This article details the steps for processing your Single Touch Payroll (STP) records through to the ATO with the ClockOn software
ClockOn does not require a Software ID to report to the ATO via STP. A Software ID is only required if your software is reporting STP directly to the ATO. Certain hosted Standard Business Reporting (SBR) enabled business/accounting software can notify the ATO that, for the purpose of its transactions with the ATO via the SBR channel, it sends and receives those transactions to the ATO in their hosted software environment. ClockOn does not transmit STP data to the ATO this way, we instead partner with a STP gateway provider (OzEdi) to pass that transaction to the ATO via the SBR channel, thus removing the need for the software id.
This article contains the following items;
- Opening the STP Wizard
- Payroll Submission
- Payroll Replacement
- Employee Update
- View Submission History
- Common Submission Issues
Opening the STP Wizard
To open the STP wizard either select the Export > Single Touch Payroll option from the menu bar or select the Single Touch Payroll option from the main screen.
This will open the following screen with the following
Payroll Submission
Once your payroll has been finalized, the next step is to report your amounts through to the ATO, this is done using the Payroll Submission option within this screen.
To use this simply use the dropdown on the screen to select the relevant payroll that you wish to report and then click the Next button to continue.
Prior to the submission, you will be asked to declare that your details are accurate, if you are happy to proceed, click the Submit button
Once the submission has been completed you will receive an STP Submission Result screen, that will allow you to produce the STP employee details reporting for the submission.
Generating this report will show you the values that were submitted to the ATO within this submission.
Payroll Replacement
A payroll replacement is used if a payroll submission is showing an error in the Submission History screen.
Prior to running the payroll replacement, you will need to identify the issues with the payroll submission, correct them and then run the payroll replacement. If the issue is unknown and cannot be resolved then please contact ClockOn support.
Please note that the Payroll Replacement is NOT used for fixing up errors in the payroll, like backpay or an incorrectly paying someone. For this, it is recommended that you make these changes in ClockOn and then in the next pay period when you run the payroll submission those changes will be updated
If you have an issue with payroll and it is listed within the below dropdown, you can re-submit it to the ATO after the cause has been resolved. common causes may be that the TFN was invalid or the address detail was incomplete for an employee
From there the process is identical to that of a standard submission.
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Employee Update
This option is used to transfer the latest employee YTD values to the ATO and can be used where changes are made outside of payroll. This option allows users to update the employee data outside of payroll in preparation for EOFY.
PLEASE NOTE: You should only select the FINAL PAYROLL INDICATOR option if you are ready to end the reporting year for the employees. This will mark their MyGov accounts as tax ready.Click Next to continue.
You will then be displayed with a listing of employees that have payments within the financial year, you can then select whether or not you wish to include them in the STP update process
The next screen shows the Same Submission screen as per the standard Payroll Submission process. Simply click the Submit button to send our report to the ATO.
View Submission History
You can also review your previous STP submission history by clicking on the View History option in the upper right of the screen.
This will show the following screen with any STP payrolls that are still in the process of being reported to the ATO
You can use the options on the left side of this screen to either view the jobs that are "In Progress", "Completed", or "All".
In the example below I have swapped the display to all and we can see a record was submitted, the payroll Id, the ATO document reference id, the type of submission ie Submit, Replace, or Update, and its status.
Common Submission Issues
In the event that STP History records are showing in Red, the issues with the records can be identified by selecting the entry and clicking on the Results button.
This will present the full result file as provided by the ATO. From there scroll to the bottom of the response and it will show you the error "Description" and "Detailed Description" text
You are not authorised to lodge on behalf of this client.
If you are getting this response, then it is likely that you have entered STP Internediatry details into the system, but have yet to contact our team to add your information to our STP gateway system.
For more information on this process please see our Tax Agent Authorisation guide.
The previous submission has already been replaced
This can occur if a "STP replacement" has occurred on a payroll Id that no longer exists on the ATO's system. It can sometimes occur for payrolls where
- The payroll for the replacement is old and no longer resides in the ATO's system.
- The previous submission was done with unauthorised tax agent details.
If this does occur you can either wait for the next period and process it through to STP, or roll back the payroll, re-process it, and submit it again.