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Overview
An Australian Banking Association (ABA) file is a type of file that can be uploaded to your Australian bank in order to process bulk payments. Easy Payslip can generate an ABA file for each of your payruns, which you can then upload to your bank to make the payments.
This ensures that you don't make any keying errors and can be a much faster way of making your wage payments every pay period.
Not all bank accounts support ABA files, but most business accounts do. If you're paying wages out of a Personal account, you probably won't see an option to use an ABA file.
Enter employee bank details
You can enter bank details for each employee on their employee record, at the bottom of the Details tab:
Enter the Account Name (generally the employee's name), BSB and Account Number for each of your employees.
Add your own bank details and download an ABA File
From the Payroll Summary screen, click the 'Download ABA File' button.
The first time you do this, you will be prompted to enter your own bank details.
Enter your BSB and Account Number. Easy Payslip will attempt to pre-populate the APCA number, which will work for most major banks. If it doesn't pre-populate, see this article: How to find my APCA Number.
Once you have entered your bank details once and downloaded your first ABA file, they will be saved and pre-populate next time. If you need to edit them, you can edit them from the same place in future.
You can see the Total Payment that will be made from your bank account — if for some reason you do not want to include a specific employee in the ABA file, simply click the row/checkbox to deselect them.
Clicking Download ABA File will save the file (with an .aba extension) to your computer.
Now, simply upload the file via internet banking to your bank and follow their instructions to execute the payment.
Make sure you double-check the amounts and double-confirm the source account in your internet banking portal before executing. It never hurts to double-check!
Frequently Asked Questions (FAQs)
Q: What do I do with the file once I've downloaded it?
A: Follow the instructions provided by your bank. "ABA file upload" + your bank's name will generally find the instructions! Some banks call it a "Direct Entry file" (or similar) but it's the same thing.
Q: Can I just pay my staff manually through my banking app, or set up a standing order instead?
A: Sure, if you want to! You don't have to use ABA Files — it's purely optional. But it can be quicker (especially if you have many employees, or your employees receive variable payments each payrun) as it saves a lot of manual entry. And it helps prevent keying errors (if you've ever paid an employee $20,000 or $200 instead of $2,000 dollars, you'll know all about that pain!)
Q: Do I have to download an ABA file for each payrun, or does an ABA file set up some kind of regular debit?
A: You have to do it every time. It's just a way of bulk automating a number of payments; it isn't setting up a regular payment, or a direct debit or anything of that sort. But once you get used to it, the process is very quick; download the file, upload it to your internet bank and process!