Process Statutory Sick Pay

From January 2023, employees are entitled to up to 3 paid days of sick leave under the scheme. You can find out more in our handy Statutory sick pay - general information guide.

You can process this in three simple steps, let's take a look.

NOTE: You can process your own company sick pay scheme instead of SSP, as long as it provides at least the same level, or greater, pay to SSP.

Before you start

Ensure the employee has a start date entered in their record, to allow Sage Payroll to check their eligibility. Employees are only eligible for SSP when they've worked for the company for the previous 13 weeks (91 days). To check or enter this:

1. Click Processing, then click Employee Details and open the record of the employee you need to process SSP for.
    TIP: If you use profiles, you must edit the employee profile to include the new SSP payment. 
2. In the Personnel tab, under the Salary section, ensure the correct date is entered in Start Date, then Save the record if you've made changes.
3. Close the record.

Process statutory sick pay

1. Set up the payment

 TIP: As with any new payment, you can use our handy Set up a new payment guide to check the current tax settings applicable to this payment type.  

1. On the menu bar, click Company/Payroll then click Payments.
2. Click New.
3. Enter the name of the payment in the Title field, e.g. Sick Pay.
4. Select Statutory Sick Pay in the Type field.
5. Ensure the Deduct, PRSI, Pension, and SSP Percentage settings are the same as above.
6. Click Save then click Close.

2. Set Default SSP Payment

1. Click Company/Payroll, then click Company Details.
2. Click the BIK/SSP tab and drop in the payment into the Set Default SSP Payment field.
3. Click OK.

3. Set up a rate in Employee Details

You need to calculate and enter your employee's normal daily rate of pay when you process their SSP. For guidance on this calculation, you can refer to OPWs guide.

To do this, open the employee's record, then in the Absence tab, enter the SSP Daily Rate. This is your employee's normal daily rate of pay. Your software automatically calculates the SSP due per day using this value.
 TIP: You can also track SSP days taken and remaining in this window.

4. Record SSP on the Timesheet

1. When you process the employee's timesheet, you can then enter how many days SSP the employee has taken in the Days taken this period field.
   NOTE: When you process SSP you must manually reduce your employee's normal payment to account for any days which weren't worked.
2. The software will then calculate the amount of SSP due in the period and include it as a payment on their payslip.

That's it, you've now processed SSP for the employee.

How it's calculated

The employee is paid statutory sick leave of 70% of normal wages, up to a maximum €110 per day.

Daily rate x Days taken this period x 0.70. 

If the amount calculated is greater than €110 then it is capped at €110.

Errors and warnings that may show

"SSP days taken exceeds entitlement (error)" - The employee has exceeded the entitlement of 3 statutory sick leave days in 2023."

"SSP days taken exceeds entitlement (error)" - The employee has exceeded the entitlement of 5 statutory sick leave days in 2024."

"No SSP Payment set up" - You need to set up a statutory sick pay payment to use. Follow the steps in the Set up the payment section above to do this."

"SSP capped at €110 per day" - An amount greater than the maximum €110 per day has been entered."

No SSP calculating

If you've entered amounts in data entry only, SSP won't calculate as the daily rate and the days taken this period need to be entered in the Absence tab to get the correct calculation. Follow the steps in the Process statutory sick pay section above to do this.

Correct SSP

If you've paid SSP by mistake, use our Correct SSP paid in error guide to correct it.