WFM UK | Payroll UK: BIK Module - Applying Benefits to Employees: Manual & Data Imports

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Overview

Applying benefits to employees is the point at which benefit configuration becomes live payroll data. Decisions made at this stage directly affect taxable pay calculations and deductions. This article acts as the central guidance point for applying benefits to employees within the BIK Module.

This article explains how to apply employee benefits manually on an individual basis and via data imports. Data imports can be used to efficiently apply all non-car and non-car fuel benefits in bulk, supporting consistent setup at scale. In addition, this article covers how employee car benefits can be added both manually and via data import. Car and car fuel benefits use a different data structure and processing logic, which is explained in detail within the relevant sections below.

Understanding both manual application and data import methods is essential. Regardless of how a benefit is added to the system, the same operational, payroll, and reporting rules apply once the data is in place.

Contents

• Applying Employee Benefits Manually (Excluding Car Benefit)
• Applying Employee Benefits via Data Imports (Excluding Car Benefit)
• Applying Employee Car and Car Fuel Benefit Manually
• Applying Employee Car and Car Fuel Benefit via Data Imports

Important: Review the individual benefit articles linked within this article before configuring benefits in the BIK Module, as some benefit types have prerequisites or mandatory configuration settings. These articles will also detail how the benefit value is attained and how the cash equivalent is calculated for taxation purposes.

Important: Before adding benefits to an employee record, either manually or via data imports, ensure that the benefit is created at company level first.

Important: Before adding benefits to an employee record, review the Calculated Examples and Payroll Scenarios article first which may include detail on applying a benefit in certain circumstances (E.g. New Starter or Leaver mid tax year).

Applying Employee Benefits Manually

Excluding Car & Car Fuel Benefit

To manually apply a benefit to an employee record, go to: 

• BIK > Employees > Employee List > find and select the Employee

This will open the employee's BIK Record.

• To apply a new benefit. select Add

• Select the required benefit under Benefit Name
  • The Benefit Name, shown at employee level, will be the chosen name when the benefit was configured at company level. It will not be the name as defined by HMRC
    • Configuring Company Benefits - Fig.3 - "Benefit Name"
• To see what HMRC Benefit Type & Event Type this benefit selection is, hover over the icon 

• Enter a Description if required or desired
  • Non-Mandatory
• Enter the Benefit Value
  • Mandatory
  • This must be entered as the full annual value of the benefit. Where a benefit does not operate over a date range, such as an asset transferred from an employee, the total benefit value should be used instead
  • If unknown, then review individual benefit type articles at the top of this article to ascertain how to achieve the benefit value
• Enter the Employee Contribution if the employee has made any contribution toward the benefit
  • Non-Mandatory, defaulted to £0.00
• Enter a Benefit Start date*
  • Mandatory
• Enter a Benefit Stop date if required*
  • Non-Mandatory

*Please Note: Start and stop dates are used to prorate the benefit value based on the number of days the benefit applies during the tax year. For example, where the annual benefit value is £365.00, and the start date is 6 April, the full cash equivalent of £365.00 is calculated. If the benefit starts on 6 April and ends on 31 December, the cash equivalent is pro-rated to £270.00, reflecting 270 days of benefit. 

• The Cash Equivalent field is read-only and displays the calculated amount that will be used for taxable purposes over the tax year
  • The fields affecting this calculation are the Employee Contributions, Benefit Start and Stop Benefit dates
• There is also a Tax Liability and NIC Liability column to detail what should be expected in Payroll with respect to either of those liabilities
  • None - Income Tax or National Insurance - No Liability due
  • Payrolled - Income Tax - Liability is due, and can be spread over the tax year
  • Immediate - Income Tax - Liability is due, and to be taken in full in the next available pay period
  • P11D(b) - National Insurance - Liability is due, Class 1A (employer only), via the P11D(b)
  • Immediate - National Insurance - Liability is due, Class 1 (Employer and Employee), and to be taken in full in the next available pay period
• Select Update:

The benefit will now be applied to the employee's BIK Record and applied to Payroll.

Please note: An employee benefit can be deleted, provided it has not been processed through payroll. If the benefit has already been included in a payroll run, a payroll rollback is required. Once payroll has been rolled back to the period in which the benefit was first applied, the benefit can then be deleted.

Applying Employee Benefits via Data Imports

Excluding Car & Car Fuel Benefit

To upload employee benefits via Data Imports, go to: 

• BIK > Administration > Data Imports
• Select Employee Benefit Upload Excl Car/Van
• Select Download CSV Template and open it in Microsoft Excel

The template will feature these column headers and require the following information with their respective validations (if any):

1. Employee Number - A mandatory field for the employee number of the employee for whom the benefit is being uploaded
   • The employee number must exist to be accepted
2. Benefit Name - A mandatory field for the name of the company Benefit Name, not the HMRC Benefit Type
   • It must be spelt exactly as the Benefit Name in the system.
   • Configuring Company Benefits - Fig.3 - "Benefit Name"
3. Description - A non-mandatory field where an additional name or description for this benefit for this employee can be added, if desired. 
4. Benefit Value - A mandatory field where the annual (total) value of the benefit is added
   • This must be numerical, limited to two decimal places
   • Can be entered as '0', or left blank (automatically applying as 0)
5. Employee Contribution - A non-mandatory field for the amount that the employee has contributed/paid towards this benefit. This will reduce the taxable liability on this benefit
   • If used, this must be numerical, limited to two decimal places
   • Can be entered as '0', or left blank (automatically applying as 0)
6. Start Date - A mandatory field for the start date of the benefit*. 
   • Use the DD/MM/YYYY format
7. Stop Date - A non-mandatory field for the stop date of the benefit*.
   • Use the DD/MM/YYYY format

*Please note: Start and stop dates are used to prorate the benefit value based on the number of days the benefit applies during the tax year. For example, where the annual benefit value is £365.00, and the start date is 6 April, the full cash equivalent of £365.00 is calculated. If the benefit starts on 6 April and ends on 31 December, the cash equivalent is pro-rated to £270.00, reflecting 270 days of benefit. 

• Complete the template with the required information and save it

• Return to BIK > Administration > Data Imports
• Select Upload Type as Employee Benefit Upload Excl Car/Van
• Load in the template saved earlier, and select an If Validation Errors Occur option:
  • Cancel Upload - even if just one error, the entire file will not upload and will be cancelled
  • Continue with Upload - all successful records in the template will load into the system and import the data, whilst all unsuccessful ones will not
    • If selecting this option, when importing data, be sure not to re-include successful rows
• Select Upload

If successful, the page will inform the user.

If entirely unsuccessful or partially successful, the page will also inform the user, detailing the reasons.

• Correct any erroneous data and reattempt the upload
  • If Continue With Upload was selected, successful records will be imported. When re-completing the upload, exclude successful records
  • If Cancel Upload was selected, no records will be processed, and all records, including successful ones, should be included in the re-completed upload
• Return to BIK > Employees > Employee List > find and select the Employee

The imported benefit(s) will be visible:

Please note: An employee benefit can be deleted provided it has not been processed through payroll. If the benefit has already been included in a payroll run, a payroll rollback is required. Once payroll has been rolled back to the period in which the benefit was first applied, the benefit can then be deleted.

Applying Employee Car and Car Fuel Benefit Manually

Car & Car Fuel Benefit only

To manually apply a benefit to an employee record, go to: 

• BIK > Employees > Employee List > find and select the Employee

This will open the employee's BIK Record.

• To apply a new benefit. select Add

• Select the required benefit under Benefit Name, ensuring the configured Car & Car Fuel Benefit type is selected
  • The Benefit Name, shown at employee level, will be the chosen name when the benefit was configured at company level. It will not be the name as defined by HMRC
    • Configuring Company Benefits - Fig.3 - "Benefit Name"

To see what HMRC Benefit Type & Event Type this benefit selection is, hover over the icon 

Please note: With Fig.12 above, when selecting a Car and Car Fuel benefit type, there is significantly more information that is required compared to any other benefit type. This is broken down further, with more information, in the Cars and Car Fuel article.

• Enter a Description if required or desired
  • Non-Mandatory
• The Benefit Value is a read-only field calculated based on the total individual values of the vehicles assigned to the benefit (continued below)
  • This is the total of the Car benefit value:
    • (BIK Rate x (List Price + Accessories Price - Capital Contributions) + Car Fuel benefit value)
• The Employee Contribution is read-only and calculated based on the total individual employee contributions towards private use of each of the vehicles assigned to the benefit (continued below)
• The Cash Equivalent field is read-only and calculated based on the total individual cash equivalents for each of the vehicles assigned to the benefit and the Car Fuel benefit cash equivalent (continued below)
• There is also a Tax Liability and NIC Liability column to detail what should be expected in Payroll in respect to either of those liabilities.
  • None - Income Tax or National Insurance - No Liability due
  • Payrolled - Income Tax - Liability is due, and can be spread over the tax year
  • Immediate - Income Tax - Liability is due, and to be taken in full in the next available pay period,
  • P11D(b) - National Insurance - Liability is due, Class 1A (employer only), via the P11D(b)
  • Immediate - National Insurance - Liability is due, Class 1 (Employer and Employee), and to be taken in full in the next available pay period,
• The Benefit Start date is read-only for the Car benefit and is the start date of the first vehicle assigned to the benefit
• The Stop Benefit date is read-only for the Car benefit and is the end date of the last vehicle assigned to the benefit

• Select Add Vehicle to select and assign a Vehicle to this employee's Car and Car Fuel Benefit:
  • There is a search function available when selecting a vehicle to help navigate through a potentially long list of vehicles. The vehicles will display in this list as Vehicle Model + Registration Number
• Select a vehicle from the list
  • Mandatory
  • If a Vehicle is not available, then this means the vehicle is currently assigned to another employee or has been made inactive in Vehicle Management.

• By default, the benefit will be selected with Private Use
  • Mandatory selection, either ticked or unticked
  • This can be deselected if the employee will not have this car for private use, and if so, there is no benefit in kind applicable, and the calculated cash equivalent will become £0.00. Proceeding with creating this benefit record without private use ticked will still allow the car to be assigned to an employee for recording purposes, but will not attract any taxable amounts to the employee
• The BIK Rate field is a read-only field that is calculated based on the information provided when the car was configured in Vehicle Management. The rates themselves can be found in the Benefit Statutory Information page
• The List Price and Accessories Price are also read-only fields with data taken from when the car was configured in Vehicle Management
• Next, enter any Capital Contributions the employee provided toward the purchase of this vehicle
  • Mandatory
  • Defaulted to £0.00
  • Capped at £5000.00, complying with Car benefit rules
  • Up to two decimal places
• Next, enter any Employee Contributions made towards the private use of this vehicle
  • Mandatory
  • Defaulted to £0.00
  • Up to two decimal places
• The Cash Equivalent field is read-only, displaying the calculated amount that will be used for taxable purposes over the tax year.=
  • This calculation is explained further in the Cars and Car Fuel article
  • The fields affecting this calculation are the BIK Rate, List Price, Accessories Price, Capital Contributions, Employee Contributions (above) and the Days with Car field (below), which itself is determined by the Date Available From date and Date Available To date (also below)
• Enter the Date Available From, the day the employee was provided the car
  • Mandatory
• To stop the car benefit, select Stop Car, and it will prompt the user to enter a stop date
  • Non-Mandatory
• The Days With Car field is the number of days between (and including) the Date Available From date and Date Available To date, where if blank the Date Available To is assumed as the 5th April in the tax year
• Select Save when the required information has been entered

The final field is Add Fuel, allowing users to apply Car Fuel benefit to this Car Benefit record 

• Select Add Fuel to enable company car fuel, or "free fuel" benefit
• This calculation is explained further in the Car and Car Fuel article
• This will present four further fields:
  • Cash Equivalent field is read-only, presenting the cash equivalent of the Car Fuel, which will also be added to the total cash equivalent for the benefit itself
  • Days With Fuel field is read-only, presenting the number of days the employee has with free fuel
  • Stop Fuel will allow users to enter a stop date if the free fuel is withdrawn by the employer
  • The Make Good button will allow users to confirm if Car Fuel was made good in full, or not at all. If made good, then the cash equivalent will go to £0.00

Please note: Users may have to save the benefit record after applying free fuel and return to the record, selecting Edit Fuel, to see it update. This is due to the benefit and vehicle data needing to be committed to the database before the Car Fuel calculation can take place.

Please note: An employee's Car & Car Fuel benefit can be deleted provided it has not been processed through payroll. If the benefit has already been included in a payroll run, a payroll rollback is required. Once payroll has been rolled back to the period in which the benefit was first applied, the benefit can then be deleted. Deleting a Car Benefit record will unassign the vehicle, allowing it to be selected once again. 

Applying Employee Car and Car Fuel Benefit via Data Imports

Car & Car Fuel Benefit Only

To upload employee Car & Car Fuel benefits via Data Imports, go to: 

• BIK > Administration > Data Imports
• Select Employee Car & Car Fuel Benefit Upload
• Select Download CSV Template and open it in Microsoft Excel

The template will feature these column headers and require the following information with their respective validations (if any):

1. Employee Number - A mandatory field for the employee number of the employee for whom the benefit is being uploaded
   • The employee number must exist to be accepted
2. Benefit Name - A mandatory field for the name of the company Benefit Name, not the HMRC Benefit Type
   • It must be spelt exactly as the Benefit Name in the system.
   • Configuring Company Benefits - Fig.3 - "Benefit Name"
3. Description - A non-mandatory field where an additional name or description for this benefit for this employee can be added, if desired
4. Car Selection - A mandatory field where a user can enter the registration number of the vehicle that should be applied to the car benefit. 
   • The vehicle must exist in Vehicle Management, and the registration number must match exactly
   • The vehicle must not be assigned to any other employee with conflicting dates within Date Available From and Date Available To
   • There can be no more than one row in the upload with this registration number
5. Private Use - A mandatory field where Yes ticks 'Private Use', or No unticks 'Private Use'
   • Yes (Ticked) - A value in Capital Contributions and Employees Contributions will be required (below), as well as a Date Available From date. This will make Company Car and Car Fuel a benefit in kind, the cash equivalent calculated which means income tax liability arises.
   • No (Unticked) - Only a value in Date Available From will be required, and no cash equivalent will be calculated because no benefit in kind arises, thus no income tax liability. Entering a value in Capital Contributions, Employee Contributions, Car Fuel, Car Fuel Stop Date and/or Car Fuel Made Good will result in an error, as these are not required
6. Capital Contributions - Only a mandatory field if Private Use is Yes (ticked), which will allow an amount the employee contributed toward the purchase of this vehicle to be entered
   • Value required, up to two decimal places
   • Zero (0) is an accepted value
   • No negative values
   • Capped at £5000.00
   • Leave blank if Private Use is No (unticked)
7. Employee Contributions - Only a mandatory field if Private Use is Yes (ticked), which will allow an amount the employee contributed towards the private use of the vehicle to be entered
   • Value required, up to two decimal places
   • Zero (0) is an accepted value
   • No negative values
   • Leave blank if Private Use is No (unticked)
8. Date Available From* - A mandatory field where the date the vehicle was provided to the employee is to be entered
   • Use the DD/MM/YYYY format
9. Date Available To* - A non-mandatory field where the date the vehicle was taken off the employee is entered
   • Use the DD/MM/YYYY format
   • If left blank, then 5th April of the tax year is assumed

*Please note: Start and stop dates are used to prorate the benefit value based on the number of days the benefit applies during the tax year. For example, where the annual benefit value is £365.00, and the start date is 6 April, the full cash equivalent of £365.00 is calculated. If the benefit starts on 6 April and ends on 31 December, the cash equivalent is prorated to £270.00, reflecting 270 days of benefit.

10. Car Fuel - Only a mandatory field if Private Use is Yes (ticked), which will allow users to indicate if the employee has Car Fuel benefit with their Car benefit. This will increase the taxable amount due on the benefit by the amount of the calculated Car Fuel benefit
    • Yes or No value only
11. Car Fuel Stop Date - A non-mandatory field where the date the employer withdrew free fuel from the employee is entered
    • Use the DD/MM/YYYY format
    • Can be left blank
12. Car Fuel Made Good - A non-mandatory field to indicate if the employee has made good on their entire free fuel benefit, or not
    • Yes or No value only
    • Yes will indicate the free fuel was made good by the employee, and no income tax liability will be due
    • No will indicate the free fuel was not made good by the employee, so income tax liability will be due

• Complete the template with the required information and save it

• Return to BIK Module > Administration > Data Imports
• Select Upload Type as Employee Car & Car Fuel Benefit Upload
• Load in the template saved earlier, and select an If Validation Errors Occur option:
  • Cancel Upload - even if just one error, the entire file will not upload and will be cancelled
  • Continue with Upload - all successful records in the template will load into the system and import the data, whilst all unsuccessful ones will not
    • If selecting this option, when importing data, be sure not to re-include successful rows
• Select Upload

If successful, the page will inform the user:

If entirely unsuccessful, or partially successful, the page will also inform the user detailing the reasons:

• Correct any erroneous data and reattempt the upload
  • If Continue With Upload was selected, successful records will be imported. When re-completing the upload, exclude successful records
  • If Cancel Upload was selected, no records will be processed, and all records, including successful ones, should be included in the re-completed upload
• Return to BIK > Employees > Employee List > find and select the Employee 

The imported benefit(s) will be visible:

Please note: An employee Car & Car Fuel benefit can be deleted provided it has not been processed through payroll. If the benefit has already been included in a payroll run, a payroll rollback is required. Once payroll has been rolled back to the period in which the benefit was first applied, the benefit can then be deleted.

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