Processing Order
Processing order specifies how the system counts accumulated hour types. The default order is chronological. Use processing order rules to change the processing order of hour types to comply with union regulations or to implement overtime policies.
The most common use of the processing order rule is to modify the order in which hours are counted so that they are paid as overtime.
Select Administration > Application Setup > Pay Policies > Pay Rule Building Blocks > Processing Order and use the following information to configure processing order.
- Total Chronologically — The list of hour type names and categories available for the processing of accumulated hours in chronological order.
- Total First (in order) — The hour types to be processed first. If there is more than one, the first is processed before the second, and so on.
- Hour types that help employees reach overtime limits can belong in this column. For example, if a holiday occurs at the end of the week, move the holiday hour type to the Total First column. Holiday hours are processed first and help employees reach overtime limits.
- Total Last (in order) — The hour types to be processed last. For example, if you moved daily overtime hours to the Total Last column, you can prevent daily overtime hours from counting toward weekly overtime. You can also total or process “non-home” labor category transfers last. That procedure ensures that the system allocates overtime hours to the department to which the person was “loaned” rather than to the “home” department.
Note: Use the Counts Toward Overtime tab in Overtime rules to select the worked times in a combination rule that count toward overtime. Optionally, use Advanced Settings to select how to count worked times that occur simultaneously. Preprocessing can be used instead of a Processing Order rule to ensure that overtime is accurately counted.
This example shows how to use the Advanced Settings in Counts Toward Overtime with a Processing Order rule to achieve the correct count of work time.
Use Advanced Settings to specify the type of overtime to count in an “overflow” situation, when one of the worked times includes a schedule deviation. Schedule deviation is related to the employee schedule.
In this example. any time worked that is greater than two hours at time and a half counts towards overtime. The type worked time that contributes to the two hours does not matter. Worked time can include zones, weekly or daily overtime types, or schedule deviations.
If the schedule deviation occurs before the regular hours (for example, the scheduled shift begins at 8:00AM but the actual worked time begins at 6:00AM), establish a processing order for the various types of overtime that occur.
The processing order is set in Pay Rules Building Blocks > Processing Order. For this example, the processing order specifies that Schedule Deviation worked hours are totaled for overtime after other types of regular time and overtime have been totaled. The rate at which the Schedule Deviation time is paid is specified on the Schedule Deviation page.
Worked Time | Counts Toward Overtime | Overtime | Advanced Settings |
---|---|---|---|
Regular |
No |
|
|
Over 38 |
Yes |
Over 2 |
The default, “Count if at least one worked time counts toward overtime,” is selected. This is in effect because Over 8 is counted for daily overtime |
Schedule Deviation |
Yes |
|
|
Over 8 |
Yes |
|
|
This configuration means that Regular time does not apply towards overtime. Over 8 is a daily type. Over 38 is a weekly type. Over 8 is not paid if another type has precedence (the type has been set in the combination rule configuration). Over 38 is the overtime that is used to calculate the wages for the time span 3-5 PM. Over 2 begins a new type of overtime that also caps Over 38. Over 2 is in effect from 5-7PM. Over 38 ends when Over 2 begins at another rate.
The Schedule Deviation rate occurs from 6-8 AM and again at 5PM on Friday for a total of three hours. If the Schedule Deviation rate, time and a half, is counted beginning at 6:00AM, the system would incorrectly calculate the entire day at the Schedule Deviation rate.
A processing order instructs the system to ignore the first two-hour span of Schedule Deviation, and begin paying at regular time through 38 hours (2PM). Move to Over 2 at 4PM and then calculate all three hours (6-8AM and 4-5PM) as Schedule Deviation. (The hour 4-5 is Schedule Deviation because it occurs outside the known schedule of 8-4 for the day.)
The example has the following spans on Friday:
Schedule |
Regular |
Over 2 |
Schedule Deviation |
|
6A |
8A |
2P |
4P |
5P |
Because Regular time does not count toward Over 2, the Advanced Settings default selection for Over 2 is “Count if at least one worked time counts toward overtime.” Because Over 8 and Over 38 both count toward Over 2, the system counts the span of time from 2 pm to 4 pm as Over 2.
If the Advanced Settings selection was the non-default, “Count only if all worked time is applied toward overtime,” Over 8 and Over 2 would count. Each would be paid as specified on the Configure Combinations tab in the Combination rule.
Determine whether an employee’s profile includes a processing order rule in one of the following ways:
Select the employee in the timecard, then run the Rules Analysis report. If the spans in the report are not in chronological order, the employee’s profile includes a processing order. Check the employee’s pay rule configuration to see if a processing order is assigned.