I need help setting up prevailing wages and creating certified payroll reports when we pay monthly

Welcome to the Community forum, @KDawatson.

I'll provide the necessary steps to create prevailing wages and certified payroll reports in QuickBooks Desktop Payroll. 

To do so, please follow the steps below:

Step 1: Set up prevailing wages

You can set up hourly payroll items with names such as Carpentry, Electrical, or General Labor for each work classification code. These items will appear on your certified payroll reports.

Step 2: Set up job costing

Utilize job costing to monitor your employees' hours for each prevailing wage item. Refer to the guide on setting up and tracking payroll expenses by job in QuickBooks Desktop Payroll.

Step 3: Set up time tracking

Implementing time tracking can streamline the process of creating your payroll and certified payroll reports weekly. Information from time tracking will automatically populate your paychecks and certified payroll reports. Through time tracking, you'll link your prevailing wage items to the jobs you've established.

Alternatively, you can generate payroll and certified payroll reports without time tracking by manually entering all necessary information on your paychecks during payroll creation and in the certified payroll report module.

• For setting up time tracking, see Set up time tracking 
• To use QuickBooks Time, see Set up and use QuickBooks Desktop for Windows and QuickBooks Time integration 
• To use QuickBooks timesheets, see Create and print timesheets

Step 4: Set up your employees

Ensure that your employees have the following configurations:

• A weekly pay frequency.
• Utilization of time tracking data for paycheck creation, if you're using time tracking.
• Inclusion of prevailing wage items and rates.

Run your payroll using time tracking and job costing

You’ll need to run your payroll on a weekly basis, ideally using the job costing and time tracking systems you have implemented. If you are not using time tracking, manually add the prevailing wage items established in Step 1 and the respective jobs set up in Step 2 to each employee's paycheck.

Step 5: Generate a Certified Payroll Report

You are now prepared to create your certified payroll report. A full version of Microsoft Excel is necessary for this task. Additionally, this report can be used to complete the optional Certified Payroll Form WH-347. 

Furthermore, you can refer to this article for more detailed steps: Create prevailing wages and certified payroll reports in QuickBooks Desktop Payroll.

For future reference, here are some guides on fringe benefits. It includes instructions on setting up a taxable fringe benefit payroll item and explains how taxable fringe benefits impact employee tax forms:

• Create taxable fringe benefits payroll items.
• Fringe benefits and tax forms.

Additionally, you can refer to this guide for instructions on creating and processing your payroll: Create and run your payroll.

The Community is always here to support you, we're just a post away if you need assistance with managing your prevailing wage items and generating certified payroll reports in QuickBooks Desktop Payroll.

Certified payroll does not permit paying once a month. It requires weekly pay periods.