Canada
United States
Bahamas
Jamaica
Trinidad & Tobago
Antigua & Barbuda
Barbados
AnguillaGlossary.
The Workzoom HR and payroll glossary: 80 HRIS terms defined in plain English, grounded in how Workzoom actually runs.
01
HR
- HRIS A Human Resource Information System (HRIS) is the central database of record for every employee profile, position, compensation, and...
- HCM Human Capital Management (HCM) is the umbrella term for software that runs the full employee lifecycle: hiring, onboarding, payroll,...
- HRIS vs HRMS HRIS (Human Resource Information System) is the database of record for employee data. HRMS (Human Resource Management System) adds workflow...
- Single employee record Most HR-payroll stacks are two databases kept loosely in step by a nightly sync. A single employee record is one record per person that HR,...
- Effective dating The entry date is not the payroll date. Those are two different things, and conflating them is where retroactive raises and transfers go...
- Position control Position control separates the budgeted job from the person filling it, attaching pay rules, benefits eligibility, security access, and...
- Employee self-service The pay stub from February lives in an email thread. The address that changed when someone moved is in a spreadsheet payroll hasn't opened....
- Benefits administration Benefits administration manages employee enrollment, eligibility, contributions, and reconciliation for health, dental, life, disability,...
- Open enrollment Open enrollment is the annual window when employees can change benefit elections without a qualifying life event. Most employers run open...
- The four Workzoom suites The four suites organize into a single shared system: HR (the required foundation), Workforce managing time and attendance, Payroll...
02
Workforce
- FTE (Full-Time Equivalent) Full-Time Equivalent (FTE) measures workforce size in standard-hour units. One employee working a 40-hour week is 1.0 FTE; two half-time...
- Headcount Headcount is the raw number of employees on payroll, regardless of hours worked. Headcount is a simpler measure than FTE but is misleading...
- Manager self-service Manager self-service gives a people manager the tools to run their own team: approving time off, reviewing schedules and timekeeping,...
- Time and attendance Time and attendance is the capture and validation of when employees work. It includes clocking, scheduling, breaks, overtime, and approvals....
- Biometric clocking Biometric clocking authenticates employee identity at punch time using fingerprint or facial recognition. It eliminates buddy punching: the...
- Buddy punching Buddy punching is when one employee clocks in or out on behalf of another, falsifying hours worked. It is the single largest source of...
- Scheduling Workforce scheduling is the assignment of employees to specific shifts, locations, and tasks. Modern scheduling tools handle 24/7 rotation,...
- Workforce management Workforce management covers scheduling, time and attendance, and time off in one place, so the hours an employee works and the hours they...
03
Talent
- Onboarding Onboarding is the process of bringing a new hire from offer acceptance to fully productive employee. It includes paperwork (statutory IDs,...
- Offboarding Offboarding is the structured exit of an employee: final pay, ROE/T4 issuance, equipment recovery, access revocation, exit interview, and...
- Performance review A performance review is a structured evaluation of an employee's work over a defined period: annual, semi-annual, or quarterly. Modern...
- Succession planning Succession planning identifies and develops internal candidates to fill key roles when current holders move on. Strong succession plans...
- Talent management Talent management covers the hire-to-develop side of the employee lifecycle: recruiting and applicant tracking, a talent pool that stores...
- ATS An Applicant Tracking System (ATS) manages the hiring pipeline from job posting through offer acceptance. Modern ATS tools include resume...
- LMS A Learning Management System (LMS) delivers, tracks, and reports on employee training and certification. Compliance industries (healthcare,...
04
Payroll
- Overtime Overtime is the wage premium owed for hours worked beyond statutory thresholds (typically 40/week in the US, 44/week in Ontario,...
- Direct deposit Direct deposit pays employees by electronic transfer to a bank account. It replaces paper cheques, eliminates lost-cheque reissues, and...
- Pay stub A pay stub is the per-period statement showing gross wages, statutory deductions, employer contributions, and net pay. Most jurisdictions...
- Payroll processing Payroll processing is the complete sequence that converts approved time records, salary changes, new hires, and terminations into confirmed...
- Statutory deduction A statutory deduction is a withholding an employer must take from employee pay each period under legal obligation and remit to a government...
- Remittance The PD7A is not the remittance. The deposit to the Canada Revenue Agency is. Remittance is the actual transfer of withheld statutory...
- Garnishment A garnishment is a court-ordered deduction from employee wages, used to enforce child support, tax debt, or unpaid judgments. Employers are...
- Gross-to-Net Gross-to-net is the full payroll calculation that turns gross earnings into the amount an employee takes home, applying every statutory...
- Retroactive Pay Retroactive pay is compensation owed for work already performed but paid at the wrong rate, usually following a backdated raise, a delayed...
- Off-Cycle Payroll An off-cycle payroll is any pay run processed outside the regular schedule, used for termination pay, a missed or incorrect payment, a bonus...
- Payroll Year-End Payroll year-end is the annual close where an employer reconciles the year's pay runs, verifies employee data, and produces statutory...
- Payroll Register A payroll register is the detailed record of a single pay run, listing every employee with their gross earnings, each deduction,...
05
Benefits
06
Caribbean
- PAYE (Jamaica) PAYE, Pay As You Earn, is Jamaica's statutory income tax withheld at source from employee wages at every pay cycle and remitted to Tax...
- NIB (Bahamas) The National Insurance Board (NIB) is the Bahamas social security authority. Bahamian employers and employees contribute a combined 11.3...
- NIS (Jamaica) The deduction order is the whole compliance risk. Jamaica's National Insurance Scheme draws 3 percent from both employer and employee on...
- NHT The National Housing Trust requires every employer in Jamaica to contribute 3 percent of gross emoluments, while employees contribute 2...
- Education Tax J$67.50. That is how far off one employee's Education Tax lands when the levy runs on gross pay instead of statutory income. Statutory...
- HEART/NSTA Trust J$292,300 is where HEART/NSTA Trust begins to matter. Jamaica's employer training levy runs at 3 percent of total monthly payroll, but only...
- S01 Five obligations collect inside every Jamaican payroll run. Tax Administration Jamaica receives them on one form, due by the 14th of the...
- TAJ J$1,902,360. That is the annual income tax-free threshold Tax Administration Jamaica sets for PAYE, and every Jamaican payroll calculation...
- C10 The C10 is the Bahamas National Insurance Board's monthly contribution schedule, listing each employee's insurable wages alongside the...
- Insurable earnings Insurable earnings are the portion of gross wages on which a social-security contribution is assessed, up to a statutory ceiling set by each...
- NIS (Trinidad and Tobago) NIS, or National Insurance, is the statutory social security contribution paid by every employed worker and their employer in Trinidad and...
- Health Surcharge (Trinidad and Tobago) The Health Surcharge is a flat weekly levy in Trinidad and Tobago, collected by the Board of Inland Revenue from employees and remitted by...
- PAYE (Trinidad and Tobago) In Trinidad and Tobago, PAYE (Pay As You Earn) is an employer-withheld income tax administered by the Board of Inland Revenue and remitted...
- NIS (Barbados) NIS, or National Insurance and Social Security, is Barbados's statutory payroll contribution administered by the National Insurance Board of...
- PAYE (Barbados) PAYE is not a tax employees file. It is a tax employers carry, calculated, deducted, and remitted to the Barbados Revenue Authority before...
- Social Security (Antigua and Barbuda) Social Security in Antigua and Barbuda requires a 9.5 percent employer contribution and a 6.5 percent employee deduction, both calculated on...
- Medical Benefits (Antigua and Barbuda) 3.5 percent of earnings goes to the Medical Benefits Scheme in Antigua and Barbuda, shared between employer and employee, collected by a...
- Social Security (Anguilla) In Anguilla, Social Security contributions are set at 10 percent of insurable earnings, split equally between employee and employer at 5...
07
Canada
- CPP The Canada Pension Plan is a mandatory federal retirement program requiring employees and employers each to contribute 5.95 percent on...
- EI 1.63 percent on every dollar of insurable earnings up to $68,900. That is what Canadian employers deduct from every paycheque, multiply by...
- T4 Four deductions follow every Canadian worker through the year: CPP contributions, CPP2, Employment Insurance premiums, and federal income...
- ROE The ROE deadline is not measured from the last day worked. It runs from the end of the pay period in which the interruption occurs, a...
- CRA Three deductions run on every Canadian payroll: income tax withholding, CPP, and EI premiums, plus CPP2 where it applies. All of them flow...
- CPP2 CPP2 is the second tier of the Canada Pension Plan, a federal contribution administered by the Canada Revenue Agency on earnings between the...
- QPP (Quebec) 6.30 percent on each side, payable to Revenu Quebec rather than the CRA. Quebec employees are covered by QPP, a parallel provincial pension...
- QPIP (Quebec) 1.30 percent. That is Quebec's Employment Insurance rate in 2026. Every other province pays 1.63. Quebec workers fund their own parental...
- Employer Health Tax Employer Health Tax is a provincial payroll tax charged to employers on total remuneration paid in a given province, with Ontario, British...
- Workers' Compensation (WSIB / WCB) Workers' compensation in Canada is a provincial no-fault insurance system funded by employer premiums, administered by WSIB in Ontario and...
- Vacation Pay Vacation pay in Canada is a statutory entitlement set by each province's employment standards legislation, calculated as a percentage of...
- Statutory Holiday Pay Statutory holiday pay is the wage an employee receives for a public holiday they do not work, set by provincial employment standards...
- Form TD1 Form TD1, the Personal Tax Credits Return, is how a Canadian employee tells their employer which tax credits to apply when calculating...
08
UK
- HMRC PAYE HMRC PAYE is the United Kingdom's Pay-As-You-Earn income-tax withholding system. UK employers report every pay event in real time via Real...
- Auto-enrolment Auto-enrolment is the UK statutory requirement that employers automatically enrol eligible workers in a qualifying workplace pension scheme...
09
United States
- Form W-2 Form W-2, the Wage and Tax Statement, is the annual form a US employer issues to every employee reporting gross wages, federal and state...
- Form 941 Form 941 is the Employer's Quarterly Federal Tax Return, filed four times a year with the IRS to report federal income tax withheld from...
- FICA FICA, the Federal Insurance Contributions Act, is the US payroll tax funding Social Security and Medicare. It is two separate taxes...
- FLSA The Fair Labor Standards Act is the US federal law setting minimum wage, overtime pay, recordkeeping, and child labour standards. Its...
- Form W-4 Form W-4, the Employee's Withholding Certificate, is how a US employee tells their employer how much federal income tax to withhold from...
- Form I-9 Form I-9, Employment Eligibility Verification, is the US form every employer must complete for each new hire to confirm identity and...
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