Pay Schedules

The article provides guidance on setting up and managing pay schedules in BambooHR. It emphasizes the significance of aligning pay schedules with payroll calendars and benefit deductions. The process begins in the Settings menu, where users can create custom pay schedules and assign them to employees. Key steps include naming the schedule, selecting pay frequency, and determining pay periods and days. Users are advised to create new schedules for future changes rather than editing existing ones. The article also highlights integration with BambooHR Payroll and Time & Attendance, noting that changes to pay schedules may require employee reassignment. Additionally, it outlines restrictions on editing pay dates and the necessity of completing required fields for payroll integration.

  • Jul 9, 2026
  • Knowledge

Title
Pay Schedules
Article Text
Pay Schedules are included in Core, Pro, and Elite. It is also in included in Payroll which is an add-on.

How do I set up and manage pay schedules in BambooHR?

Purpose: To help you understand the importance of setting up your company pay schedules for your payroll calendar and benefit deduction frequencies to function accurately. Pay schedules link directly to the Compensation table data on the Job tab and coincide with Benefit plan settings.

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Do you prefer hands-on learning? Our interactive guides will show you different aspects of your BambooHR experience. We have an interactive guide specifically designed to show you how to accurately set up your pay schedules. You can use the link below to access this guide. All you need to do is modify the "REPLACEME" with your BambooHR subdomain, and you can get started!

https://REPLACEME.bamboohr.com/home?pendo=F2gkht-DB2nFs0dDv1dy_65hpX4&step=vMbsmJE1qJHUXas6mttzv3bg-fc

Set up pay schedules

To set up your pay schedules, go to Settings and click Employee Fields. Select Pay Schedule. Or, if you use the BambooHR payroll integration, go to Payroll in Settings and select Pay Schedules. From here, you can create custom pay schedules to help you identify how your employees get paid within your company. Click + New Pay Schedule (see below).

When you click on the calendar icon, a table will show the pay period start and end dates and the designated pay dates. You will want to make sure that these dates align with your current payroll schedule. Carefully set up these pay schedules to ensure the dates shown are correct before assigning employees to these pay schedules. If the dates are inaccurate, click on the pencil icon to edit the pay schedule. Then, you can assign it to your employees. 

If you determine that you do not need a pay schedule in the future, you also have the option to delete it by clicking on the trash can icon.

Add employees

You can add employees to each designated pay schedule within the Compensation table on the employee's Job tab. You can either edit the active line or click Add Entry to add a new line with the new pay schedule. Once added, you will see a number appear in the People column within Pay Schedules settings to help you identify which employees have that particular pay schedule assigned to them. You can only add or edit pay schedules from within Settings, and employees must be assigned to a pay schedule through their Job tab or through Power Edit.

Add a pay schedule

  1. Name: Be sure to name the pay schedule to distinguish it from other pay schedules.
  2. Frequency: Select the pay frequency for this pay schedule. Please note that the syncing TRAXPayroll frequency options include: Weekly, Every Other Week, Twice a Month, and Monthly. 
  3. Pay periods end on the: The options in this field adjust according to the frequency selected. Be sure to enter the correct day/date that aligns with your pay period.
  4. Pay days are: Enter the number of days between the pay period end date and pay date. This buffer gives time to approve hours worked and for the payroll admin to make sure everything is accurate for payroll.
  5. If a day lands on a weekend or holiday?: Banks are not open on weekends or bank holidays in the US. Therefore, paydays landing on weekends or holidays automatically move to the day before the weekend/holiday or the day after. Select which way works for your company.
  6. Include this pay schedule in Payroll: If you use the BambooHR Payroll integration and want to include this pay schedule in payroll, check this box. If you do not check this box, employees in this pay schedule will not sync over to Payroll. 
  7.  First Pay Period For This Pay Schedule: If you are enabling BambooHR Payroll, you will need to select the correct period start and end date for the first pay schedule in the drop-down menu and confirm the first pay date. 
  8. Hours Per Week: When Payroll is enabled, you can manually set how many hours are in a workweek for the employees assigned to this pay schedule. The default is 40 hours per week and will adjust based on the pay frequency selected. 
  9. Will all benefit deductions happen every paycheck under this Pay Schedule?: This section allows you to select whether or not your benefit deduction frequencies align with your pay schedule frequency. If you select No, section 8 will appear.*
  10. *How often should the following benefit deductions occur?: If your deduction frequencies don't align with your pay schedule, you can select the deduction frequency for each plan in this section. You will have the option to select deduction frequencies for all Active, Scheduled, or Inactive plans. 

If you need to change a specific pay date, you can do this by viewing the pay calendar on the Pay Schedule settings page. Hover over the pay date and click on the pencil icon to change the date. When updating the pay date, the following restrictions apply and will result in an error:

  • You cannot edit a pay date if the pay date for the current pay cycle is within three business days of today. 
  • You cannot edit a pay date to be within three business days of today. 
  • You cannot edit a pay date to occur on a holiday or weekend.

If you need to update all future pay dates within a pay schedule, we recommend that you create a new pay schedule with the correct pay dates moving forward. After you have created the new pay schedule, do not forget to move all employees to the correct pay schedule.

Note: If you use the payroll Integration, you will not be able to edit the pay date for the current payroll run in BambooHR. You will need to reach out to a payroll support hero to help you with this.

Time & Attendance

If you use BambooHR Time & Attendance and need to make changes to a pay schedule, you will need to create a new pay schedule and move all employees to the new pay schedule.

When you change a pay schedule for an employee, their current timesheet will remain unchanged. Once the pay period is over, the employee will be on the new schedule.

Also, you cannot add an employee to Time & Attendance until you have added them to an active pay schedule.

Payroll

You will notice that once you have created a syncing Payroll pay schedule, you can only adjust the following: 

  • Pay days are (X) day(s) after the period ends.* 
  • If a payday lands on a weekend or federal holiday?
  • Hours Per Week
  • Will all benefit deductions happen every paycheck under this Pay Schedule?

*Any changes made to these settings will impact the current and future payroll runs.

Note that you cannot edit the pay frequency once assigned to an employee because it would alter your payroll schedule, and as noted, things would get messy. To adjust this for an employee, you will need to remove the pay schedule from the employee's Compensation table line item and then reassign them to the appropriate pay schedule.

When you add an employee to a pay schedule that syncs with payroll, you will see an error message if the employee does not have data in all of the required fields for the integration. You cannot add the employee to the pay schedule until you have added all of the required information.

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