Welcome to the Spring '26 Tempus Update. This quarter we've focused on making Tempus easier to use, easier to learn and easier to trust, and this article brings together the changes we think matter most to you.
The biggest change is our new support site, the one you're reading this on. We also cover the checks we run behind the scenes on every pay run, where we're at with the Employment Leave Act, a change to how we help you with your IRD payments, and a small but important change to the Tempus brand colour.
Our new support site is a big step forward from the one it replaces. It is on brand, it works as well on a desktop as it does on a phone, and it is designed to suit everyone, whatever your level of Tempus knowledge.
What we hope you'll notice first:
Built mobile first. Every page is designed for a phone before it is scaled up to a desktop, so it's easy to use wherever you happen to be.
Screenshots open full screen. You can view any screenshot full screen without downloading it, and pinch to zoom in on the detail.
All of our forms in one place. Every Tempus form now lives together on the Forms page, and each one is much easier to use.
Two forms in particular have made the move: the Tax Code Declaration (IR330) and the KiwiSaver Deduction Form (KS2). Your staff can now complete both of them themselves, directly on the support site, so you no longer need to manage that paperwork yourself.
These two forms decide how much comes out of each pay. The IR330 sets the tax code so the right PAYE is deducted, and the KS2 sets the KiwiSaver contribution rate.
When your staff open either form on a mobile, a step-by-step wizard guides them through it, right through to the signature, which they simply draw on their phone screen.
Alongside these you'll also find "New Employee Request", "Request Final Pay", "Update Working Pattern", "Change of Employment Type" and "Time Clock Lease Request" for our non-staff member users of Tempus.
We've consolidated and added to our rostering guides for clients who use Tempus rostering, which you'll find in the Rostering section. We've also added around 20% more end user guides, most notably for the time clock, which we've expanded further.
We understand our explanations can sometimes be a little technical. So every article now has an "Ask ChatGPT", "Ask Copilot", "Ask Gemini" and "Ask Claude" button, which takes the article topic to the AI assistant of your choice, so you can have it explained a different way.
We considered publishing a simplified and a standard version of every article. Instead, we've chosen to keep one article per topic, put our effort into more screenshots and diagrams, and give you this option for the times you'd like something explained differently.
⚠️ Note: We can't control what an AI assistant chooses to read, or how it answers. Please check anything important against the article itself, and contact Tempus Support via support@payrollbytempus.com if you're unsure.
Third party integrations in one place. All of our third party integrations are being consolidated, so they're easier to find.
Richer guides. Expect more screenshots and diagrams, and in the future we hope to add videos and the ability to have an article read out loud.
Watch this space. We take pride in the support we provide, and we're only getting started!
Much of the quality assurance on a pay run happens where you can't see it. Behind the scenes, we run a series of checks against every Tempus pay run before it goes out the door. This quarter we reviewed those checks, and we are now checking nearly 100 things per person, per pay run.
They range from the very simple to the very easily overlooked, for example:
Is the person being paid at least the minimum wage? For most of the year this is a non-event, but it becomes a challenge around April, when the minimum wage changes.
Has daylight saving been accounted for? It doesn't happen often, so it is easily missed.
Was a public holiday an otherwise working day for a casual employee who worked on it? This is one of the more dreaded questions in payroll.
These checks sit over and above what the Tempus platform does as standard, and we run them on every pay run, whether you realise it or not. We're proud of that, and we're excited to keep improving them, both for the Holidays Act as it applies today and as we look ahead to the Employment Leave Act.
The Employment Leave Act 2026 will replace the Holidays Act 2003 on 6 August 2028. Until that date the Holidays Act 2003 continues to apply, and employers cannot begin following the new Act early.
We know the date, but like everyone else we're still waiting on detailed guidance from MBIE, the specific, practical direction a payroll eco-system needs in order to be built correctly. That puts us in something of a holding pattern for now, and we're comfortable with that. We're aware of what is coming, we're keeping a close eye out for that guidance, and there is nothing you need to do today.
🌐 Employment New Zealand | Changes to leave coming in 2028
⚠️ Note: This article provides a general overview of changes to leave law. If you have any questions relating to a specific employee's agreement or your legal obligations, please contact Tempus Support via support@payrollbytempus.com or seek employment relations advice.
Earlier this year, Akahu payments were available to some Tempus clients. Following a change in market conditions, they are no longer available. We have no return on the horizon, though we would certainly welcome one, as it was a fantastic piece of technology.
We explored other ways of including the IRD amount in your payment file, which would have kept your IRD obligations up to date and kept payments quick. It came down to the banks, who asked that tax payments be made through their own pay tax feature rather than through a batch payment file. We acknowledge the banks' requirements, and so we've changed how we communicate a finalised pay run.
When we finalise a pay run, we now give you an estimate of the amount you need to pay the IRD, and an estimate of the date it needs to be paid by. This applies whether you pay the IRD once a month or twice a month.
When you receive the batch file to pay your staff, you can use that estimated amount and due date to schedule your IRD payment through your bank's existing pay tax function.
⚠️ Note: Both the amount and the date are estimates.
You may have noticed that Tempus looks a little different. We've moved away from a predominantly black brand colour to a darker blue.
It is visually refreshing, but the main reason was accessibility, to make Tempus easier to see for people with limited vision. Thank you to everyone who took part in the consultation for this change.
We call it "new blue", and it now runs through everything from Tempus itself, to this support site, to the experience on our time clocks.
The Tempus team is here to support you. If you have any questions, comments or feedback about anything in this update, please email support@payrollbytempus.com and we'll happily look into it for you.