Thursday December 11th 2025
For payroll teams up and down the land, we know this can be one of the most hectic and challenging times of the year.
With many businesses closing for the Christmas period, it’s common for companies to pay their staff early due to office closures and staff holidays. However, it’s vital to remember the permanent easement on reporting Real Time Information (RTI) that applies during this time.
As per guidance from HM Revenue and Customs:
“If you do pay early over the Christmas period, you must report your normal or contractual payment date on your Full Payment Submission (FPS).
For example, if you pay on 19 December 2025 but your normal payment date is 31 December 2025, please report the payment date as 31 December 2025. In this example the FPS would need to be sent on or before 31 December 2025.
Doing this will help to protect your employees’ eligibility for income-based benefits such as Universal Credit, as an early payment could affect current and future entitlements.
HMRC have published important updates and information for employers on GOV.UK, which includes:
- the October Employer Bulletin 2025 which reminds employers of the permanent easement on reporting RTI over the Christmas period
- help which can be found in CWG2 where a regular payment is made early at Christmas
The overriding PAYE reporting obligation for employers is unaffected by this exception and remains that you must report payments, on or before the date the employee is paid.”
With this time of the year being something of an exception when it comes to pay runs, it’s vital that payroll teams use the earlier December pay date instead of the usual pay date. This will ensure everything runs smoothly, and there are no nasty surprises for employees or payroll teams.
So, if you’re paying your staff early this year (and you’re using our fabulous payroll software), you might want to stick around!
How to do this using Cezanne Payroll Software
Luckily, this type of operation is easy to do in Cezanne’s own in-house payroll software.
To change the date in Cezanne, do the following:
- Go to Payroll
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- company payrolls (click on the company name)
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- pay schedules – and click on the schedule you want to update
Click on ‘Edit timesheet and sickness dates’ at the bottom, then enter the same value which you had there before, then save.
Then, go to the pay period tab ➡️ click on the pencil icon on the left of the December period ➡️ edit ref date for December ➡️ click ‘Save’ and lastly, click ‘Finalise Pay Periods’
You should now be fully prepared for paying your staff early… and all without worrying about any HM Revenue & Customs pitfalls….
If you need any further assistance, don’t hesitate to raise a support ticket, and we’ll do our very best to help you out as soon as possible.
