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Bonus True-Up tool — the California lookback, step by step
Work out what a multi-period bonus adds to overtime, double time, break premiums and sick pay in California, choose the method, queue it for payroll, and print the calculation summary.
A promised bonus raises the regular rate for the period it covers, so California owes a top-up on the overtime, double time, break premiums — and sometimes sick pay — already paid in that period. Pay & Tips → Tools → Bonus True-Up works it out from your records, saves it as evidence, and queues bonus + true-up for the next payroll run. The Payroll Run page's This bonus covers more than this pay period box does the same in one click using your account's method; the tool is where you choose a different method for one bonus, handle percentage or production bonuses, run a whole roster at once, and print the summary.
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1 · Who and when
Pick the employee, the bonus period (the dates the bonus was earned over — a month, a quarter, a year) and the amount, as dollars or as a percent of earnings. Hours, premiums and sick pay fill in from SafeShift records as soon as these are set; every value stays editable.
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2 · What kind of bonus
Two questions decide the formula. Promised, announced or expected? Yes = earned, it counts toward overtime; No = a discretionary gift, nothing to true up. Does the amount grow with hours or output? No = flat-sum (a fixed amount — divided over straight-time hours only, overtime at 1.5×, double time at 2×, the formula *Alvarado v. Dart Container* requires); Yes = production (divided over all hours, overtime at 0.5×, double time at 1×). A percent of earnings bonus already carries its share of overtime, so no separate true-up is owed.
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3 · Check the numbers, then send
Values marked from SafeShift records came from the period's punches, premiums and leave; the premium count is the paid count after the one-meal-plus-one-rest-per-day cap. Edit anything that is wrong — the summary follows as you type. Save and queue for payroll writes an append-only record and adds bonus + true-up as retro pay dated today, so the next run that covers today pays both in one check. Save only keeps the record without queueing.
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Advanced: allocation method
Whole period (default) divides the bonus over the whole bonus period's hours — the usual method for a bonus earned evenly over it. Strict, week by week gives each worked week an equal share and trues each week up at its own per-hour value (29 CFR §778.209(b)); light weeks true up higher, and the summary prints one row per week. Both are lawful. Choose strict when the employer's previous stubs printed the adjustment week by week (ADP Workforce Now's "Bonus Lookback" page), so the numbers stay consistent after a transfer; otherwise leave the default.
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Advanced: how sick pay was calculated
California allows two ways to pay sick leave to hourly staff, and the choice here must match how the sick hours in that period were actually paid. 90-day average (sick hours need no true-up) — each sick day is paid at the total non-overtime wages, including the nondiscretionary bonuses, commissions and retro pay paid in the 90 days before it, divided by the hours worked in them, so bonus earnings already sit inside the sick rate. That method never reprices backward: a bonus paid after a sick day does not change that day's rate, and it raises the average for sick days taken in the 90 days after it is paid, which SafeShift does on its own. So nothing is trued up here. This is SafeShift's own method, so if SafeShift paid the sick leave, keep it (it is the default once records fill in). Workweek rate (sick hours trued up with the bonus) — sick pay was the regular rate of the week it was taken, which the bonus raises retroactively, so the sick hours are trued up like overtime. Pick this only when another system paid the sick hours that way (a stub with an "Adjust Sick" line).
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Set the account's method once
Pay Schedule → Bonus true-up method (California) stores the allocation and sick choices for the account. The Payroll Run page's one-click shortcut uses them, and the tool opens on them after records fill in. A new customer keeps the defaults; a customer transferring from stubs that print the lookback week by week sets strict workweek, plus the workweek sick rate if those stubs carried an "Adjust Sick" line.
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Print the calculation summary
Every saved calculation has Print summary in the saved list: a one-page Payroll True-Up Calculation Summary with the bonus, its period, the method, the records used and where each came from, the week-by-week table under strict allocation, the components, the true-up owed and where it was queued. On the Payroll Run page, Export → Bonus true-up summaries (PDF) bundles one summary per bonus paid on that run (greyed out until a bonus is queued on it). It documents the calculation for the employee and the file; the itemized statement issued with the paycheck remains the official wage statement.
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Many employees at once
In step 1 choose a scope instead of one person. Step 3 then shows the roster with the engine's numbers per employee — one bonus for all, a percent, or a per-person amount — and Queue all saves and queues every row. The roster table always previews the whole-period method; to true up one employee week by week, run that person alone.
Good to know
- Records changed on a saved row means punches, premiums or leave in the bonus period moved after it was queued. Recompute shows the old and new totals; if more is owed, Queue top-up adds the difference as retro pay. Less owed is never clawed back automatically — California needs written authorization for wage recovery.
- A same-period bonus needs none of this: add it under Other earnings on the Payroll Run page as Earned or promised and the week's overtime and premiums reprice on their own.
- Salaried non-exempt staff have no hourly split in the records, so the tool asks for their hours by hand.
- The federal comparison line on the summary is what generic payroll "bonus lookback" tools compute — overtime only, divided over all hours, half-time. California's method governs for California employees and the higher figure is paid.
If something goes wrong
What does each option under Pay Schedule → Bonus true-up method mean?
Period — the bonus is divided once over the straight-time hours of the whole bonus period and every overtime, double-time and premium hour is trued up at that one value; the usual method for a bonus earned evenly. Strict workweek — each worked week gets an equal share and is trued up at its own value, printed one row per week; pick it to match stubs that printed the lookback week by week. 90-day average (no true-up) — SafeShift paid the sick hours at the 90-day average, which already includes bonus earnings; the method never reprices backward (a later bonus raises the average for the sick days that follow it, automatically); keep it whenever SafeShift priced the sick leave. Workweek rate (trued up) — another system paid the sick hours at the week's regular rate (an "Adjust Sick" stub line), so they are trued up with the bonus like overtime. Each option shows this explanation under the selector as you choose it.
The summary has no week-by-week table.
The calculation was saved under the whole-period allocation. Open Advanced in step 3 and choose Strict, week by week before saving, or set strict workweek as the account's method under Pay Schedule so the tool and the run-page shortcut use it.
The per-hour increase looks very high.
It is the bonus divided by the straight-time hours in the bonus period. Few recorded hours — a test account, or a period set wider than the hours on file — give a large per-hour value. Check the bonus period dates and the hours shown in step 3.
Why does the premium line dominate the total?
California prices meal and rest premiums at the regular rate (*Ferra v. Loews Hollywood*), so each paid premium hour trues up by the full per-hour bonus value, where overtime trues up by the half-time or time-and-a-half share. Federal law has no premium true-up at all.