At a glance
-
The Ministry of Justice may send you a letter requesting money be deducted from an employee's pay
-
The letter provides payment amounts, the start date, and remittance details
-
Court fines must be paid directly to the Ministry of Justice (NOT to the IRD)
-
Learn more about court fines at justice.govt.nz
There's a court fines deduction in MYOB that's been created for you. All you need to do is assign it to the employee, enter the total amount of the fine, and how much will be deducted each pay.
Once the balance of the court fine reaches zero, the deduction stops automatically.
To set up an employee's court fine deduction
Go to the Payroll menu > Employees.
Click an employee who requires this new earning. Need to add an employee?
Click the Standard pay tab.
Under Deductions, click Add deductions and choose Court fines.
Enter the details of the court fine:
Enter the Balance owing. This is the total amount of the court fine to be deducted over time. Once this balance is reached, the deductions will stop.
Enter the Amount per pay to be deducted.
Click Save.
Next time you do a pay run for the employee, the court fine deduction will be included.
Protected net earnings
Employees who are required to pay court fines are entitled to keep 60% of their net (after-tax) earnings. If a court fines deduction will leave the employee with less than 60% of their net pay, the court fines deduction will be adjusted automatically to comply with the protected net earnings rule.You can check the Balance owing on the court fine at any time in the employee's standard pay (Payroll > Employees > click the employee > Standard pay tab).
You can check the Balance owing on the court fine at any time in the employee's standard pay (Payroll > Employees > click the employee > Standard pay tab).
FAQs
What happens to the deducted money?
Court fines deductions must be paid to the Ministry of Justice, and payment details will be in the letter they provide to you. For more details about payments, visit justice.govt.nz
You can make a record of these payments in MYOB using an expense transaction (Banking menu > Record expense).
Here's an example spend money transaction for a court fines payment. Note the following:
For the Bank account we've chosen the MYOB bank account the payment is coming from.
For the Contact (payee) we've set up a supplier record for the Ministry of Justice so we can choose them here.
We've entered a Description of transaction to help identify this payment.
In the Category field on the first line we've chosen MYOB category that's linked to our payroll deductions. Learn about your payroll linked categories.
Can I change the account my deductions are allocated to?
Court fines deductions withheld from pays are allocated to the linked account you've set in MYOB for your payroll deductions (Accounting menu > Manage linked accounts > Payroll tab).
If you'd like your deductions to be allocated to a different account, you'll need to change this linked account. This affects the accounting side of MYOB so you might want help from your accounting advisor before doing this. They can also help work out if you should create another liability account for this purpose.
What if the deduction amount varies between employees?
Follow the steps above to assign the court fines deduction to each employee, and enter a different amount for each employee.