Payroll on Autopilot is designed to help Global Payroll clients keep payroll running smoothly, on time, and with minimal effort. 

With our payroll automations, payroll submission and approval will happen automatically based on the guardrails you’ve configured. 

You stay fully in control — the system simply takes care of the routine steps so payroll doesn’t stall due to missed deadlines or last-minute approvals.

Auto-submit and auto-approve operate independently, each following its own rules and thresholds (even when both use the same percentage in your policy). This gives you flexibility to fine-tune how automation works across your payroll process.

This feature is available for Global Payroll entities only (excluding the US).

In this article:

Managing your payroll automation policy

About the variance threshold

Updating policy details (including variance threshold)

Managing your automation policy

Step 1 - Open entity details

Org Settings > Entities > select the entity >  Payroll tab > Payroll Automations

Step 2 - Review automation details policy

Select a payroll group to review or edit the details (such as threshold limits).

If you wish to create a new automation, click the Set up button

 

Step 3 - Set up automation details

On the setup page, Select the Payroll group

You can turn on one or both automations:

• Automatic payroll submission
  Your payroll will be submitted automatically at the submission deadline unless the cost variance exceeds your set threshold. If your threshold is exceeded, manual review will be triggered.
• Automatic payroll approval
  Payroll will be approved automatically at the approval deadline unless the variance threshold is exceeded. If your threshold is exceeded, manual review will be triggered.

The variance threshold determines when manual review is required.

• Enter the maximum allowed variance (%) compared to the previous cycle’s total payroll cost.
• If payroll costs change by more than this percentage, you’ll need to manually approve the cycle.

This ensures that any unexpected changes are flagged before the cycle moves forward.

The variance threshold is calculated based on gross payroll cost, not net amounts.

Once your payroll automation settings are configured, the final step is selecting who should be notified whenever payroll needs to be approved manually.

Step 4 - Configure notification preferences

Notify all admins : All organization admins with payroll permissions will receive notifications related to the automation.

Notify selected admins : If you prefer to limit notifications to specific people, then select this option and choose at least two admins from the list

Step 5 - Payroll will auto-submit/auto-approve 

If auto-submit and/or auto-approve is enabled, the automation will run on the due date when thresholds are met.

If thresholds aren’t met, the selected admins will be notified for manual action.

Auto-approval and auto-submission run independently and have independent thresholds, even if they use the same percentage value in the policy. Either step can fail and then trigger manual intervention.

Updating payroll automation details

Once a policy is active, you can update or disable it directly in your Entity Settings.

1. Go to Entity Settings → Payroll tab → Payroll Automations
2. Find the policy you want to modify
3. Click the three dots (⋯) menu on the right side

From here, you can:

• Delete the policy entirely, or
• Edit the policy:
  • Turn auto-submit and/or auto-approve off for a specific payroll group
  • Update the variance threshold

All changes are applied as soon as you confirm the update.