Benefits and Contributions

This section explains payroll terms that sit at the boundary between compensation, leave balances, reimbursements, and workplace plans.

Use it when the main question is not just “what was earned,” but also:

• what was deducted from pay for a plan
• what the employer funded separately
• whether a benefit changed taxable pay
• whether a reimbursement was taxable
• how paid leave balances move through payroll

Start here if you are trying to understand why a paycheck includes plan deductions, benefit-related value, PTO balances, or reimbursements that do not behave like ordinary wages.

Current pages:

• PTO explains the broad payroll concept of paid time off.
• Accrued Vacation explains vacation buildup tracked across payroll periods.
• Employee Contribution explains payroll amounts funded by the employee through pay.
• Employer Contribution explains payroll-linked plan funding paid by the employer.
• Fringe Benefit explains compensation-related benefits that still matter in payroll.
• Taxable Benefit explains when a benefit has payroll tax or reporting significance.
• Imputed Income explains payroll-recognized income value that is not just ordinary cash pay.
• Taxable Reimbursement explains when a reimbursement still has payroll tax or reporting significance.
• Non-Taxable Reimbursement explains the contrasting payroll treatment for reimbursements handled without the same tax effect.
• Benefit Arrears explains previously unpaid benefit-related deduction amounts payroll still needs to recover.
• 401(k) Payroll Deduction explains a U.S.-specific plan-linked payroll deduction.
• RRSP Payroll Deduction explains a Canadian retirement deduction handled through payroll.

In this section

• 401(k) Payroll Deduction
  What a 401(k) payroll deduction means in payroll, how it affects pay, and why it is treated as a plan-linked deduction.
• Accrued Vacation
  What accrued vacation means in payroll, how leave balances build over time, and how the balance differs from vacation pay already issued.
• Employee Contribution
  What an employee contribution means in payroll, how it reduces take-home pay, and how it differs from employer-funded contributions.
• Employer Contribution
  What an employer contribution means in payroll, why it matters to employer-side payroll cost, and how it differs from employee deductions.
• Fringe Benefit
  What a fringe benefit means in payroll, why benefit value can still affect payroll records, and how it differs from ordinary wages.
• Imputed Income
  What imputed income means in payroll, why non-cash value can still affect payroll tax treatment, and how it differs from ordinary cash pay.
• Non-Taxable Reimbursement
  What a non-taxable reimbursement means in payroll, why some repayments stay outside taxable wages, and how it differs from taxable reimbursement.
• PTO
  What PTO means in payroll, how paid time off enters the pay run, and how it differs from vacation-only or sick-only pay treatment.
• RRSP Payroll Deduction
  What an RRSP payroll deduction means in payroll, how it affects pay, and why it matters in a Canadian payroll context.
• Taxable Benefit
  What a taxable benefit means in payroll, why benefit value can affect taxable wages, and how it differs from a deduction or ordinary pay.
• Taxable Reimbursement
  What a taxable reimbursement means in payroll, why some repayments still increase taxable pay, and how it differs from non-taxable reimbursement.