Payroll Export

Each pay period, whoever runs your payroll needs to know what changed: who joined, who left, who was off, what to reimburse, and whose hours moved. Admin > Payroll Export gathers that for any period you choose and downloads it as CSV files.

Luna HR holds no salary, tax code or bank details, so the export goes one way and it is facts, not pay. It tells payroll that someone was off sick for three days; whether those days are paid is your payroll system's rule, not something Luna decides.

Running an export

Go to Admin > Payroll Export
Set the first day and last day of the pay period — This month and Last month fill them in for you. A period can be up to 93 days
Look through the five tabs to check what will be sent
Click Download all, or download a single list from its tab

Each list is a separate file named after the list and the period, for example payroll-absences-2026-08-01-to-2026-08-31.csv. Empty lists are skipped. Dates are written in your company's date format (Admin > Company Details).

Only administrators can open the page. Every download is recorded in the Activity Log with who took which lists for which period, because the files contain National Insurance numbers, dates of birth, home addresses and sickness absence.

What is in each list

Every row starts with the employee number, the payroll reference from the employee's record, and their name.

| List | Who or what is in it | Also includes | |---|---|---| | Starters | Everyone whose start date falls in the period | Date of birth, gender, NI number, address, email, employment and contract type, FTE, working pattern and weekly hours, job title, department | | Leavers | Everyone whose leaving date falls in the period | What was decided about untaken holiday during offboarding, and the number of days | | Absences | Agreed leave that overlaps the period | Leave type, first and last day, half days, days in the period, total days, fit note | | Expenses | Claims marked as paid by Payroll in the period | Claim title and reference, amount, currency, date marked paid, payment reference | | Changes | Changes to FTE, working pattern, employment type, contract type, job title or department made in the period | The date, and what it changed from and to |

Starters

The preview shows what payroll will still need for each starter — NI number, date of birth or address — if it isn't on their record yet. Someone who is still completing onboarding will often be missing these until they finish.

Absences

Only leave that has been approved is included. Pending, rejected and cancelled requests are not.

Days in period counts the working days of the absence that fall inside the dates you chose, using that person's own working pattern and bank holidays. An absence from Thursday 27 August to Friday 4 September 2026 is two days in an August export (the Thursday and Friday; Monday the 31st is a bank holiday) and four in September — never counted twice, never missed. The file also says whether an absence started before the period or continues after it.

Choose which leave types to include with the tick boxes above the list. To begin with, types that are not taken from an allowance — sickness, unpaid, compassionate and parental leave — are ticked, and annual leave and time in lieu are not, since payroll rarely needs them. Your choice is remembered in your browser.

Run the export after the last approval for the period has been made, so that late sickness absences are in it
If you re-run a period, the rows come out in the same order (by surname), so two files can be compared line by line
Set each person's Payroll reference on their employee record so that rows match your payroll system's own employee IDs

Employee Management — where payroll references, NI numbers and working patterns are set
Leave — leave types and approvals
Expenses — marking claims as paid
Integrations — sending expenses to Sage Accounting or FreeAgent