The Flexipay feature to support HMRC Notifications is used to download a list of notifications from HMRC to apply them to Employees. These include the following messages:

 

·         P6

·         P6B

·         P9

·         Student loan start

·         Student loan stop

·         Postgraduate loan start

·         Postgraduate loan stop

 

When a user clicks Download messages, Flexipay will log into the HMRC gateway to attempt to retrieve Notifications. It will log in using the HMRC Gateway User ID of the first Company. After a password has been entered, Flexipay will download all Notifications for all registered PAYE schemes assigned to that ID and save them to the ‘Common’ folder in your Flexipay directory. This includes Notifications for companies not included on the current data set being used in Flexipay. It will then try and match the downloaded Notifications to this Company. It will then move onto the next Company in the Flexipay directory, and check to see if it has a different HMRC Gateway User ID. If so, it will prompt another download using the new HMRC Gateway User ID and password. Then, whether or not it needed to download additional Notifications, it will match Notifications belonging to the current Company. It will then continue to repeat this process for all companies in all datasets in the Flexipay parent directory until all Companies have had their Notifications downloaded and matched.

 

This means that if an HMRC Gateway User ID is connected to multiple companies, you may be prompted to download messages not intended for the company you are currently running a payroll for. Flexipay will then process any downloaded Notifications for any dataset in the same parent folder, including the current dataset in use. As a result of this, if you swap to a different dataset in the same Flexipay directory to a company using a PAYE scheme associated to that HMRC Gateway User ID, the notifications will already be downloaded and matched. This minimises the number of times that a payroll administrator with multiple companies using the HMRC Notifications system needs to run the Download messages function.

 

For example:

 

A payroll administrator uses Flexipay to run payrolls for 5 different companies (Company A, B, C, D, E). The datasets for Companies A-D are in the same Flexipay parent directory, and the administrator does not use Flexipay for Company E.

 

The payroll administrator has two separate HMRC Gateway User ID’s. One has PAYE schemes for Companies A, B and C, as well as a PAYE scheme for Company E. Another HMRC Gateway User ID has PAYE scheme for Company D.

 

Flexipay currently has Company A’s data set loaded, and the payroll administrator clicks Download messages in Flexipay, and goes through the process of downloading and matching the Notifications. The notifications are applied to all relevant Employees in the entire parent directory, so even though they currently are ‘using’ the data set for Company A, Companies B and C will also have their Notifications matched. Company E’s notifications will be downloaded, but will not be matched to any Employees as they are not present in any data sets in the parent directory.

 

To download and match the Notifications for Company D, the payroll administrator will be prompted to log in to the relevant HMRC Gateway User ID during the Download messages process.

 

As a result of one use of the Download messages function, Companies A, B, C, D and E will be downloaded, and the Notifications are matched to Employees. Please note that Company E’s Notifications will still be downloaded, even if they have no data present in Flexipay whatsoever - this is because they are connected to the same HMRC Gateway User ID.

 

Note: Flexipay will not attempt to match Notifications to your company if they are not intended for it. Flexipay will only match Notifications to Employees by using the NI number provided, as well as the surname and works number. The works number corresponds to Flexipay’s record of the Employee’s payroll reference.