Ontario Personal Emergency Leave (PEL) requires that employers provide up to 10 days per calendar year of sick leave for employees who need a sick day, or have an injury or medical emergency, or other family emergency. Although a maximum of 10 sick days can be used, only the first two are required to be paid.
Creating a sick leave benefit for PEL will require two components:
A
Benefit Codewhere the sick day entitlement will be accrued for each year.An
Earning Codethat will reduce the entitlement and pay for only the first two sick days taken in the year.
1. Create a Benefit Code for PEL entitlement
The benefit code for the PEL entitlement will keep track of how many sick days an employee is entitled to take in the current year, and reset the entitlement at the start of each calendar year.
Let’s go through the steps to create the Benefit Code for the PEL entitlement:
Open
Canadian Payroll > Employer Payroll Tables > Deduction/Benefit CodesCreate a new
Benefit Codefor the PEL entitlement.
The Deduction Data settings and an Entitlement Formula will be added to the Benefit Code in the following sections.
1.1. Deduction Data tab
The settings for the Deduction Data tab should be setup as follows:
| Type | Accrued Sick Leave |
| Leave Entitlement | Enabled |
| Accumulate In | Days |
Using these settings on the Deduction Data tab the benefit code will be used as a sick leave entitlement for the employee that will accrue entitlement in days.
| 1 | Accrued Sick Leave is selected for the Type to use the Benefit Code as a bank for accrued PEL entitlement. |
| 2 | The Leave Entitlement option is enabled to indicate this Benefit Code is an entitlement. |
| 3 | The entitlement is set to accumulate in days. This will change the units that the entitlement is accrued and taken in. |
1.2. PEL Entitlement Formula
By using a formula in the Benefit Code to generate the accrued entitlement the number of accrued days can be limited to 10 per year, and the province of employment can be checked so that only employees who are employed in Ontario will have the entitlement.
Say that again? The formula can be read as: “If the employee province of employment is Ontario, and there is no accrued leave, then generate 10 days of accrued leave.” |
1.3. Formula tab
Enter the entitlement formula into the
Leave Units L0=field.
| 1 | The formula is entered in the Leave Units L0 field. |
| 2 | The code for the entitlement Benefit Code is updated in the formula. |
| 3 | The formula can be tested with dummy values using this button. |
Tip: Test the formula! Press |
1.4. Save the PEL entitlement Benefit Code
The benefit code setup is now finished and the code can be saved by pressing OK at the bottom of the Benefit/Deduction Code window.
The next component for the PEL is to create an earning code to record when employees actually have taken a sick day, and pay them accordingly. This will be covered in the following sections.
2. Create an Earning Code for PEL taken
An Earning Code for recording the PEL taken by employees will be created now. This Earning Code will be responsible for reducing the entitlement days each time that a PEL is taken, as well as ensuring that the first 2 days of taken are paid.
Open Canadian Payroll > Employer Payroll Tables > Earning Codes.
Create a new Earning Code for PEL taken.
2.1. Earning Data tab
The settings for the Earning Data tab should be setup as below. These settings will make the Earning Code reduce the leave entitlement automatically whenever PEL taken.
| % of Basic | 100.00 |
| Accumulate Work Units In | Hours |
| Earning Type | TakeLeave |
| Leave Entit. | The Deduction/Benefit Code created previously. |
| Formula Based Earning | Enabled |
| Reduce Salary | Enabled |
Reduce Salary When you choose the There you will find an option called |
Notes:
|
| 1 | Hours is selected for work units to accumulate in. |
| 2 | Earning type TakeLeave is selected. |
| 3 | The PEL entitlement Benefit Code is selected for the Leave Entitlement. |
| 4 | Formula Based Earnings are enabled so that a formula can be entered in the Formulas tab. |
| 5 | Reduce Salary is enabled to correctly pay salaried employees who take PEL. |
2.2. PEL Taken Formula
Say that again? The formula can be read as: “If the employee is working in Ontario and 2 days or less of leave have been taken, pay the hours entered.” |
This formula will limit the payments to only the first two days of leave. Starting on the third Personal Emergency Leave there will be no payments only time.
2.3. Code Formula tab
Enter the leave taken formula into the
Work Units U0andEarnings E0fields as specified.
| 1 | Work Units are updated for each day of PEL taken. |
| 2 | Earnings are only updated based on the result of the formula. |
| 3 | The code for the PEL entitlement Benefit Code is updated in the formula. |
| 4 | The code for the PEL taken Earning Code is updated in the formula. |
2.4. Save the PEL taken Earning Code
The Earning Code setup is now finished and the code can be saved by pressing OK at the bottom of the Earning Code window.
3. Program Options
In order for this new process to calculate the leave entitlement units accurately you will have to add the following options to the Program Options.
Add new Program Options Press Insert on the Program Options screen to add new Program Options. |
Open System Administration > System Parameters > Program Options.
Add the MinLeaveTakenCodes option:
Option Id Py.PayCal.MinLeaveTakenCodes Description List of earning code where a minimum leave taken units will apply. Value YYY Replace YYY with the code of the PEL taken Earning Code Add the MinLeaveTakenUnits option:
Option Id Py.PayCal. MinLeaveTakenUnits Description List of Minimum leave taken units matching to Py.PayCal.MinLeaveTakenCodes. Value 1.0 Any amount of hours lower than the total hours per day will be considered 1 day for the emergency leave code.
3.1. Max Leave Taken Options
The final option that will need to be added is for the maximum units of leave that will reduce the entitlement. The maximum units can be calculated using two different options:
The first option is to choose a maximum for each entry.
The second option is to choose a maximum for each day.
Note: Both program options (per day/per entry) cannot be used at the same time. |
Add either MaxLeaveTakenUnitsPerEntry or MaxLeaveTakenUnitsPerDay option.
3.1.1. Per entry option
The per entry option takes a maximum of 1 day even if the total hours of leave for that day is over the regular hours per day for that pay group.
For example if an employee gets paid 10 hours of Personal Emergency Leave in a pay group where the per day hour is 8, this program option will make sure to deduct 1 day of Personal Emergency Leave not 1.25.
| Option Id | Py.PayCal.MaxLeaveTakenUnitsPerEntry |
| Description | List of the Maximum leave taken units for each ENTRY matching to Py.PayCal.MinLeaveTakenCodes. |
| Value | 1.0 |
3.1.2. Per day option
The per day option is for employees with split shifts. This option will calculate 1 unit of Personal Emergency Leave taken even if there is more than one entry within the same day.
For example if an employee works two shift of 4 hours in the same day and requires two 4 hours entry of Personal Emergency Leave, this option will let the system know to only deduct 1 day of PEL.
| Option Id | Py.PayCal.MaxLeaveTakenUnitsPerDay |
| Description | List of the Maximum leave taken units for each DAY matching to Py.PayCal.MinLeaveTakenCodes. |
| Value | 1.0 |
4. Add the Earning and Deduction/Benefit Codes to the employee(s)
The formula’s included under the earning and the deduction/benefit codes will only return a value if the employee has a province of employment set to Ontario. Which means that these two codes could be added to a pay group by using the “Employment Defaults” option.
Note:
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If you have any questions or experience any difficulties please reach out to Client Care. Thank you.