Submit Your Suggestions for Vista

This feature was added in 6.17

maybe it should be like the payroll push to AP only the opposite.  That it is entered in ap and then paid in payroll so then the batch is created in ap and the payment is paid in payroll that week.  again reporting would have to be written so that ap could see the dates and ck numbers that the payment was made on in payroll without seeing other secure information

Payroll has so many security issues with it and the ap and payroll people are different so I think having an option to pay through payroll OR AP might be the best scenario depending upon what companies need.  Reporting would be a huge factor in this so that AP people could still see what petty cash items were paid on paychecks.  The same with payroll, payroll personell would need to see what petty cash was paid in the AP module. 

AP / Payroll to reimburse employees,  address change and reimbursements is a big deal for us also.

Targeted for 6.17 - development on track

We set up a Job in JC called GL, and numbered the Phases to match the expense GL accounts.  We use the Phase Overrides in JC Dept. Master to direct expense reimbursements through Payroll > Job Cost > GL.

As Gary suggested, we use a specific Earnings Code just for reimbursements.

This does require a bit of setup, but once set up it works pretty slick.

Even though the Phase has different format than that of a GL code, because they can be entered without keying the ".", it works out.  Phase 62.507.00 = GL Account 6250.700

On that same note, one we put in as a company over a year ago in September 2016 (https://vistaerp.ideas.aha.io/ideas/PF-I-34) is the #1 overall vote getter and is in the same boat of "likely but not yet planned".

Keep the faith - this is currently the most highly requested Vista accounting suggestion.  We intend to add the feature, but have yet to target a specific release - stay tuned.

Admins, please review this suggestion and re-prioritize. It's been 321 days since this idea was first presented. There have been 17 comments all agreeing to the need of this and as of now, it's status is "Likely but not yet planned". Don't let us lose faith in this wonderful suggestion box tool!

I envision this as adding the AP Vendor field in PREH. Then whenever the payroll person put a vendor number in that field, Viewpoint then would know that that vendor should be updated whenever a change is made to an address field in Payroll. Payroll then has control over the address fields and doesn't need to also update AP.

I like having the reimbursement being paid in AP, so I would not change that, but i do have a problem with the address not being updated.  Everyone is right that major changes in Viewpoint's payroll would be needed for the reimbursement to be paid thru the payroll.

I'm not in Australia. But we currently process all employee expense reimbursements through A/P rather than payroll.  There are a number of reasons we do this:

1) We are a larger GC, and have more AP personnel/resources than we do for Payroll. There is a distinct line between those two roles for segregation of duties, confidentiality, etc.  Doing this through A/P makes more sense given our resources.

2) Our employees like have the ability for payroll payments to go to one bank account, and expense reimbursements to go to another. While I am guessing there is a way to do this in payroll, it probably wouldn't be nearly as easy as keeping them in the separate modules.

3) Reimbursing expenses is non-taxable, so you don't run the risk of messing up W-2s, 940s, and other important tax documents.

4) As previously mentioned, there is no way to record expenses to other GL codes or the proper phase codes in jobs. Using a "dummy" job sounds risky - I don't like anything on the WIP that isn't a true project.

5) Back to my first bullet, payroll doesn't know that much about specific phase codes and GL codes for expenses, while A/P doesn't know anything about payroll. Again - they are separate.

6) We utilize 3rd party software (Concur) for expense report management. That way, we can import automatically straight to AP Transaction Entry. While this may/may not be possible to import to payroll, this feel much riskier to me, as you have to make sure it is the right earning code, and also make sure taxes are not impacted.

Thanks

The issue we have with doing it through Payroll like Tim mentioned is GST and also for reporting purposes. Earning reports would be wrong as it's not really an earning as it's a reimbursement. It also makes reconciliation harder at the end of the financial year.

We use PR Register Totals to reconcile between PAYG Summaries and Payroll, but the more money that passes through PR that's not a true earning, the more time we need to spend on it.

We would like to do it through Payroll, but have issues as we cannot apply directly to GL accounts and have to setup earnings codes for everything, which is not realistic.

Having the vendor/employee link at a minimum for AP payment purposes would be valuable for us.

Your responses have been helpful in understanding why reimbursements through AP can be preferable to PR.  The inability to expense directly to a GL account is certainly valid - you would need to setup and post to a dummy job as a workaround this limitation. As for non-taxable, non  W-2 reportable earnings - just add an earnings code(s) specifically for expense reimbursement and exclude them from the basis of all your tax deductions and liabilities.

there are several reason employee reimbursements and petty cash are entered through AP rather than payroll.  First Payroll does not have the availability to charge general ledger accounts.  Payroll only earnings codes.  Second it would put a great burden on the payroll people to enter expenses as they are already trying to get time entered.   A simple link between the two, similar to HR and Payroll might be a better answer.  but it would only be for addresses and bank accounts possibly.  Our ap doesn't worry about address because all of our AP is EFT to our employees.

From our perspective, we have chosen to isolate any reimbursements to employees out of the PR process in order to eliminate any confusion on taxable items, W-2 reporting, etc.   I agree that adding an AP vendor for employee reimbursements means keeping that data (address, DD info, etc) updated in addition to PR fields.  It requires redundant input/update.  Gary, your comment suggests we can do reimbursements (non-taxable, non W-2 reportable money) through PR without affecting PR taxes, etc.  If that is your position, can you point us/me in the direction of how to best set that up to include that reimbursements with their weekly checks, but tie it to jobs/equipment/OH?  Thanks!

Gary - How would one do this in ViewPoint?

Our primary concern, is the employee addressed being updated in AP. They do get updated in Payroll, however they are never updated in AP. Some of the AP payments then get lost in the mail.
My “PR timecard report” checks that the address are both the same – every time it run. We just use it as a link between AP & PR. We are not concerned if the payments are actually paid in PR or AP.
I do not think we would change where they are paid from.

Gene

Excluding for a moment the Australian need to capture GST (I'll need more on this from Tim), it sounds as though many/most see Payroll as a viable, perhaps preferred means to reimburse employee expenses.  So, the obvious question is why aren't more of you using it that way?

Would love it to tie in their direct deposit info as well. We deposit per diem to employees as an AP check, which means each Employee has to be set up as a vendor, and their direct deposit information has to be kept updated in both places.