Question: How do we go about in establishing year to date payroll amounts and annual, personal and long service leave balances? Can we process payrolls in the meantime or do we need this information processed before we commence our first payroll?
Answer: Create an opening balance payslip that has the correct Gross/Tax/Super etc. e.g. 01/07/2013 to 30/11/2013. You can use manual for Tax, Super should calculate but you could also use manual item there. Then run the leave report to see what leave this payslip creates and then do a leave adjustment (Setup -> Payroll -> Leave Adjustment) to insert the difference.
An alternate method is to put the actual hours worked on the opening balance payslip by type. E.g. Normal 300, Annual 12, Personal 8 and then this payslip will calculate the correct leave with using a leave adjustment.