PeopleHR: HRIS Integration

If you use PeopleHR, you can integrate with Pento using PeopleHR’s API, which helps to reduce time spent entering employee details for payroll.

Setting up Integration in PeopleHR

Generating the API key

To set up the integration in PeopleHR, an admin user has to generate an API key in the PeopleHR account.

To generate the API key, you will need to follow the steps below:

1. Log into PeopleHR
2. Navigate to the Settings page from the left sidebar
   
3. Select API Credentials
   
   
4. Select Generate a new API Key (the plus button)
   
   
5. Fill in the Name of the API Key and click on each row in the Application table. This will open a new window with a list of permissions. Please select all of them.
   
   
   
6. Select Save

You should now have a new API Key.

Connecting to PeopleHR in Pento

To connect to PeopleHR, you will need to follow the steps below:

1. Navigate to Settings from the left sidebar
2. Under the Integrations heading, select Overview
3. You will see an icon for PeopleHR; click Integrate
   
4. Once you have selected Integrate, the following pop-up will appear:
   
5. Insert the API Key previously generated in PeopleHR. You can select the Copy button from PeopleHR to paste it into Pento.
   
6. Once entered, select Integrate.

You should now be fully connected.

Settings 

Once connected, you should be directed to the Integration settings screen; you will need to set up your settings and map the fields you require between PeopleHR and Pento.

Pause syncing

Please toggle on Pause syncing if you need to update data directly in Pento and do not want it to be overwritten by the data in PeopleHR. You can unpause the sync at any point; however, if you do not update the data in PeopleHR, the values in Pento will be overwritten with those from PeopleHR. 

Termination and Holiday pay pension settings.

Please toggle on include holiday pay in pension calculations if you wish for termination pay & termination holiday pay to be included in pension calculations by default. Do not toggle this option if it varies from employee to employee.

Sending payslips via PeopleHR

Please toggle on send additional payslips via PeopleHR if you wish for your employee's payslips to be uploaded to PeopleHR and via email to the employee email addresses defined in PeopleHR and Pento.

Syncing employee salaries from PeopleHR

Please toggle on Sync employee salaries from PeopleHR if you wish for your employee's salaries to be synced from PeopleHR to Pento.

Excluding employees from being synced

To enable this, please refer to our below article

Mapping Fields

You will also see mapping fields similar to the below screenshot. The fields on the left represent the fields on Pento, whilst the fields on the right represent the fields on PeopleHR. You can map any field from PeopleHR to Pento. Once mapped, the data will sync from PeopleHR to Pento.

How to amend your Settings

You may need to amend your settings in Pento to enable or disable synced fields, amend the payslips and/or termination pay settings, and remove and/or add any employee filters. To do this, you will need to follow the steps below.

1. Navigate to Settings from the left sidebar
2. Under the Integrations heading, select PeopleHR
   
   

How the sync works in Pento

Understanding how the data is synced from PeopleHR to Pento is helpful to ensure your Employee's details are accurate and up to date.

Syncing is executed when Pento is first connected to PeopleHR (described above), each time the integration settings are updated in Pento and every hour.

Pento will check for any changes to the mapped fields on employees.

How Employee data is synced

Employee data is synced using the Employee ID, i.e. If there is an employee with the same ID on Pento and PeopleHR, the employee data in Pento will be populated with the employee data from PeopleHR for the fields defined in the Mapping settings. Any fields defined as Do not map will not be synced.

New Starters

Any new employees should be added to PeopleHR using a unique and previously unused Employee ID. Once you have added them to PeopleHR, as long as the Employee ID is not present on any active or terminated record in Pento, a new employee record will be created for them.

Please refer to our help article How to Add a New Starter to Pento for further guidance. 

Syncing individual employees

If you are connected to PeopleHR, but an employee's data is not syncing, you can pull through the updates by syncing an individual employee. To do this, you will need to follow the steps below:

1. Navigate to Employees from the left sidebar 
2. Search for the relevant employee
3. To the right of the employee details, select "Actions"
4. Select Sync now

You will also see a timestamp with the last time and date an employee was synced. Once you have triggered Sync now, you will see a successful banner and an updated timestamp.

You can also sync individual employees if you have paused syncing in your PeopleHR settings in Pento. 

Sync Indicator ⚡️

The sync indicator highlights which fields are linked to other systems, like your HRIS or HMRC. Basically, it's a heads-up that if you change something in Pento, it'll get updated with the latest info from those other systems the next time Pento syncs up with them.

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.

You can see the indicator in your employees' profile:

In the Salary tab:

And on the payslip:

Frequently Asked Questions

I updated my employee's data in PeopleHR. Why hasn't it synced with Pento?

Syncing is executed every hour; however, you may need to wait a short period for it to update. You can force the sync through by syncing individual employees.

Alternatively, it could be that the information on PeopleHR was entered in an invalid format for Pento; see further guidance on accepted formatting here. If this still doesn't pull the changes through, you will need to contact support, who will be able to help.

Employees are showing as Pending in the Employees list.

Employees will only show as Ready once all the required information has been synced. Please refer to our help article on How to ready your employees for payroll and ensure the data is entered on PeopleHR.

I need to finalise my payroll, but some employee data is yet to sync. What should I do?

If you are unable to wait for a sync to execute and syncing individual employees has not worked, you can update Pento directly. However, once the sync has been completed, the information on Pento will be overwritten with the data from PeopleHR. It will update the fields in Pento to blank if it is invalid.

Alternatively, you can pause syncing in your integration settings, update Pento directly and unpause the sync once the payroll has been submitted. You will need to make sure any changes you made to Pento are updated in your HRIS if you require them to be synced going forward. 

I updated Pento but not PeopleHR.

As PeopleHR is the source of truth for Pento, you will need to ensure any changes you make on Pento are the same in PeopleHR. Otherwise, the values in Pento will be overwritten with those in PeopleHR; if the value of these fields in PeopleHR is null or empty, this will overwrite any values you add directly to Pento.

Are Title and Gender mapped from PeopleHR to Pento?

Due to HMRC requirements, we must report an employee's Gender and Title on the FPS each month. Currently, HMRC requires the title to match the gender normative associated with a title. Therefore, Pento syncs the Gender from PeopleHR and assumes its Title.

Once I have confirmed Payroll, does the information still sync from my HRIS?

No further changes can be made if a payroll awaits approval or confirmation. This means any changes affecting the payslip calculations are not synced, e.g. salaries. Once the payroll has been processed and paid, the sync will be re-enabled, and salaries will be backdated as appropriate. Data that does not affect the payslip values, e.g. bank details, will continue to be synced regardless of the payroll status.

Pento has not synced with PeopleHR for a few days, but the sync is not paused.

This can happen if you have multiple plugins in PeopleHR or two Pento integrations. PeopleHR has a rate limit (usually 50), but they can increase this when you reach out to them directly and ask to increase the rate limit.  

If an employee changes bank details in the HRIS after the payroll has been confirmed, will the net pay go to the new bank account?

The payment details are locked in for the transfer one day before your scheduled payday. If the employee's new bank details sync to Pento before this day, they will get their salary paid into their new bank account.