How to Make Payroll Processing Easier For Your Business

Running payroll can be frustrating, especially for small businesses. You want to spend your company’s time and resources making an impact in your industry — not dealing with tedious administrative processes.

Thankfully, paying your employees doesn’t have to be a headache. Follow these five tips to alleviate stress and improve efficiency in your organization’s payroll processing!

Keep accurate payroll records

The first step to a painless payroll process is to keep accurate employee records. Make sure you track when your employees work, when they take time off, and when they’re entitled to overtime pay.

Documenting these details carefully will help in two main ways. First, if any wage disputes come up with former or current employees, you’ll be covered with plenty of evidence. Second, it will make your payroll process more efficient in the long run even if no conflicts arise.

Choose a payroll schedule that works for you

There are a few different payroll schedule options in the United States. The most common are:

• Weekly
• Bi-weekly (every other week)
• Semi-monthly (twice a month)
• Monthly

How often you pay your employees can have a substantial effect on your business’s cash flow — and on your worker satisfaction.

Hourly workers often prefer to be paid more frequently, since their paychecks depend on the specific number of hours they were able to work in a given pay period. Salaried employees, on the other hand, are more easily able to calculate their income and tend to be comfortable with a longer schedule.

Your payroll schedule is an individual business choice, and there’s no “right” answer. It can be helpful to align the schedules for all of your workers so your processing team can be as efficient as possible. However, if some workers get paid monthly but some get paid weekly, things can get complicated quickly.

Consider a paperless payroll process

In 2020, almost everything — from banking to job applications — is paperless, and for good reason. Adopting a paperless payroll process is not only environmentally friendly, but it’s also more efficient and allows you to keep employee records safe with less risk than storing physical copies.

Going paperless can be an investment up front, but it can dramatically cut costs in the long run. Try to eliminate hard-copy paper burdens like time sheets and physical pay stubs, if possible.

Stay on top of tax requirements

Payroll tax processing is a necessary burden that can have drastic consequences if not performed correctly. In fact, one in every three small business owners finds themselves penalized by the IRS for payroll errors.

Make sure you don’t become part of that statistic by carefully keeping up with tax requirements. You are responsible for understanding compliance laws and making sureyour organization operates within them.

This can be complicated, especially when rules change — it can be helpful to call in a third-party professional for assurance that you’re on the right track.

Have a professional do your payroll processing

If you don’t have the time and resources to build a payroll processing system yourself, you’re in good company. A cost-effective option is to outsource your payroll needs to an experienced professional who can get the job done quickly and accurately.

Payroll processing professionals have economies of scale on their side. Because they do this for a living, they are extremely familiar with the ins and outs of every step of the process.

In the long run, building a relationship with a reputable accounting firm can save you time and money — not to mention headaches. If you’re looking to get out from under the stress of payroll processing, Schumacher Sama is here to help. Contact us today to see what we can do for you!