Paying people is the job you can't get wrong. stub keeps it to a check: set up payroll once, add the people you pay, and every pay day starts with a draft payslip for each of them — tax, UIF and leave already worked out — waiting for you to look over and complete.
Payroll is being rolled out business by business. If you can see Employees in the sidebar, you have it. On a cheaper plan than Growing Business, stub shows you what upgrading gets you when you open it.
1. Set up payroll
Go to Employees in the sidebar and click Set up payroll. You can also start from Settings → Finance → Payroll → Enable. stub walks you through it one step at a time:
- Tax numbers — your employer registration numbers. In South Africa these are your PAYE number, UIF number and, if you pay the skills levy, your SDL number. Add the ones you have; the rest can wait.
- Filing — how your payroll is taxed and filed, where your country asks.
- Leave — the leave your team gets by law, filled in for you. Change any of it to match what you offer.
- Payslip extras — anything some of your team get on top of their pay, like a travel allowance or medical aid. You set each person's amounts later.
- Pay schedule — how often you pay and on which day.
Click Enable. stub sets up your leave, a payslip template and your pay schedule, and creates the pay run for the current period.
You don't add tax lines yourself. In South Africa, PAYE, UIF and SDL are worked out on every payslip for you.
2. Add your employees
On Employees, click Employee. Only Name is required, but a payslip needs pay:
- Pay — what they earn before tax, and Per year, month, week, day or hour.
- Hours a week or Days a week — their usual week.
- Start date — pay runs include them from this day.
Click + to add their employee number, role, department, ID number, tax number or date of birth. Their age changes how their tax is worked out, so it's worth adding.
If a pay run is already open for this period, stub offers to Add payslip for them straight away. Bringing a whole team across? Use ··· → Import.
To change what someone is paid, open them and click their Pay card. Click any line to set it for that person: a fixed Amount, a Rate, or Off to leave it off their payslips. For PAYE you can also record a Tax directive.
3. Choose when you pay
A pay schedule creates each pay run for you. Set it up during setup, or from Settings → Finance → Payroll → Pay schedule:
- Pay cycle — Monthly, Twice a month, Fortnightly or Weekly.
- Pay day — a day of the month (or the last day) for monthly pay, or a weekday for weekly and fortnightly. Twice a month pays on the 15th and the last day.
- Employees — everyone, or only some of your team.
Under Advanced you choose whether each run starts with a draft payslip for everyone, and whether it completes on pay day by itself.
4. Run payroll
Each run is one pay day: a payslip for everyone you pay. Your schedule creates it, or click Pay run to make one yourself and set the Pay period and Pay date.
Fill it. Click Add everyone to give everyone employed in the period a draft payslip from their usual pay, or + Employee to pick people. stub tells you if someone has no pay set up or isn't employed in that period.
Check each payslip. Open one to see its income, deductions, contributions and net pay. On a draft you can add a line — a bonus, overtime, a one-off deduction — or change an amount. Tax lines are worked out for you and can't be edited by hand.
Complete it. Set the run to Completed. stub asks whether to also:
- Email payslips to employees — each gets their payslip as a PDF.
- Create tax returns — the returns this run feeds, ready in Reports.
Completing records the pay in your books as money you owe your team and the tax authority. It doesn't pay anyone. You still pay your team from your bank yourself. The run's Payments view lists what each person is owed.
Or let it complete itself. The pay-day card on the run shows Completes on and the date when the run will complete by itself on pay day. Click it to change the pay date or switch this off, in which case it reads You complete it yourself.
A run is Draft, Partly completed when only some payslips are done, or Completed. To fix a completed run, set it back to Draft. Reopen takes its payslips back out of your books so you can edit them.
5. Payslips
- Download — on a payslip, click ··· → Download for the PDF. A draft is marked as one.
- Send — on a completed payslip, ··· → Send emails it to the employee. If they have no email address, add one to their details first.
- Accounting — on a completed payslip, opens the journal entry it made in your books.
To act on several at once, tick them in the run and choose Complete, Reopen, Send or Delete.
6. Leave
Your leave types live under Settings → Finance → Payroll → Leave. For each one you set how many Days someone gets, whether it's Paid, whether it's earned a little each month or all at once, at the start, and what happens to unused days: carry them over, carry some over, or lose them.
To record leave, open the employee and click + Leave. Pick the dates. stub counts the weekdays for you; adjust the count for public holidays or half days. Then choose Save & approve. Their balance shows what's available, pending and left after the request.
Approved leave appears on their next payslip with their remaining balance. To set someone's starting balance, add an Opening balance entry on their leave.
7. Payroll returns
When you complete a run with Create tax returns ticked, stub prepares the returns it feeds and shows you which ones are ready. In South Africa that's the monthly EMP201, the EMP501 reconciliation and your employees' IRP5 certificates. Each one lands in Reports under Payroll, and on the Returns tile on Insights, badged Due, Overdue or Filed. For your company's own tax, see Set up Income Tax.
Tip: Turn on Completes on pay day only once you've checked a run or two by hand. After that, pay day takes care of itself.