"EMPLOYEE MANAGER" was written to assist the small business owner in tracking and recording employee personnel data and their work records. It saves countless hours of weekly wage calculations in determining Regular Pay, Over-Time Pay, Gross Totals, Net Totals, & Myriad Deductions! Simply enter the amount of hours worked and press ENTER.. The totals will instantly appear and be recorded for printing & future referance per each weekly payroll. For any employer who has had the arduous weekly chore of hand-calculating gross wages against the confusing, multi-page, IRS WAGE WITHHOLDING TABLES, this program breaks the surly governmental bonds. It calculates withholdings to the penny as opposed to the "give or take" method used in FEDERAL WITHHOLDINGS TABLES. You may also setup any of your employees deduction withholdings to figure in; STATE TAXES, UNION DUES, MEDICARE, SOCIAL SECURITY, PENSION FUND, STRAIGHT PAY DEDUCTIONS, etc..... All data can then be researched/printed by any of several means. The most useful method being; "QUARTERLY" wage data (search/view/print) as required by most governmental accounting. It also shows MONTHLY totals and averages! "EMPLOYEE MANAGER" will allow entry of up to 15 employees including their names, addresses, phone, SS#, dates of birth, & pay rates. You can also search this data in any fashion, print mailing labels, phone lists, and even have a modem dial telephone numbers automatically!... ENTERING NEW EMPLOYEES Select "EMPLOYEE" function & "ADD NEW EMPLOYEE" sub-function. Type in the employees personal data, name, address, phone, social security number, etc. The last field (PAY RATE) is very important! Enter a "dollars & cents" figure representing the hourly wage for this employee. The program will ask if the entry is "OK?". Press "Y" or "N" (Yes/No). If "Y", then the new employees' info will be recorded, and a new blank EMPLOYEE card screen will appear. Enter another employee or press ESCAPE to quit. ASSIGNING PAYROLL DEDUCTIONS All new employees are automatically assigned a Federal Deduction status of claiming "SINGLE" with "0" allowances (dependants) and with an OVERTIME wage rate at Straight-Pay.. (as opposed to time and 1/2, etc). In order to change this, and assign other deductions from weekly gross pay, you must select "EMPLOYEE" function & "DEDUCTIONS" sub-function. You'll then see a numbered list of all EMPLOYEE names to choose from. Enter an employee's number from the list, and the "DEDUCTIONS CARD" will appear. Although this card is self-explanatory, there are a few things worth mentioning. First of which is the US Federal Wage Withholdings Tax Tables used to compute an employees withholdings. FEDERAL WITHHOLDINGS COMPUTATIONS The current ShareWare version of "EMPLOYEE-MANAGER" contains US Federal withholdings formulas based upon the "Table 1-WEEKLY PAY" structure. This Governmental table can change from year to year and so must the formulas used in the program. The version number on the opening screen, beneath VT-Xpress logo, denotes the current US Federal Tax Table being used in the program you have. IE: "by R.James VT-Xpress" v1.93 "v1.93" means you have ShareWare version #1, using 1993 US Tax Tables...... OTHER DEDUCTIONS.. State Tax, Pension, Medicare, and Social Security deduction fields must indicate the PERCENTAGE (ie; 2.33%, 12.57%, etc) taken from the GROSS PAY. So, simply type in a number! No need to add "%" sign. If your deduction percentages total more than 100% (fire the employee!), the program will advise you accordingly, and force a re-try! The "STRAIGHT-PAY" deduction will take a set amount in dollars & cents from the GROSS. Use this for "savings plans", "union dues", etc........ ENTERING A PAYROLL Select "WEEKLY PAYROLL" from main menu, & the "PREPARE WEEKLY PAYROLL" sub-function. Enter the payrolls' date as prompted. Separate payroll entry cards for each employee will appear. Simpy enter the amount of REGULAR & OVER-TIME (if any) HOURS worked by that employee. Press ENTER, and watch hours of tedious calculator work appear on screen instantly! You can skip any employee for that week by pressing "F5". On-Screen prompts will guide you through each step. Once you select "P" to post each employee pay, the data is appended to a newly created file named by the date and extension named ".pay"... So, payroll on 12/25/93 will be named=> "931225.PAY" This is not important other than to inform you how data is stored........ After the last employees' pay is posted, you may make a printout of the weeks record for hard-copy files. A printout of all wage allocations per each employee on that payroll will print on a separate sheet as well as a separate sheet(s) of individual "Pay Stubs". The pay stubs contain all wage data (to-the-penny) and can be clipped and given to employees along with their pay or kept for future employer accounting purposes. You can however, select "PAYSTUB PRINTOUT" to print any set of stubs from any specific payroll at a later date if you choose. MANIPULATING RECORDS DATA By selecting "RECORDS" from main menu you'll see 3 functions available. ALL QUARTERLY PAYROLLS.. SINGLE EMPLOYEE PAYROLLS.. TOTALS PER MONTH & YEAR Simply follow the On-Screen prompts to research any of the categories. You may find the "averages" in the TOTALS PER MONTH & YEAR function to be of some interest in projecting future work/wage tallies. SEARCHING/EDITING AN OLD EMPLOYEE RECORD To change/edit a previously enter EMPLOYEE CARD (including hourly wage) select "SEARCH" from main menu. Enter a portion of the employees name and press enter. The old card will appear and you'll have several functions available at this point. All are pretty much self-explanatory including one that "auto-dials" the employees telephone number if you have a modem! In order to edit an existing card, take note of the "RECORD NUMBER" in the lower right hand corner of the card. Then return to the main menu and select "EMPLOYEES" function and the "EDIT OLD RECORD" sub-function. Enter the "RECORD NUMBER" in the box when asked. The EMPLOYEES' CARD will then appear and you may edit it accordingly. GENERAL PRINTOUTS Under the "PRINT" main menu you're given several ways to printout JUST THE EMPLOYEE CARD record data (Payroll data is not used here). For instance you can print a telephone list of all employees, or mailing labels for all employees for Christmas cards, business notifications, etc. MISCELANEOUS ITEMS & TIPS The "MODEM SETUP" function simply tells the program what Communications Port your computer system is using. Usually, most systems use Com.Port #1 If you inadvertantly enter the date of an existing payroll, you'll be immediately alerted by the program! If you actually wanted to rewrite any payroll you certainly may do so by answering es to the systems quiery.. This will completely over-write all posted data for the previous entry date. As a matter of fact, we suggest testing & playing with the system somewhat by doing exactly that. Enter a "test" payroll on the same date a few times! PROGRAMMING TAILORED TO YOU! VT-Xpress will customize this basic "EMPLOYEE MANAGER" program to fit any specific business needs, state tax tables, pension plans, form printouts, etc, for a nominal fee. For instance, several businesses in CT have already received upgrades whereby the horrendous CT State Income Tax tables have been programmed in! The registered versions of "EMPLOYEE MANAGER" may already have some of features you require as is! ($25 registration fee)... Please drop us a line detailing some of the things that could help your business out .... Thanks for trying our software! R. James VT-Xpress Box #25, Main St. Voluntown, CT 06384 USA