November 17th 2022, Release Note: WFM UK | HR & Payroll: Pension Letter Enhancements, NEST API, Payment and Deduction Export

Summary

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Feature 1	Feature 2	Feature 3
Pension Letter Enhancements Pension letters will now be sent automatically on a daily basis. The 'Send Out Documentation screen' will also show sent pension letters.	NEST API The ability to switch on the NEST API has been added to the Pension Module, as well as a screen to be able to view submissions to NEST and their status including any errors returned.	Payment and Deduction Export A new export is available that lists every payment and deduction from an employee's pay slip, in Excel format.

Release date for all features: November 17th 2022

 

Pension Letter Enhancements

• Enabled by Default? - Yes
• Set up by customer Admin? - No
• Enable via Support ticket? - No
• Affects configuration or data? - Yes

What's Changing?

Pension documents sent via the pension module will no longer be a manual process but instead will send automatically on a daily basis. The pension module's 'Send Out Documentation' screen has also been updated to include the ability to view pension documents sent to employees.

Reason for the Change

Automating the process of sending pension documents removes the risk of non-compliance as well as the manual effort required to send pension letters. Visibility of pension letters sent via the Pension module in one screen reduces the effort required to see which employees have been sent letters.

Customers Affected

All customers using the Pension module.

 Warning: Between (and including) 16th and 21st November 2022, please do not attempt to upload any new pension letter templates or send any pension documents via the pension module. This is due to a procedure that will be taking place to migrate the portal from the old process to this new automated process.

 

Release Note Info/Steps

Contents:

1. Pension Letter Automation Global Setting
2. Pension Letter Automation
3. Email Sent to the Employee with the Pension Letter
4. View Documents Already Sent
5. Additional Resources

Pension Letter Automation Global Setting

Pension Letter automation will be enabled by default. However, a global setting can be used to disable or reenable the automation.

To disable or enable pension letter automation go to:

• Pension Module > Administration > Global Settings > Edit Portal Configuration
• Tick (or untick) the box for Automatically send the pension letters to employees

Fig.1 - Global Setting for Pension Letter Automation (Classic User Interface)

Fig.2 - Global Setting for Pension Letter Automation (New User Interface)

Best practice: Fourth recommends consulting your Customer Success Manager or Bureau Payroll Specialist before enabling or disabling global settings.

Please Note: The original manual method of sending pension documents from the pension module remains available.

 

Pension Letter Automation

With the global setting enabled, pension documents that are ready to send will be automatically sent at 03:00 (am) each day.

Documents that will be sent can be viewed (in the same place as before) by going to:

• Pension Module > Pension Process > Send Out Documentation
• Ensure View Documents Already Sent is set to No

Fig.3 - Pension Module Send Out Documentation screen (Classic User Interface)

Fig.4 - Pension Module Send Out Documentation screen (New User Interface)

Please Note: Any documents due to be sent by post will still need to be processed manually and the PDF retrieved. If a personal email address is present in an employee's record but still defaulting to 'post', then review this article which gives guidance on how to update the employee to default to email.

Please Note: The pension documents will be generated using the normal event based triggers (such as automatic enrolment into a pension scheme). Nothing has changed in regards to how the pension module determines which document to send for which employee. 

 Warning: The automated procedure will not automatically send any pension letters that are six weeks older than the day the procedure runs. It has been designed this way to safeguard against sending any letters that have not been sent on purpose prior to this release. Please note that this will not create a backlog of letters to be sent.

 

Email Sent to the Employee with the Pension Letter

Previously when an employee received their email with the pension letter, it was attached as a PDF document. The email has been updated to provide a link instead because Pension documents will now generate dynamically using stored mail merge fields, rather than generating a static document that is stored separately. An example of the email can be seen below.

Fig.5 - Example email sent to an employee delivering their pension documentation

When the employee uses the link, a PDF version of their pension letter will then be downloaded.

 

View Documents Already Sent

To view documents that have been sent via the Pension module, go to: 

• Pension module > Pension Process > Send Out Documentation
• Ensure View Documents Already Sent is set to Yes

This will list documents that have been sent with an option to View them, whilst also detailing which employee, what letter, and how it was sent.

• To download a PDF copy of a document, select View

Fig.6 - Send Out Documentation > View Documents Already Sent (Classic User Interface)

Fig.7 - Send Out Documentation > View Documents Already Sent (Classic User Interface)

The ability to view an employee's document can still be accessed by going into their Employee Document Management screen within the Pension module. Please note it will state 'Unknown' with regard to file size as the document is no longer stored in a way that takes up server space.

 

Additional Resources

Advanced notification regarding Pension Letter changes
Default Pension Letters to Personal Email address
Sending Pension Letters Manually

 

NEST API

• Enabled by Default? - No
• Set up by customer Admin? - Yes
• Enable via Support ticket? - No
• Affects configuration or data? - Yes

What's Changing?

The ability to switch on the NEST API (for automatic transmission of NEST Starter and Contribution Files) has been added, as well as full visibility of submissions sent to NEST, including errors returned.

Reason for the Change

NEST has retired the method of transmitting files using SFTP and created an API to handle the transmission of files between payroll software and NEST. Integration of the NEST API will give users visibility of submissions without the need to log into NEST every time, reducing the amount of NEST admin required.

Customers Affected

All customers using the Pension module, specifically those who operate a NEST pension scheme.

Release Note Info/Steps

Contents: 

1. NEST API Global Setting
2. Warning Messages (when enabling the NEST API)
3. NEST API Validation for submissions
4. NEST API Submissions
5. NEST API File Resubmission
6. Additional Resources

NEST API Global Setting

The NEST API will not be enabled by default and will need to be switched on by a customer system administrator.

To switch on the NEST API, go to:

• Pension module > Administration > Global Settings > Edit Pension Provider Reporting
• Tick the box for Should the Pension Files be automatically sent to the Pension Provider (Yes/ No)
• Then tick Should the Pension Files be automatically sent to NEST via their API?
• Select Save

Note: When enabling the NEST API, warning messages may be displayed onscreen. See the Warning Messages section for details.

Fig.8 - NEST API Global Setting (Classic User Interface)

Fig.9 - NEST API Global Setting (New User Interface)

Best practice: Fourth recommends consulting your Customer Success Manager or Bureau Payroll Specialist before enabling or disabling global settings.

 

Warning Messages (when enabling the NEST API)

When enabling the NEST API, it is possible that one or several warning messages will be displayed warning the user that specific detail is missing from their NEST Pension Schemes.

The warning messages will not stop the NEST API from being enabled, but if a message gets displayed it means there is a problem that will stop the NEST submission from being successful.

The warning messages will be in relation to pension schemes with NEST in the Pension Provider field of the pension scheme. This can be NEST, Nest, or nest.

This information is required for the NEST API to work. Each message is displayed below, along with what is required:

 Several warning messages can be displayed at once, and could be a mixture of any of the below messages.

 

Pension Scheme Reference has 'EMP'. Only the reference numbers should be used

Fig.10 - NEST API 'EMP' in reference warning message

Payment Source is blank and/or Default Group Name is blank

Fig.11 - NEST API Default Group Name and/or Payment Source is Blank warning message

To rectify these warnings, go to: 

• Pension module > Administration > Pension Scheme
• Go into the relevant NEST Pension Scheme(s) (complete these steps for all active NEST schemes)
• Select Edit Pension Scheme
• Make the required changes and select Save

 Warning: Similarly to when files are manually uploaded, ensure the correct details are entered. Incorrect details run the risk of uploading employee details and contribution details to the incorrect group or payment source within the NEST account (if more than one group or payment source exists).

Pension Provider should only state Nest, nest or NEST

Fig.12- NEST API Pension Provider is not NEST, Nest or nest

 

This warning will display if 'Nest', 'nest' or 'NEST' are in the Pension Provider field within the pension scheme but also contains other characters. For example, it may state NEST Pension, in which case the 'Pension' part should be deleted.

To rectify this go to: 

• Pension Module > Administration > Pension Scheme
• Go into the relevant NEST Pension Scheme(s) (complete these steps for all active NEST schemes)
• Select Edit Pension Scheme
• Within the Pension Provider field, ensure it only states NEST, Nest or nest
• Select Save

Pension Diary has not been generated and/or Pension Diary is missing the contribution payment date

Fig.13 - NEST API Pension Diary not generated warning message

Both of these warnings will display if the pension diary for the pension scheme has not been generated. If the pension diary has been generated but the Pension Diary is missing the contribution payment date warning displays it means the pension diary has not been generated in full and requires attention. 

To rectify this go to:

• Pension Module > Administration > Pension Scheme
• Go into the relevant NEST Pension Scheme(s) (complete these steps for all active NEST schemes)
• Select Pension Diary
• To generate the dates, select the First Contribution Payment Date that needs to be paid
  • This will ensure that Contribution Payment Date is completed
  • The date entered for First Contribution Payment Date will continue monthly for the rest of the year
  • Please note: These should be reviewed and compared to the NEST contribution payment dates to ensure each contribution payment date matches for each period
• For How many Days Between Starter File And Sending Out Automatic Enrolment Information?:
  • The New Starter file will automatically generate 2 days after the payroll payment date
  • 'Automatic Enrolment Information' refers to the letters sent via email to employees once they have enrolled
• Enter a number for How Many Days Between Contribution File Date & Starter File Date?
• Enter a number for How Many Days From New Starter File to Start Opt-Out Period?
  • The opt-out start date commences the 30-day opt-out period. It should start when the employees will receive their enrolment notifications
• When all the data is entered, select Generate/Re-Generate Pension Diary

Best practice: If there is any doubt on how to generate a pension diary or what data should be entered to generate a pension diary, raise a support ticket or contact your Bureau Payroll Specialist.

 Warning: For payrolls that pay in arrears, the Pension Reference Period Start and Pension Reference Period End will differ from the pay period start and end. The Pension Reference Period Start and Pension Reference Period End should match the date range for each NEST Contribution Schedule (in NEST).

The NEST API will use these dates to identify which schedule to add information to. If previously the pay period start and end have been used to identify which schedule to upload contributions to (manually), then consider changing which period is uploaded to. In this situation, it is best to raise a support ticket or contact a bureau payroll specialist to seek advice.

Do not change Pension Reference Period dates, as this will effect pension assessments and calculations.

 

NEST API Validation for submissions

The information that is required to match between Fourth and NEST can be summarised as the following: 

• For Starter submissions and Contribution submissions, the Pension Scheme Reference (excluding the EMP) must match the EMP Reference from NEST
• For Starter submissions and Contribution submissions, the Payment Source must match the pension scheme in Fourth and the expected payment source in NEST
• For Starter submissions, the Default Group Name (including worker groups if used) must match between the pension scheme in Fourth and the expected group in NEST
• For Contribution submissions, the Pension Reference Period Start Date must match the Contribution schedule start date on NEST, for each relative schedule 
• For Contribution submissions, the Pension Reference Period End Date must match the Contribution schedule End date on NEST, for each relative schedule 
• For Contribution submissions, the Contribution Payment Date must match the Contribution schedule Payment Due Date on NEST, for each relative schedule 

NEST API Submissions

With the NEST API global setting switched on, to see submissions made to NEST via the API go to:

• Pension Module > Administration > Pension Scheme
• Select NEST API Submissions (Starters and Contributions)

This screen will display every submission made in the last 12 months unless Display all NEST api submission history (unchecked - show only past 12 months) is ticked - in which case it will display every single submission ever made.

For each submission, it will detail company, pay basis and pension scheme information as well as which type of file was sent and whether it was successful, partial (success) or failed.

• Selecting View under Submission Details will show all employees on each submission and additional details
• From here, any error messages can be read and the appropriate action taken

Fig.14 - NEST API Submissions screen

• SUCCESS - This means that the data has been sent to NEST and has been successful in full. In the NEST account, all of the data on the submission will have no errors and be processed in NEST

Fig.15 - Submission Details showing all employees on the file (Success File)

• PARTIAL - This means that the file hasn't been rejected by NEST but some employees on the file have been rejected and require attention

Fig.16 - Submission Details showing all employees on the file (Partial File)

• Failed - This means that the file has been rejected by NEST and the errors will need to be addressed

Fig.17 - Submission Details showing all employees on the file (Failed File)

Returning to the NEST API Submissions (Starters and Contributions) screen, if a submission is not made or is due to be sent these can be seen by selecting Display pending and recent unsent NEST api submissions.

Fig.18 - NEST API Pending/missed submissions screen

 

NEST API File Resubmission

If an error is corrected in Workforce Management or a reason occurs to resubmit an API Submission back to NEST, go to:

• Pension Module > Administration > Pension Scheme
• Select NEST API Submissions (Starters and Contributions)
• Go into the submission needing to be resubmitted
• Select Send File Again?

Fig.19 - NEST API submission resend function

 Warning: If payroll is rolled back in full (every employee) and the starter file or contribution send date (located in the pension diary) has passed, then the resubmit function will not be available to use. The file will still send if before the send date. If a payroll is partially rolled back (not every employee) the resubmission function will work as normal.

 

Additional Resources

Original NEST API Release Note (When previously only enabled via support ticket)

 

Payment and Deduction Export

• Enabled by Default? - Yes
• Set up by customer Admin? - No
• Enable via Support ticket? - No
• Affects configuration or data? - No

What's Changing?

A new export is available in the Payroll module that will display all payments and deductions from an employee's pay in a line-by-line format.

Reason for the Change

It was found that it would be beneficial to have an export available that detailed all payments and deductions (including tax and national insurance) for an employee available in one place.

Customers Affected

All customers using the Payroll module.

Release Note Info/Steps

To find and run the new export, go to: 

• Payroll Module > Reports > Exports
• Select the Payment and Deduction Export

• Complete the search criteria as required
  • Please note: When selecting Tax Year ensure that it is the correct tax year for the dates being entered for From and To Date
  • Please note: As per the note on screen, only search for a date range of 3 months maximum due to the amount of data being returned (one payment or deduction per row)
• Select Run export

Fig.20 - Payment and Deduction Export (Classic User Interface)

Fig.21 - Payment and Deduction Export (New User Interface)

The new export will return every pay and deduction element from an employee's payroll within the date range provided.

Fig.22 - Example of the Payment and Deduction Export