BambooHR integration

Integrating BambooHR with UK Payroll allows your to easily sync employee payroll details. See BambooHR’s API for more detailed information.

How to connect to BambooHR

1. From the left side bar, navigate to Settings.
2. Under Integrations, select Overview.
3. Click Integrate in the BambooHR tile.
4. Enter your BambooHR company domain in the Subdomain field and click Integrate.
5. Enter your login details into the BambooHR pop-up to complete the connection.

   Note: A full admin user, who has full access to employee data, should log in to BambooHR.

For more guidance on BambooHR integration, see BambooHR’s Using OpenID Connect to Authenticate and Retrieve an API Key.

How to set initial BambooHR settings

Once you have logged in successfully, you’ll need to check that BambooHR is set up to sync correctly to UK Payroll in the BambooHR settings pop-up.

1. In the Setup tab, decide when new joiners to BambooHR should be synced to UK Payroll (Immediately, Monthly, or Monthly, with a custom cutoff day). Click the radio button next to your choice.
2. In the Documents tab, select which documents you’d like to send to BambooHR, in addition to via employee email. Mark the boxes next to the relevant documents, and select the Destination folder in BambooHR from the dropdown menu.
3. Click Save & enable.

You will also need to map your BambooHR fields (right side) against UK Payroll’s fields (left side). This will allow the data to sync to UK Payroll correctly.

Note: Select Do not map for any optional fields you don’t want to sync from BambooHR, or for fields that aren’t available in BambooHR. Additionally, multi-list fields can’t be ampped and won’t appear for selection as each UK Payroll field can only accept one value.

How to edit general BambooHR settings

From the left side bar, navigate to Settings > Integrations > BambooHR. Here, ****you can toggle the following settings:

• Pause syncing: This setting is used to update data directly in UK Payroll. When this option is toggled on, the values in UK Payroll are overwritten by BambooHR.

  Note: If you pause syncing, it will not affect sending payslips to BambooHR on payday.

• Sync employee salaries from BambooHR: When toggled on, this setting automatically import employee salaries from BambooHR into UK Payroll.
• Sync holiday entitlement from BambooHR: When toggled on, this setting syncs the holiday balance for terminating employees from your chosen Holiday Policy. Once enabled, choose the relevant policy type from the Choose policy from BambooHR dropdown. Mark the box to make the holiday entitlement pensionable by default.

  Tip: You can update the pensionable by default setting per employee, if required.

• Organizational structure: When toggled on, this setting imports BambooHR’s org structure and matches it to the org structure in UK Payroll.
• Exclude employees: When toggled on, this excludes employees from the sync. For more information, see Exclude employees from a HRIS sync.

  Note: You must set up the filters for employees you want to exclude before saving any initial settings. Otherwise, UK Payroll will import all employees once you have connected.

• Include holiday pay in pension calculations: When toggled on, this setting includes termination holiday pay in pension calculations by default. Don’t toggle this option if holiday pay varies by employee.
• Send additional payslip via Bamboo: When toggled on, this setting uploads employee payslips to BambooHR and sends an additional payslip to the employee email address defined in BambooHR. You can also choose a specific folder to upload the payslip in BambooHR from the Payslip Location dropdown.

FAQs

What does ⚡️ mean?
⚡️ is UK Payroll’s sync indicator. The lightning symbol highlights the fields that are lined to other systems, such as BambooHR or HMRC. It’s there to remind you that if you change one of those fields in UK Payroll, it will be overwritten by information from the linked systems when next synced.

If a field doesn’t have an integration option or it’s set to Do not map, there won’t be a sync indicator next to it.

How is employee data synced?
Employee data is synced using the Employee ID, or Employee # in BambooHR, which must be the same in both systems. UK Payroll is then populated with the employee data from BambooHR for the defined fields in Mapping.

Note: BambooHR is the source of truth for employee data. Mapped fields in UK Payroll will be overwritten with the BambooHR value, even if the field in BambooHR is null or empty.

How do I add a new starter?
New employees should be added to Bob using a unique and previously unused Employee ID. Once you have added them in BambooHR, a new employee record will be created for them in UK Payroll as long as the Employee ID is not present on any record in UK Payroll. For more information, see Add a new hire.

Note: Employees with a future employment date won’t be added into UK Payroll until their start date.

Why aren’t my employees syncing properly?
Default fields in Bamboo are not passed through in API - In BambooHR, you can set default fields so that specific fields are selected by default when an employee is created. However, when a field is set by default, it isn’t passed through in the API, so the information will not be passed to UK Payroll. To resolve this, edit the employee, reselect the information and resave.

Data is not populated in the API until the effective date is reached - In BambooHR, when you set Job Information, you pick an effective date. The information in the table will not be included in the Bamboo API until the effective date is reached. Consequently, the data will only populate in UK Payroll once the effective date is reached, and if any filters are based on data in this table, then they won’t be filtered out until the effective date is set. To resolve this, don’t populate an employee ID until the employee’s start date. Alternatively, add a custom Ready for payroll field and filter out employees set to No.

What do I do if an employee’s data is not syncing?
If you’ve just updated your employee’s data in BambooHR, you may need to wait a short period for it to update. However, if after some time, the data is still not syncing, or if you have paused BambooHR syncing, you can pull through an update by syncing individual employees.

1. Navigate to Employees from the left side bar and select the relevant employee.
2. Click Actions > Sync now.

If that still doesn’t work, the information may have been entered incorrectly in BambooHR. For more information on ensuring flawless syncs, see Ready your employees for payroll.

Finally, if you are still having trouble syncing employee data, pause syncing and update UK Payroll directly. However, once the sync does work, the information on UK Payroll will be overwritten with BambooHR data. Make sure any changes made in UK Payroll are also updated in BambooHR.

Why are employees showing as Pending?
You can check an employee’s payroll status by navigating to Employees from the left side bar. Employees will only show as Ready once all the required information has been entered into and synced from BambooHR. To ensure you have all of the necessary information in BambooHR, see Ready your employees for payroll.

I need to finalize payroll, but some employee data is yet to sync. What should I do?
If you can’t wait for a sync to execute and syncing individual employees isn’t working, you can update UK Payroll directly. However, once the sync is executed, UK Payroll data will be overwritten with BambooHR data. If the data is invalid, the UK Payroll fields will update to blank.

Does data still sync from BambooHR once payroll is confirmed?
No changes can be made if payroll is awaiting approval or confirmation. This means any changes affecting payslip calculations aren’t synced, e.g. salaries. Once payroll has been processed and paid, the sync will be re-enabled and salaries will be backdated as appropriate.

Data that does not affect payslip values will sync regardless of payroll status.

If an employee changes their bank details in BambooHR after payroll has been confirmed, will the net pay go to the new bank account?
Payment details are locked in for the transfer one day before your scheduled payday. If the employee’s new bank details sync to UK Payroll before this day, they will get their salary paid into their new bank account.

Why can’t I use the payslip uploading feature?
To use this feature, the BambooHR API needs permissions for Documents. Either create a new admin account that has the permissions for Documents turned on, or request that your BambooHR administrator update your BambooHR account permissions. For more help, contact BambooHR Support.

I’m a full admin, but I’m still being told I don’t have permission.
Sometimes BambooHR doesn’t update the permissions of the underlying API key used to authenticate UK Payroll.

1. Log into BambooHR.
2. Navigate to Settings > API Keys.
3. Hover over the UK Payroll row and press the trash icon to delete.
4. In UK Payroll, navigate to Settings > Integrations. If your BambooHR integration is still active, click Disconnect.
5. Then, re-connect with BambooHR. The system will automatically generate a new API key.