8 Steps to a Successful Employee Central Payroll Implementation

When it comes to deploying SAP SuccessFactors Employee Central Payroll, there are a lot of things to think about. Even with a smaller number of employees, payroll is an essential corporate activity that can be extremely complex. In an area where issues can cause workforce disruption if things are not working smoothly, getting the implementation correct is critical. SAP SuccessFactors Employee Central Payroll is the industry’s foremost cloud-based payroll engine, available as part of SAP’s SuccessFactors HXM Suite. If you want your payroll transformation to be successful, you must have a well-planned, well-managed, and well-executed implementation project.

We’ll look at eight suggestions to help you get there.

Choose a world-class team

The success of your implementation project is dependent on your team. It’s critical to have the correct number of employees on board to help define the requirements, build the solution, test it, and receive training on using the Employee Central Payroll system. You also want to make sure that users are involved from the start, rather than waiting until user acceptance testing or parallel payroll testing.

Your partner team is even more crucial. While there are some similarities between Employee Central Payroll and SAP ERP Payroll, there are also subtle variations that your payroll lead consultant should be aware of. You should look for a company that has worked with Employee Central Payroll before and has consultants who have led multiple Employee Central Payroll projects and have a lot of experience with payroll implementation. However, not only the quantity of projects is crucial, but so is their quality; you should chat with recent, previous customers to see if the payroll implementation ran perfectly. Employee Central Payroll should also be familiar with Employee Central, Business Software Inc.’s tax apps, mashups, and point-to-point replication between Employee Central and Employee Central Payroll.

Employee Central Payroll’s front end, Payroll Control Center, is a vital aspect of your payroll process. The Employee Central Payroll lead should have prior experience with Payroll Control Center implementation projects. This knowledge enables them to create end-to-end payroll processes that add value rather than being an afterthought.

A minimum of one ABAP (Advanced Business Application Programming) developer, an SAP Basis consultant, and an integration consultant with experience with the point-to-point integration between Employee Central and Employee Central Payroll will make up your Employee Central Payroll team.

Define the scope of the project

It’s necessary to determine the proper scope for your project before signing a statement of work (SOW) with the implementation partner, even if it’s not a key element. Without due diligence, essential features or operations may be overlooked, necessitating a later change order or, worse, not being deployed at all. 

Payroll Control Center is frequently left out of SOWs, so try to ensure it is included in yours. Any integration or development effort should be explicitly specified so that you thoroughly understand your place in the project’s objectives and your deliverables.

Perform proper testing

Testing the payroll system is, without a doubt, one of the most important actions you’ll undertake during your setup. Employees and unions can react badly and disrupt response to payments that are inaccurate or delayed. Employees can also become disengaged if they believe you can’t get the fundamentals right, such as salary. There may also be financial consequences for your business. As a result, it’s vital to guarantee that your system is reliable from the start.

Appoint an experienced testing lead who will be accountable for implementing a detailed and comprehensive testing strategy. All business scenarios and platform functionality should be rigorously tested. The number of test scenarios in context and scripts should be substantial given the complexity of payroll.

Parallel payroll testing, which entails running payroll in both your legacy system and the new Employee Central Payroll system, then comparing the results to verify that Employee Central Payroll is delivering the correct results, is necessary for your payroll system. Typically, two parallel payroll tests are conducted, however, there may be reasons to perform more tests in specific cases. The confidence that your Employee Central Payroll system will give you is the knowledge that accurate payroll data will be guaranteed, once it goes live. And that this was the result of rigorous parallel payroll testing.

Handle previous mistakes and changes in functionality

It’s an inescapable fact that there will be functional variations in how the system works and how payroll is set up and executed, especially when switching from legacy payroll to Employee Central Payroll. You should plan ahead of time how you’ll cope with differences in functionality — this is even essential when the new functionality makes life easier — and how you’ll deal with payroll calculation problems. Because of miscalculations in the legacy payroll system, it may be necessary to make retroactive calculations going back several years and pay money to employees.

Learn about reporting options and possibilities

The reporting tools and options in Employee Central Payroll aren’t as robust as they are in other SAP SuccessFactors HXM Suite modules. As a result, you should determine your reporting requirements early on and evaluate whether you need to invest in a third-party reporting solution such as SpinifexIT.

Only data in the system can be reported on in Employee Central Payroll. You must use a third-party solution or copy payroll data into SAP SuccessFactors People Analytics for integrated reporting with data from other systems, such as organisational objects and cost allocation.

Get online and get connected

Set up the SAP router and VPN from your network to SAP to access the Employee Central Payroll back end. This must be handled early in the project to make sure that the system is ready for the implementation team to begin setting things up correctly. Consider starting the access process early in the program stages if you have VPN access or user issuance policies that prevent timely access to your project and cause delays.

Similarly, you should think about how these access permissions may affect consultants’ access to Employee Central Payroll. Some companies, for example, only allow VPN access from a corporate device (typically a business laptop) and don’t allow public access to the SAP router. Remote consultants may be impacted by such constraints, which can add unanticipated time and money if access becomes difficult or demands physical presence in a particular place.

Set up hardware

You should first set up cheque printing hardware and SAP spool functionality before using Employee Central Payroll to print cheques, pay notices, or file W-2 tax forms. This task must be conducted with the aid of an SAP Basis consultant. While it is not complex, if you do not plan ahead of time for the task, you may experience delays when testing and using the printing function.

Manage updates

The first step after SAP SuccessFactors has deployed your Employee Central Payroll system is to add the most recent support packages. You can do so by opening an SAP One Support Launchpad ticket or going to the payroll system information screen in SuccessFactors, where you can also assess the support packages. You should also use the Upgrade Center to apply any necessary Employee Central Payroll features.