Complex Formulae

A complex formula generates a value that may override or be applied to the Fixed Amount, Fixed Units, or Fixed Rate specified in the previous field.

Complex formulae can comprise either a single component, or several components, such as ‘a’ and ‘b’, which you can add together, subtract one from the other, multiply together, or divide one into the other. You can use up to 26 components (letters ‘a’ to ‘z’) in this way. You assign values to the components in the Operand Values area at the bottom of the screen.

The components can be any of the following:

Any of the valid entries allowed for simple formulae components, i.e. a numeric constant, a percentage figure or ADT.
A pay element references, that is, the amount, number of units or rate derived for another pay element.
A formula mnemonic representing a value which is derived from employee data.

A complex formula can be a single arithmetical statement, or a set of statements constituting a simple program. For further information, see Types of Statement.

For examples of complex formulae, click on the above forms of expression, or click WINDOW in ResourceLink to display the Valid Pay Element Formulae window. For some practical examples of complex formulae, see Complex Formulae Examples.

General

Evaluation Priority

Since a pay element value can be calculated from the value calculated for another pay element, it is important that pay element calculations take place in the correct order. Therefore if the formula for the current pay element includes the amount calculated for another pay element, you must enter a number in this field to determine the order in which this one is calculated. That is, it must be calculated after the pay element on which its amount is based.

You can enter a priority number between 0 and 9, where 0 (or blank) is always processed first, then 1, 2 etc through to 9. If more than one pay element exists for a given priority, the pay elements for that priority are calculated in order according to their ID numbers.

Alternatively, you can enter a letter between A and Z to indicate priority. Any formulae with a letter are processed after GAYE and Pensions processing, in element order within letter order. This ensures that if pensions affect accumulators, then these new formulae will take pensions into account if they refer to accumulators. Operands defined in formulae with a letter priority may refer to 'this run' amounts of pension contributions, which is not possible for existing formulae.

Note: Entering a letter to indicate priority should be used carefully to ensure accumulators etc are not being updated after they have been used in pre-pensions formulae.

Operand Values

In this section of the screen you define values for the components specified in the Complex Formula section of the window. For example, in the following illustration variable ‘a’ represents the amount calculated this period for pay element 2760; variable ‘d’ is 75%:

Seq	Ref	Value
---	---	====
001	a	TA[2760]
002	b	TA[3000
003	c	TA[3001]
004	d	75%

You can enter operand values in the following forms:

Numeric, e.g. 150.25
Percentage, e.g. 90%
Pay Element Reference[NNNN], e.g. FA[1000]

The amount held in the employee’s fixed pay element code 1000.

Mnemonic, e.g. FTE

The proportion of the job hours worked by the employee.

Note: If your keyboard does not have square brackets [ ], use curly brackets { }, in their place.

For a list of the conventions you can use in operand values for complex pay element formulae, from the Value column click WINDOW to display a help screen.

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