Payroll in GrantLink

GrantLink connects each employee payroll cost to the work the employee did and to the grants that can pay for that work. You can then report payroll by employee and grant. GrantLink does not run payroll, pay employees, or replace your payroll provider.

There is no payroll month to close or reopen. The live view changes as you import payroll registers, record work evidence, make corrections, and match payroll runs to QuickBooks. When you need a fixed record, save a report snapshot for the date range you choose.

The payroll workflow

1. Import a payroll register in chat. Attach your payroll CSV to a GrantLink chat and ask GrantLink to import it. Your existing export often works without renaming its columns.
2. Check what GrantLink understood. GrantLink summarizes which columns hold the employee, dates, run, currency, entity, and earnings. It asks you a question only when a required fact is missing or unclear.
3. Record where the work happened. In Allocations > Payroll, open a cost that needs attention and choose an Initiative. Name the person or record that confirms the work.
4. Assign the cost to eligible grants. If exactly one grant funds the Initiative and is eligible on the pay date, GrantLink assigns the cost to that grant. If several grants are eligible, you enter the percentage for each grant. Any amount you do not assign stays visible as unresolved.
5. Review the live result. All payroll shows every employee cost with its Initiative, grants, and history. Needs attention shows only costs that still have an unresolved amount.
6. Match each payroll run to QuickBooks. Ask GrantLink to find the QuickBooks expense lines that support each imported run. Matching reads QuickBooks data only, and GrantLink does not change anything in QuickBooks.
7. Use or save the report. Report shows payroll by employee and grant for any pay-date range. A snapshot saves as Supported when every cost in the range is assigned and every run is matched. Otherwise, you can save a snapshot that is labeled Working.

Chat and the payroll page

Use GrantLink chat to import files, ask questions, explain a cost, and request a correction. Use Allocations > Payroll when you want to review a list, the details of one cost, or the employee-by-grant table.

Chat and the payroll page read and change the same saved records. The payroll page also has an Import payroll in chat button that opens a new chat for an import.

What "Current through" means

The payroll page shows a date such as "Current through Sep 13, 2026." The date is the latest pay date among the payroll runs you have imported. It does not mean that GrantLink knows whether a later payroll run exists.

GrantLink tracks each of these conditions separately:

• Received: a payroll cost came from an imported payroll register.
• Assigned: the full cost is assigned to one or more grants.
• Matched: the imported payroll run is matched to QuickBooks expense lines that add up to the run total.
• Supported report: every cost in the selected date range is assigned, and every run in the range is matched.

Who can use payroll

Payroll is available only to organization admins. Members and viewers cannot open payroll details or change them. Payroll registers and payroll evidence files that you attach also become admin-only files.

Do not put Social Security numbers, bank details, home addresses, birth dates, tax elections, or unrelated HR information into GrantLink. For details, see Payroll Access, Privacy, and Current Limits.

Next: Import a Payroll Register.