Condition A
A leave request that spans two months
Approve it mid-run and check what both months record. A balance divided across the wrong periods shows up as a dispute later.
LedgerLane · Choosing a System
The pay run stops where the rule isn't met.
Most Singapore payroll systems carry the same feature list. They differ in how the pieces connect — leave, timesheets, payslips, bank files, and the journal that finally lands in your ledger.
Awaiting IRAS ack
A worksheet walkthrough for Singapore SMEs and accounting practices · updated November 2026
Five modules decide the comparison — open each one
Feature lists rank modules equally. Your payroll does not. Open the module you actually run and see what to test in a live demo.
Awaiting vendor demo
Module 01
Start with the pay run, not the dashboard
Sit with whoever runs payroll and list the exception types you handle in a normal quarter: mid-month joiners, final settlements, bonuses, unpaid leave, overtime, work-pass renewals. Then ask each vendor to walk through two of them live, in front of you, in their own system.
This single exercise eliminates most of the shortlist. A platform can look complete and still require three manual adjustments for a mid-month joiner with a pro-rated CPF contribution — and you will only find out the night before payday if you never asked.
What to test in the demo
A pro-rated CPF contribution for a mid-month joiner, and one final settlement with unused leave encashed. Watch what the operator has to type by hand.
Module 02
Leave management: where disputes start
Leave management software matters because leave is the input that corrupts payroll silently. An encashment not deducted, a balance carried into the wrong year, an approval that arrived after the run.
Check whether leave balances feed the pay run directly or are exported and reconciled somewhere else. Check what happens to a leave request that spans two months. And check whether an employee can see their own balance, because that single feature removes a category of HR email permanently.
What to test in the demo
Approve a request that spans two calendar months mid-run and watch what the system does to the balance.
Module 03
Timesheets and approval before calculation
Timesheet approval should be a gate, not a parallel process. If timesheets are approved after the pay run has been calculated, the run is provisional and everyone pretends otherwise until someone finds the mistake.
For hourly and shift-based teams this is the highest-value feature in the entire system. For fixed-salary offices it is mostly irrelevant, which is exactly why feature comparison tables mislead: they weigh every module equally when your payroll does not.
What to test in the demo
Reject and resubmit an approved timesheet, then confirm the pay run refuses to calculate until it is approved again.
Module 04
Payslip generation and what employees actually need
Payslip generation in Singapore is partly statutory record-keeping and partly employee service. Itemised digital payslips that an employee can retrieve on demand beat PDFs emailed on request every time someone asks.
Look at the itemisation level. A payslip showing gross-to-net with a single CPF line is technically a payslip; one showing each component and the CPF treatment per component is the one that ends questions.
What to test in the demo
Open one employee's payslip and count how many CPF lines it shows. One line across several components is the one that generates emails.
Module 05
Bank file upload and payment practicalities
This is the module that fails quietly. Confirm the exact file format your bank accepts, then confirm the payroll system produces it. Test with one small run before the first full cycle.
DBS and MAYBANK are named among Financio's supported bank integrations in Singapore, and both appear in payroll transfer workflows. If your banking setup is unusual — a second signatory arrangement, a foreign currency account, a corporate card covering reimbursements — treat this as the first question rather than the last.
What to test in the demo
Ask the vendor to produce the upload file, then send it through your bank's test process before you sign anything.
Section 01
Accounting handoff: journals, not re-keying
The final test is what reaches your ledger. Payroll generates accounting entries and someone has to get them there. Compare the three patterns honestly, including the one where a human retypes it.
Approach
Approach
What a month-end looks like
Read
Where it works
Watch
What to check first
Single-suite posting
One login, one system of record
Posting happens automatically as part of the run; the payroll entry appears in the ledger without a separate export step. Financio moves between accounting and payroll in one login.
Practices that want the payroll entry in the same ledger the client already opens every morning.
Ask to see the journal, not the integration logo. Confirm the account codes it lands in.
Connected apps
Separate systems, one link between them
Payroll sits in its own system and an integration moves the data across — an ABSS Accounting connection, or Xero's payroll app connections. The link has its own failure modes.
Businesses that already live inside one accounting platform and don't want to move the ledger.
Find out what happens when the sync fails midway through a run. Is there a queue, or do you start over?
Manual re-keying
A report printed and entered by hand
Someone reads the payroll report and types the numbers into the ledger. It works, in the sense that a hand-cranked engine works.
Very small teams, or one-off months where the volume doesn't justify a connection fee.
Every manual entry is a reconciliation item next month. Budget the hours before you choose it.
Section 02
Work backwards from your month-end
If you can describe what happens between the last timesheet approval and the journal landing in the ledger, you can evaluate any platform against it in an afternoon. This is the sequence to walk through.
-
01
Close the timesheets
All hours approved and locked. Any rejection reopens the gate before calculation begins.
-
02
Settle the exceptions
Joiners, leavers, bonuses, unpaid leave and work-pass changes get resolved against the current month.
-
03
Calculate with CPF and SDL
Rates applied per component, not as one CPF line. Check the treatment of allowances and reimbursements.
-
04
Issue the payslips
Each employee can retrieve their own itemised slip on demand rather than emailing HR for a copy.
-
05
Bank file and journal
Upload the payment file your bank accepts, then confirm the journal lands in the ledger before month-end closes.
Section 03
Seven questions worth resolving before you commit
Each of these is a place where a system can look complete on the brochure and still leave your month-end carrying an open item. Take them to the vendor and ask to see the answer live.
Condition B
Leave encashment on a final settlement
The balance must be deducted automatically and the payout treated correctly for both CPF and income tax reporting.
Condition C
Approval arriving after the run calculated
The run should refuse to finalise, not quietly go provisional. Confirm what the operator actually has to do next.
Condition D
A mid-month joiner with pro-rated CPF
The most common place shortlists get eliminated. Ask to see the pro-ration logic, not a fixed example you already ran.
Condition E
Your bank's exact upload format
Confirm with your bank first, then match the payroll system to it. DBS and MAYBANK appear in Financio's supported integrations; unusual setups need extra checking.
Condition F
Journal lands in the right account codes
See the actual entry, not the integration badge. Ask which ledger accounts the payroll components map to on your chart.
Condition G
Employee self-service for payslips
Can an employee retrieve their own slip without contacting HR? If not, that is a permanent operational cost disguised as a feature gap.
Resolved when
All seven answers are on the same sheet
Once you have every answer written against the same list, comparing platforms stops being an opinion poll and becomes a short, decisive review.
Bringing it together
You do not need the perfect system. You need the one whose gaps you already know.
Once you have the seven answers written down, the comparison gets short. Some platforms will eliminate themselves on the pro-rated CPF test. Some will survive the bank file question and then fall over on the journal. The survivors are the ones whose gaps you have decided you can work around.
If you are comparing specific platforms side by side, our platform comparison covers the accounting and payroll tools that fit Singapore SMEs — Xero, ABSS Accounting, QuickBooks Online Singapore, Financio, SimplePay and the payroll apps that connect to them. Each entry notes what the platform is good at, what it is not, and which of the five modules above it handles well.
Bring your requirement list to us and we will walk through it in the same order — the pay run first, the dashboard last.
Common questions
The questions we get asked most when shortlists are being drawn up
If your question is not here, send it through — we answer one-off questions the same way, without trying to steer you toward a specific platform.
Send us your requirementsIs a suite always better than separate accounting and payroll apps?
Not always. A single-suite posting removes a class of reconciliation work because there is no export step — that suits practices whose clients open the same ledger daily. Connected apps suit businesses already committed to one accounting platform and unwilling to move the ledger. The right answer depends on which failure you can tolerate more easily: a sync that fails part-way, or a second system to keep in step.
Do we need timesheet approval if everyone is on a fixed salary?
Mostly not. For fixed-salary offices, the module is mostly dead weight — the exception being overtime, unpaid leave deductions, and any commission that depends on days worked. Paying for an approval gate you never use is one of the ways a comparison table misleads: every module weighed equally when your payroll does not use them equally.
How much does a wrong leave balance actually cost?
It depends on how long it goes unnoticed. A single miscalculated encashment on a final settlement becomes a payroll correction, a letter to the employee, and a revised entry. If the same error repeats across a team, it also becomes a reconciliation item in the accounts. The cost is not the adjustment itself — it is the trail of small corrections that follow it.
Can we start with one module and add the rest later?
Yes, and many Singapore SMEs do — most commonly starting with payslip generation and CPF computation before adding leave management. The thing to check first is whether the modules you are deferring will integrate cleanly when you turn them on, or whether they will force a migration. Ask that question in the same demo.
What about outsourced payroll — does this same evaluation apply?
Partly. The exception list and the bank file question still apply, because you will still be handing over the same inputs. Leave management, timesheet approval and payslip delivery become the provider's tools rather than yours, but the accounting handoff question stays — you still need to know how the payroll entry reaches your ledger. If you are weighing this route, our comparison of outsourced and in-house payroll covers it in more detail.
Where to go next
Put the seven answers next to two platforms and the choice usually makes itself
Send through your exception list and we will write back with the questions that matter against your specific month-end, without pushing a platform you have not asked about. Or read through the platform comparison first and take your notes into a demo with structured questions ready.
Awaiting your exception list
LedgerLane is a Singapore learning hub for the people who run their first payroll month and the ones who have run a hundred. We publish guides like this one, and we answer questions directly.
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