Ok, so next to the taxman, your company payroll department might well be the most criticised people on the planet. Of course, when your pay is accurate and on time then you love the payroll people with a passion but when things go wrong it is a completely different matter. Rightly or not the payroll professionals come in for an awful lot of abuse if your pay is not perfect.

I have had experience of working in a payroll department, in fact, I WAS the payroll department so I am going to put forward a few ways that you can help your payroll department perform their job more efficiently and process all the money that you are due correctly. Yes, it is largely up to you I am afraid!

Your payroll department is only able to work with the information that you give it so it is important that you provide them with everything they need. I dont mean handing in your expense forms the day after they are due either. It is your responsibility to send your payroll department everything that you are claiming for in good time for them to process it.

If you live in a country where you have a tax code that may be open to change due to your circumstances, your payroll department cant be expected to be psychic, even if you wish they were. For example, in England, if you have not submitted your previous tax form when you start with a new company then the payroll department is obliged to set your tax deduction rate at the basic rate. This is a lot higher than your tax code is likely to be but it is the only course of action that they can take. So, when your pay is processed you may find that you have a lot more tax deducted than you should have. This is down to you and means that you have to wait until the end of the tax year to claim back your overpayment form the local tax office, not your payroll department.

Of course, not every country works the same way but they do have similar policies when it comes to claiming work related expenses. If you do not send in your claims in a timely and accurate manner your payroll department is not going to be able to reimburse you for the amount you have paid out.

Payroll departments are usually extremely busy around pay day because of the volume of last minute submissions for expenses and other additions to your pay. They are only human and mistakes are not always avoided due to the high pressure they are under.

At the end of the day, your payroll department IS only human. You need to do your part to help them perform their job efficiently. The larger the company that you work for, the more that liasing with your payroll department becomes a necessity. Next time you look at the amount of pay that you have received and start to complain about it being less than it should be, think long and hard about whether it is the payroll departments fault or yours. Chances are, it is the latter!