Understanding Payroll Cycles

Virtual TimeClock is pretty flexible when it comes to defining payroll cycles. You can set your payroll frequency (how often you get paid) to weekly, biweekly, semi-monthly, or monthly. This covers the payroll needs for most businesses. Once you pick a frequency and set the current payroll period start date, the end date will be automatically calculated for you. All you have to do is close the period and the current payroll period dates will advance based on the frequency you've set.

It's easy to confuse your payroll frequency with your pay dates. For example, here at Redcort Software our payroll frequency is semi-monthly. The first period runs from the 1st to the 15th and the second period runs from the 16th to the end of the month. However, we get paid on the 5th and the 20th of each month. Every time we close a payroll period, the time clock software knows exactly what dates to move the current period to.

For whatever reason, you may find your business needs a custom payroll cycle. That's no problem with Virtual TimeClock because you can set a user defined payroll period.

There are a couple of drawbacks to using the user defined payroll frequency. First, when you close the payroll period, Virtual TimeClock won't know what dates to advance the current period to, so you'll have to manually change the current period start and end dates. Second, when running timecard reports, the 'Last Period' date range selection won't automatically populate because the time clock doesn't have a static frequency from which to calculate the prior period dates.

Jeff
Technical Support Team
Redcort Software, Inc.