
Figure 220: Defining the behavior of a duration type Pay/Bill Rule Effect Below the Match area is the Effect section. This allows you to have the hourly rate of the matched shift change in various ways. You can either multiply by a number, add a dollar amount, or round to the nearest multiple of a dollar amount. You can use more than one of these functions: they will be applied in the top-down order of Multiply by, then Add, then Round to. Order You can change the order in which rules are executed by changing the Order number. By default, Rosemark sets the number to be the same as others with the same name, or to the next multiple of 10 beyond what is already used. This makes it easy to change the order of rules because you have plenty of room between rules. In the list shown below, a rule was changed from 10 to 25, so it would happen between 20 and 30. You can also set whether the matching of rules should continue after this rule has been matched. If the Skip subsequent matching rules check box is checked, it will skip any other rules that are further down the list. In the list, a little red stop sign will show that this option has been selected.
Figure 221: Changing the order of Pay/Bill Rules
Depending on what Rules are in place, you may have Shifts that match more than one Rule. For example, a weekend shift that is only 2 hours long could match both a Duration and a Day of Week Rule. At each level, you can control the order that Rules are applied to matching shifts. Obviously, this only matters when a shift matches more than one of the rules but it can make a significant difference in those cases.
Override on a Payment Obligation You can choose to override any Pay/Bill Rule at the individual Payment Obligation level. For example, you may have an individual Client that you don't charge extra for short shifts. So you would want to turn off the ShortShift rule on this Payment Obligation. To do this, from the Payment Obligation, click on the Pay/Bill Rules button (note that this button will have a number on it, which indicates how many Pay/Bill Rules are affecting it). This will open the Pay/Bill Rules list for this Payment Obligation. This will include any Rules that are inherited from the top level (global) Pay/Bill Rules set, as well as any overrides. To override a rule, you have two options:
In either case, it will put in a new instance of the Pay/Bill Rule, maintaining the same settings (including Order) as the Rule you started with. When you override the global settings of a rule, you can change the effect on the Pay Rates and the Bill Rates independently. For either (or both), you can either turn the rule off, change its effect (override) or let it follow the default inherited from the level above (global).
Figure 222: Turning off a Pay/Bill Rule on a Payment Obligation |
