The Payroll audit trail
Description

If you have a number of people operating the payroll, this can be very useful to help you identify which user made a particular change.

To make it even easier you can print the payroll audit trail. The report contains the following information:

  • The employee that's been changed.
  • The option that's been changed, for example, PRSI code, tax/USC status.
  • The option's value before and after the change occurs.
  • The date and time a change occurs.
  • The name of the user that made the change.
Cause
Resolution

Audit Retention - View or amend the payroll audit trail settings

To help prevent any performance issues in your software, it's important to keep the payroll audit trail files to a manageable size. To do this:

  1. On the menu bar, click Company/Payroll then click Company Details.
  2. Click the Misc tab.
  3. In the Audit Retention box, enter the number of pay periods you want to keep the audit details for.
    Recommended setting for audit retention
    Don't set this value to zero, as this holds all audit information within the software and never clears down. As the audit files grow in size over time, Sage Payroll's performance may become sluggish and the size of your payroll backup files greatly increase.
  4. To save the audit retention setting, click OK.

Preview the payroll audit report

  1. On the menu bar, click Reports then click Payroll Reports.
  2. Select Payroll Audit.
  3. If you want to view audit information for specific dates, under Selection, enter the date range in the From and To boxes.
    If you've recently cleared down the audit files, the audit report only shows data since the last clear down. If you want to view information prior to the audit clear down, you can restore a backup to revert back to a previous period.
  4. In the List box, select the area of your payroll you wish to report on.
  5. Click Preview.
  6. When prompted Delete these Audit Details, click either Yes or No.
    If you click Yes, the payroll audit files clear down automatically and you won't be able to view this information again without restoring a backup.
    If you click No, the audit files remain until the audit retention period is set and the clear down occurs.
  7. To close the Payroll Reports window, click Cancel.

Preview the employee audit report

  1. On the menu bar, click Reports then click Employee Reports.
  2. Select Employee Audit.
  3. If you want to view audit information for specific dates, under Selection, enter the date range in the From and To boxes.
    If you've recently cleared down the audit files, the audit report only shows data since the last clear down. If you want to view information prior to the audit clear down, you can restore a backup to revert back to a previous period.
  4. In the List box, select the area of your payroll you wish to report on.
  5. Click Preview.
  6. When prompted Delete these Audit Details, click either Yes or No.
    If you click Yes, the payroll audit files clear down automatically and you won't be able to view this information again without restoring a backup.
    If you click No, the audit files remain until the audit retention period is set and the clear down occurs.
  7. To close the Payroll Reports window, click Cancel.

Clear down the payroll audit trail

Method 1 - Clearing down the audit files through Sage Payroll reports

  1. On the menu bar, click Reports then click Payroll Reports.
  2. Select Payroll Audit.
  3. Click Preview, then click Close.
    When prompted Delete these Audit Details, click Yes.
  4. Enter the administrator password.
  5. Click Delete Audit Files.
  6. To close the Payroll Reports window, click Cancel.

Method 2 - Clearing down the audit files through Windows Explorer

If your payroll audit files are too large to clear down within Sage Payroll, you must replace the existing audit files with a clean set. To do this, you must create a dummy company and copy the blank audit files from this company payroll in to your existing company payroll.

  1. Open Sage Payroll and log in as the system administrator.
  2. On the menu bar, click Company then click Company Setup.
  3. Click Add New Payroll then enter the following information:
    Payroll ID Type BLANK.
    Licence Name Select your company's name.
    Password Leave this option blank.
    Frequency Select a pay frequency. You don't need to select the same frequency as the payroll with the problematic audit files.
  4. Click Create, then click Close.
  5. On the menu bar, click Help then click System Information.
  6. Click the Data Directory link.
  7. Open the folder, BLANK.
  8. Browse and locate the following files, PAYAUDIT.CDX and PAYAUDIT.DBF.
  9. To take a copy of both files at the same time, hold down the CTRL button on your keyboard and left-click on each of the files. Then right-click your mouse and click Copy.
  10. Browse to and open the company payroll folder that you want to replace the PAYAUDIT files for. Then right-click your mouse and click Paste.
  11. When prompted, click Copy and Replace.
  12. To close out of Windows Explorer, click on the X button at the top right-hand side of the window.
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