Every payroll needs a few business days between when you approve it and when employees get paid. Your company's processing period may be anywhere between one day and three days. Learn more about processing periods.

This gives us time to process direct deposits so employees can be paid on time. Most of the time, this buffer sits comfortably before your pay period ends.

But if your payday lands close to the end of your pay period, or falls on or right after a weekend or bank holiday, your approval deadline can get pushed earlier than expected, sometimes even before your pay period is officially over. When that happens, any hours your employees work between your approval date and the actual end of the pay period won't be included in that payroll.

This is a normal side effect of how payroll processing works everywhere, not something specific to Playground. This article will show you how to handle this situation when it comes up, and how to move to a new pay schedule that avoids it in the future.

Your Options When Approval Falls Before Period End

If you notice your approval deadline lands before your pay period ends, you have four ways to handle it. Here's how each one works, along with the tradeoffs.

Option 1: Enter Expected Hours Before Approving

Instead of waiting for actual clock-in and clock-out data, you can manually enter the hours you expect each employee to work for the remaining day(s) in the pay period, then approve payroll with those estimated hours.

Pros ✅	Cons 🚨
Employees get paid on time for the full pay period, with no follow-up payroll needed.	If actual hours end up different from what you entered (someone leaves early, calls out, or works overtime), you'll need to true up the difference on the next payroll.
Keeps your payroll cadence clean and predictable.	Requires you to estimate ahead of time, which adds a manual step to your process every affected pay period.

Staff hours can be added individually under each profile.

Navigate to your My School -> Staff tab.
Click the staff member you want to add hours for.
Select their Hours tab and click Record -> Hours if you are adding additional days worked.
Select the date you want to add, and add check-in and check-out estimates.
Click Save when finished. You should then see these new hours appear when you approve your upcoming payroll.

Option 2: Approve With Missing Days, Then Run an Off-Cycle Payroll

You can approve payroll as-is, knowing it won't include the last day(s) of the pay period, and then run a separate off-cycle payroll afterward to pay employees for the remaining hours once they're actually worked.

Pros ✅	Cons 🚨
No guesswork — you pay employees for hours actually worked, not estimated hours.	Employees receive two separate payments for one pay period, which can be confusing.
Straightforward to execute since it doesn't require changing anything about your existing schedule.	Requires you to remember to go back and run the off-cycle payroll — if you forget, employees are underpaid for hours they already worked.

🚨 This is the option most likely to lead to employees being underpaid, since it depends on remembering a manual follow-up step. If this is a path you want to take, click here to run an off-cycle payroll.

Option 3: Pay by Check and Wait to Approve Until Payday

If you pay employees by check rather than direct deposit, you can wait to approve payroll until the actual pay period has ended, then hand out checks on payday (or shortly after).

Pros ✅	Cons 🚨
Captures every hour worked in the correct pay period — no missing days.	Only works if you're paying by check — not an option for employees on direct deposit.
Simple to understand: you just wait for the full pay period before approving.	Requires printing out or manually writing checks. Delivering checks to employees may be difficult if not all employees are working on the payday.

Payment methods for payrolls can be adjusted during the approval process.

From your Payroll -> Dashboard tab, click the blue Run button next to your upcoming payroll.
On the Review Employee Pay tab, you can adjust each staff member's payment method individually, or in bulk.
1. Individually: Click the blue Direct Deposit text next to each staff member and change the payment method from Direct Deposit to Manual. You won't need to change the payment method if it is already set to Manual.
2. In Bulk: Select the checkbox next to the Name column header to select all staff. Once they are selected, click the white Change payment method button and make sure Manual is selected. Click Save when finished.
Continue through the payroll approval process.

🚨 If you select to pay staff manually, you will be responsible for printing or manually writing checks. Staff will not get paid via direct deposit if their payment method is set to "Manual".

Option 4: Move the Employee Payday

You can shift your payday out by a few days for this one payroll.

Pros ✅	Cons 🚨
Allows you to pay employees by direct deposit.	Employees will have to wait longer than usual for their paycheck.
You will not need to calculate missing hours. You will simply wait to approve until the pay period closes.	You'll want to communicate the payday change clearly to your team ahead of time.

Individual paydays can be adjusted during the payroll approval process.

From your Payroll -> Dashboard tab, click the blue Run button next to your upcoming payroll.
Continue through the approval process until you reach the final step.
On this Confirm & Submit Payroll step, click the Pencil icon next to Payday.
Select a new Payday and click the checkbox next to "I confirm that the payday selected is compliant with local laws and regulations".
Click Save when finished.

🚨 Changing your payday will change the day your employees get paid if anyone is set up for direct deposit.

Our Recommendation: Switch to a Biweekly Schedule

While all four options above will get your employees paid correctly, we recommend a more permanent fix: switching to a biweekly pay schedule where the pay period ends on a Friday and pays out the following Friday.

Why This Is Best Practice

This structure builds in enough runway that your approval deadline will never fall before your pay period ends, even around holidays. Every pay period is a consistent 10 business days, so there's no guesswork about processing time, and no schedule-specific edge cases to manage.

Employees tend to love this schedule too:

Consistency: paychecks arrive every other Friday, so employees always know exactly when they're getting paid.
Predictability: unlike semi-monthly schedules, pay period lengths do not change. Employees are always paid for a 14 day period.
A natural rhythm: getting paid at the start of the weekend is a small thing that employees consistently appreciate.

How to Set It Up

From your admin dashboard, navigate to the Payroll tab and click Pay Schedules.
Click Add pay schedule and select Biweekly as the schedule type.
Set your pay period to run Saturday through Friday, with payday landing on the following Friday.
Review the calendar preview to confirm your pay periods and paydays for the rest of the year look correct.
Click Save to activate the new schedule.

Handling a Pay Period Gap When Changing Pay Schedules

🚨 Before you switch: think through the transition carefully. If your new biweekly schedule doesn't line up cleanly with your current one, you may have a gap in coverage or an overlap between the two schedules.

Gap in coverage: if there are dates between your last old-schedule pay period and your first new-schedule pay period that wouldn't get paid, you'll need to run an off-cycle payroll to cover those dates.
Overlap in coverage: if your old and new schedules both include the same dates, be careful not to pay employees twice for those days. Double-check the date ranges on both schedules before approving anything during the transition period.

💡 We recommend mapping out your last old-schedule payroll and your first new-schedule payroll side by side before you approve either one, so you can confirm every date is covered exactly once.

FAQs

Will switching pay schedules affect my current employees' pay?

Switching schedules doesn't change how much employees earn — it only changes how often and on what days they're paid.
During the transition, double-check for any gap or overlap in dates between your old and new schedule (see the callout above).
If there's a gap, run an off-cycle payroll to cover it. If there's an overlap, make sure you don't approve pay for the same dates twice.

What if I don't notice my approval deadline is before my pay period ends until after I've already approved?

Check the pay period dates shown on your approved payroll to confirm which day(s) were left out.
Run an off-cycle payroll for the missing date(s) to pay employees for the hours they worked.
Consider one of the four options above, or switching to a biweekly schedule, to prevent this from happening again.

Can I switch to biweekly in the middle of the year?

Yes, you can switch at any time — most clients transition between quarters for a clean cutoff, but it's not required.
Map out your last old-schedule payroll and first new-schedule payroll to confirm there's no gap or overlap in dates.
If needed, run an off-cycle payroll to cover any dates not included in either schedule.

Why does my approval deadline change from payroll to payroll?

If you're on a semi-monthly schedule, your paydays land on different days of the week each pay period, which can shift your approval deadline earlier or later depending on weekends and holidays.
A biweekly schedule avoids this, since paydays always fall on the same day of the week (Friday), keeping your approval deadline consistent every cycle.

Will my employees be underpaid if I approve payroll before my pay period ends?

Any hours worked between your approval date and the actual end of the pay period won't be included in that payroll.
To make sure employees are paid for those hours, choose one of the four options above — entering expected hours, running an off-cycle payroll, paying by check, or moving payday.
Switching to a biweekly Friday-to-Friday schedule is the most reliable way to prevent this from happening again.

Handle an Early Payroll Approval Deadline