Overview

Compensation settings control how FTE Tree turns FTE, U.S.-dollar pay rates, adjustments, and pay ranges into planning cost. The main settings are annual hours per FTE, pay grades, and pay ranges.

Every base pay rate has a Pay rate basis of Hourly or Annual. Annual hours per FTE annualizes Hourly values. Annual values already represent full-time annual base pay at 1.0000 FTE and are not multiplied by annual hours. FTE Tree then applies the Position’s FTE once to calculate Position cost.

FTE Tree uses Department, Employee, Job code, and Pay grade as its default terms. Your organization may use different labels, so the names you see in FTE Tree can differ from the examples in Help.

Access needed

Activity Access needed
Configure annual hours Manage position setup
Configure pay grades, pay ranges, or adjustments Manage position setup plus View sensitive workforce data for All departments
Configure a Job code pay suggestion Manage position setup
Review exact pay or pay-derived costs The relevant Position view access plus View sensitive workforce data for every Department included in the calculation
Access setup See Permissions and roles.

Job code pay suggestions are reusable guidance available through Manage position setup. Pay grades, pay ranges, and adjustment rules require that permission plus View sensitive workforce data for All departments, because the setup itself contains exact compensation values and organization-wide rules. A regular approver without View sensitive workforce data may still see a Pay grade name while its dollar range remains Restricted.

Annual hours per FTE

Annual hours per FTE controls how Hourly pay rates become annualized full-time pay.

Choose how many hours FTE Tree should multiply by an Hourly base pay rate to arrive at its annualized full-time amount. FTE Tree does not supply a default; enter the value selected by your organization. For example, 2,080.00 hours represents 40 hours per week for 52 weeks, while an organization may choose 2,088.00 hours for a leap year if that matches its compensation or budgeting policy.

Enter annual hours with no more than two meaningful decimal places. Saved annual hours display with two decimal places, so a typical 52-week, 40-hour schedule appears as 2,080.00. Fractional values such as 1,950.50 and harmless trailing zeros are supported; a value such as 1950.501 that would require rounding is not accepted.

Do not set annual hours to 1.00 to represent Annual pay. Enter the amount as the Base pay rate and select Annual as its Pay rate basis. Annual hours are required only when an Hourly value participates in a calculation or comparison.

Annual hours per FTE can change by date. Enter a new row only when your organization’s annualization policy changes. Report allocation is separate: reports allocate the already annualized cost across the selected date range using the selected cost allocation method.

Annual hours examples

Setup Base pay rate Pay rate basis Annual hours per FTE Annualized full-time base pay
Standard Hourly setup $30.0000 Hourly 2,080.00 $62,400.00
Leap-year Hourly setup $30.0000 Hourly 2,088.00 $62,640.00
Annual setup $80,000.00 Annual Not used $80,000.00

After annualization, FTE applies once. A 0.5000 FTE Position using $62,400.00 of annualized full-time pay produces $31,200.00 before annual cost adjustments.

If annual hours changes during a report period, reports can split the period and apply the correct annual hours to each portion of the period.

Pay grades

Pay grades define pay ranges that can be attached to Job codes. They support pay range comparison by showing where a Position base pay rate falls within the expected range.

Each Pay grade has dated pay ranges with a minimum, optional midpoint, maximum, and Pay range basis of Hourly or Annual. Add a new dated range when the range changes instead of overwriting the earlier one.

To use a pay grade, attach it to the appropriate job code history. FTE Tree looks up the range for the date being viewed and can show where the position’s base pay falls between the range minimum and maximum. The viewer needs View sensitive workforce data for every department included in the view. When the pay rate and range use different hourly or annual bases, FTE Tree converts them to annual values before comparing them. An hourly value therefore requires annual hours for that date.

Pay ranges are comparison-only: changing a range can change the displayed range or penetration, but it does not change FTE, pay, adjustments, Position cost, or Assigned cost. A Pay grade can be configured to require the entered Position pay rate to fall within its range.

Pay grades do not set Position pay. Every Position stores its own Base pay rate and Pay rate basis. An effective Job code pay rate is shown only as a suggestion. Assigned cost uses the Position base pay assumption with active assignment FTE; Employee records do not define a standard pay amount.

Choose Make unavailable from a pay grade’s update page when it should no longer be selected on new Job code changes. Existing and historical Job code values keep the same pay grade and dated ranges. Choose Make available to offer it again.

Pay grades and their dated ranges are not deleted through standard settings. Make a pay grade unavailable when it should no longer be offered, and correct or void an exact dated range when it was entered in error.

Pay range review

Pay range review helps users answer questions such as:

  • Is the Position pay rate below the configured minimum?
  • Is the pay rate above the configured maximum?
  • Where does the pay rate sit within the range?
  • Did the expected range change on a different effective date?

Add a new dated pay grade entry when a range changes. Do not overwrite an old range if users still need reports or activity history to explain earlier decisions.

Setup order

Build compensation settings in three phases.

Phase What to complete
Hours Confirm annual hours per FTE for cost calculations.
Pay structure Create Pay grades and dated ranges, update Job codes, optionally add effective Job code pay suggestions, and configure Position adjustments.
Review Check one sample Position and assignment before importing a larger set of data.

This sequence helps calculations, reports, and pay range comparisons use complete information from the beginning.

How these settings affect calculations

Annual hours per FTE, Position pay rates, optional Job code pay suggestions, Pay grades, pay ranges, and adjustments affect different parts of compensation review.

FTE and the Base pay rate are entered directly on the Position. For an Hourly rate, annual hours produces annualized full-time base pay; an Annual rate is already annualized full-time base pay. Pay rate adjustments produce the Adjusted pay rate and adjusted annualized full-time pay. FTE then produces annualized Position cost, and annual cost adjustments produce final Position cost.

For Assigned cost, FTE Tree annualizes the Position base pay rate and applies each active assignment’s FTE. Position adjustments do not change Assigned cost.

For worked examples of hourly and annual setup, hours that change by date, job code suggestions, and assigned cost, see Position costs and headcount. See Position adjustment examples and Position costs in reports for the remaining examples.

Common checks

If a compensation amount looks unexpected, review:

  • Whether annual hours are set for the selected date.
  • Whether each Base pay rate has the intended Hourly or Annual basis.
  • Whether the Position has the intended Base pay rate for the selected date.
  • Whether the Position has an active Base pay rate for the date being reviewed.
  • Whether the assigned Job code or the nearest higher-level Job code has the expected optional pay suggestion.
  • Whether the Pay grade range and its basis are attached to the Job code for the effective date.
  • Whether Position adjustments apply to FTE, pay rate, or annual cost.