Employees
Add and manage your workforce — personal details, pay structure, rates, and per-employee overrides.
The Employee List
The list shows all active employees with their department, pay type, and effective rate for the pay period. You can filter by department, search by name or employee number, and sort by any column.
The rate column shows a calculated period total, not just the raw hourly figure:
- Hourly / Casual → rate per hour
- Daily → hourly rate × 8 hours
- Weekly → hourly rate × (work days × 8)
- Bi-weekly → hourly rate × (work days × 8 × 2)
- Monthly → hourly rate × (work days × 52 ÷ 12 × 8) — the SA standard
- Monthly Fixed → the fixed monthly salary
- Piece Work → shown as "Piece Work" — no fixed rate
If an employee has no personal rate set, the company default from Settings is used for the display.
Adding a New Employee
- Click Add New Employee at the top of the list.
- Enter the employee's first name, last name, and employee number. If you leave the number blank, one is generated automatically.
- Assign a department. This determines the employee's default shift times, work-week length, and pay period.
- Choose a Pay Type. See the table on the Overview page for guidance.
- Enter the appropriate rate. For all time-based types (hourly, daily, weekly, etc.) this is an hourly rate. For Monthly Fixed it is the full monthly salary.
- Set Saturday, Sunday, holiday, and overtime rates if they differ from the standard hourly rate. Leave at 0 to inherit the company defaults.
- Optionally upload up to three photos, set a PIN, and add notes.
- Click Save Employee.
If an employee earns a fixed daily wage (e.g. R200/day), enter their hourly equivalent: divide by 8 and enter that value (R25.00/hr). This ensures that short-day deductions and overtime are calculated correctly per half-hour. The employee list will then display R200.00/day as expected.
Pay Types in Detail
Hourly, Daily, Weekly, Bi-weekly, Monthly, Casual
All of these use the same calculation engine: hours clocked × hourly rate. The difference is only the length of the pay period and how payslips are generated (automatic batch vs. on-demand). Clockings during the period are totalled and multiplied by the applicable rates (weekday, Saturday, Sunday, holiday).
Monthly Fixed
The employee receives a fixed salary every month regardless of the hours they clock. Clockings are still required for legal compliance (South African BCEA). If a day is unaccounted for — no clocking and no absence record — the payslip for that month cannot be generated until the gap is resolved on the Absent Days page.
Piece Work
Earnings are entered manually per day in the Piece Work Log. No rate is stored on the employee record. Payslips are generated on demand once entries are ready.
Bi-weekly Period Start Days
Bi-weekly employees are paid twice a month. Two period start days are configured — Period 1 (e.g. the 1st) and Period 2 (e.g. the 16th). These can be set globally in Settings, overridden at department level, and then overridden again per employee. The most specific setting wins.
Leave the per-employee bi-weekly fields empty unless this employee genuinely has different period dates from their department. When left empty, the department setting is used — and if the department has no value set, the global default from Settings applies.
Editing an Employee
Click Edit on any employee in the list. All fields can be changed at any time. Changing the pay type or rate takes effect on the next payslip generated — it does not retroactively alter existing payslips.
Deactivating an Employee
Employees cannot be permanently deleted if they have clocking or payslip records — this protects your historical data. Instead, use the Deactivate button. Deactivated employees are hidden from lists and excluded from payslip generation, but their records remain intact.
Never deactivate an employee mid-pay-period if you still need to generate a payslip for them. Generate the payslip first, then deactivate.
Pay Components per Employee
The lower section of the employee edit page allows you to assign individual Pay Components — for example, a specific travel allowance or medical deduction that applies only to this person. Employee-level components override department-level components of the same type.
ID Badges
Once employees have photos on their records, you can generate printed ID badges directly from the Employees page. Select the employees you want badges for using the checkboxes in the list, then click Download Badges PDF. A PDF is generated with one badge per employee, formatted for printing and cutting. Each badge shows the employee's photo, name, employee number, and department. The badge layout uses your company logo and brand colour from Settings.
For best results, use the same photo angle across all employees — a straight front-on shot at consistent size prints cleanly. The employee record supports up to three photos (front-on, slight left, slight right), but the badge uses the primary front-on photo.
Tax Exemptions
Each employee has two tax exemption toggles on their record:
- Exempt from PAYE — no income tax will be calculated or deducted from this employee's payslips.
- Exempt from UIF — no UIF contribution will be calculated for this employee.
These are typically used for foreign nationals who have no South African tax obligations and do not contribute to the South African UIF fund. When either box is ticked, it overrides the global PAYE/UIF toggle in Settings — so even if PAYE is enabled system-wide, the individual employee will not have it deducted.
Consent & Privacy
If your company collects biometric data (face recognition for the iOS app), you must record the employee's consent. Tick the Consent Given checkbox on the employee form — the system records the date and time automatically. This is required for POPIA compliance.