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Sage HR Online Services - Setup checklist

Four key preparation steps to do before you integrate Sage 50 Payroll with Sage HR

Oliver Cook avatar
Written by Oliver Cook
Updated over a week ago

Before you you create your Sage HR company integrated with Sage 50 Payroll, there are some checks you must do. These can prevent avoidable issues going forward, such as employees not getting welcome emails because their email address is incorrect.

📎NOTE: Check you have your Sage account (formerly Sage ID) login details.

If you don't have a Sage account, you can create one when you set up Online Services. If you've logged in to the My Sage website before, use these details to sign in.


1. Get your employee data ready

Employee Record

Sage 50 Payroll pushes through four critical fields for the employee into Sage HR. These include:

  • First name

  • Last name

  • Email address

  • Start date

For any additional employee information, you can run a report from Sage 50 Payroll and manually enter it into Sage HR later.


2. Employee work email addresses

It is essential that you check the following:

  • Ensure all email addresses in the employee record in Sage 50 Payroll are accurate and up to date

  • Email addresses are unique for each employee. Don’t use duplicate or shared email addresses

  • Email addresses are case-sensitive in Sage HR, so ensure they're all lowercase

📌TIP: You can send out the Employee Details Verification Letter to your employees to confirm or update any details you hold about them, including their email address.

⚠️CAUTION: The email address is permanently set so we strongly recommend you use the email address the employee wants to use long term, ideally their work email address if they have one. This is because this email address may be visible depending on user levels and permissions.

If an employee only has a personal email address and it is considered unsuitable, or they don't want it to be visible in the Payroll portal, we advise that they create a new formal email address and use this instead.


3. Admin user email address

The person who first sets up Sage HR through Sage 50 Payroll is known as the Main Admin. and has full access. The main admin has their own profile in Sage HR alongside your employees and can be viewed in the company directory.

  • Make sure you get the admin email right first time, as it can’t be swapped with another email, or recreated ​

  • Don’t delete the admin user. You can only have one admin user and it is the only profile that can view all payslips

  • The email address you use for the admin profile must not be used in an employee record in payroll. The email used needs to be unique to the admin user and must not used elsewhere in Payroll

  • We recommend you have the means to ensure you can access this profile in the event of the admin user leaving the company or being unavailable


4. What to make your employees aware of

We advise you to make your employees aware of the following:

You will be using Sage HR Online Services

This is so your employees don't try to access your company via Sage Employee Online Services.

Sage Employee Online Services is a different Sage online payslips portal that some of your employees may have used when working for another employer. Make sure don't go to www.sagepayrollservices.co.uk to log in after they get their welcome email. They won't be able to access your company here.

Don't access Sage HR until you send them their welcome email

Your employees won't be able to log in to your Sage HR company until they receive a welcome email.

This welcome email will be what they use to create their Sage account login. They don't create a Sage account by going to the Sage HR website

Who their HR or Payroll admin contact is

Make your employees aware of who their payroll or HR admin contact is. This is so they know who to contact if they have payslips or pay queries or an issue using Sage HR Online Services.


Next steps

Sign in to Online Services Settings

When you set up Sage HR Online Services, you must sign into your Online Services using your Sage account (formerly Sage ID).

We explain how to do this if you already have a Sage account, and what to do if you don't.

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