Business Managers Need to Answer These Five Questions About Payroll 

No matter what business you choose to be in, one factor will remain the same: the payroll process. This begins when you hire your first employee. You must pay them based on the hours they work according to their pay rate for each pay period. In addition, you need to know what to withhold for state and federal taxes, insurance, and unemployment. 

Whether your business is small, mid-sized, or a corporation, the payroll process is unavoidable. One possible time and money saver is outsourcing payroll. It’s up to you to decide if it can save you time and money along with giving you peace of mind. 

How Much Time Can You Devote to Payroll?

Whether you have a few paid workers or several hundred employees, payroll demands take a 

lot of time and attention to detail. Someone must put in major amounts of data, double checking for mistakes, for pay period after pay period.

The work demands that you be up to date on all federal and state payroll regulations. 

If you look at bookkeeping certification courses, you’ll see that they require years of work in payroll processing before being eligible to apply for certification.

There’s a lot to learn, like keeping track of benefit deductions, garnishments, new hires and terminations, and time off. 

Then there’s state and federal regulation changes. Outsourcing payroll can immediately free up time for the business owner and staff. 

Is It Cheaper to Hire or Outsource?

The costs of processing payroll can be hefty especially for a small-to-medium-sized business.

Your employees can spend many work hours on calculating payroll, training and support, keeping up with changing in tax laws, preparing and remitting payroll taxes and returns, w-2’s, new hire reporting and much more. 

When you figure out how many work hours your staff gives to payroll activities, you may decide that outsourcing may be a money saving option.

Outsourcing means you don’t have to pay employees for work not dedicated to growing your business. 

How Can You Secure Your Payroll Process?

Unfortunately the payroll process poses potential risks for any company. There is the risk of employees tampering with company files. There is the concern of how safe or secure your payroll data is on the company’s server. 

Professional financial services have technologies that can highlight varied types of issues including payroll fraud.

Outsourcing to an established, reputable firm can provide a confidential place for your business payroll data including effective backup and multiple servers. 

Do You Have Payroll Expertise?

Do you have time to research and study the ever-changing regulations, government forms and withholding rates?

There are many sources to go to but how do you decide what source to trust and how to keep up with all the state and federal regulations?

When outsourcing payroll, your business can take advantage of a team of experts whose job it is to keep up with all of the regulations as well as handle multiple areas of payroll and human resources. 

Who Can Help You Avoid IRS Penalties and Errors?

Penalties for errors with payroll tax filings can be expensive.

According to the Internal Revenue Services, 40 percent of small businesses pay penalties averaging around $900 per year for incorrect or late filings and payments.

These errors can lead to audits and further penalties, nothing any business wants to have to handle. 

Professional payroll providers must stay on top of the rules, regulations and requirements of the IRS.

By outsourcing payroll, you have a team of experts at your disposal dedicated to keeping your payroll accounts accurate and error free.

Depending on your answers to these questions, you may decide to outsource their payroll. 

This can save you time and money while giving you peace of mind to focus on other important aspects of your business.

You have no choice but to take responsibility for payroll, but, at least, you get to decide whether to keep payroll in house or outsource it.