Whether it is small or large, every business has to use some payroll system to pay its employees. The use of manual payroll systems decreases significantly with rapid advancement in technology. At present, some online payroll service providers are available, making the payroll calculations very easy to process, which are very complicated through manual payroll systems.
Therefore, before choosing an online payroll service for your business, there are several questions you should ask to make sure that it best suits your business needs. Here in this blog, we will look at five important questions you should ask yourself before concluding which online payroll service is best for your business.
What specific online payroll services does it provide? At present, the majority of online payroll providers offer cloud-based services to their users. Some leading online payroll providers like PAYCHEX, ADP, QuickBooks, etc., provide dozens of payroll solutions. It is important for you first to identify your requirements and then choose the online payroll service that offers everything that you need.
Following are the services that a full-service online payroll provider should offer to its customers.
- Fully automatic payroll processing that accurately calculates how much an employee should be paid after each pay period.
- Filing and paying payroll taxes to relevant government agencies.
- Reporting of new hires to the appropriate departments on your behalf.
- Paid time off (PTO) management.
- Making annual payroll reports so that you can get a clear idea of how your business operates.
- Easy mobile access through mobile-friendly apps and websites.
1.What is the pricing structure of an online payroll service?
Online payroll providers offer different pricing plans to their customers based on the extent and level of services they acquire. On average, per month pricing structure of online payroll service costs around $12 to $200 per month. However, advance plans may cost above $200 because it includes some extra services.
Some payroll providers also offer per day and employee pricing plans. Per day pricing plans usually cost around $1 to $15, whereas pricing plan ranges between $1.50 to $5 per month per employee. It is entirely up to you what kind of pricing plan you want to choose based on your company’s interests.
2. Is it safe to use an online payroll service?
As an employer, it is essential to know to what extent these online payroll providers can secure the company’s private information from the hands of hackers. These service providers usually store their payroll data in the cloud. Leading online payroll providers use 256-bit AES that can defend databases against password and login theft. Apart from this, having multiple layers of security, including controlled access, biometric scanning, and PIN restrictions, is also very important for keeping the company’s private information intact.
3. What kind of customer support services they offer?
To look for the kind of customer support that an online payroll provider offers to its customers is very important. This is because whatever the payroll service you may use, sooner or later, there will come a situation where you need help and guidance from a service provider.
For this reason, many business owners prefer to use the services of a payroll provider who offer 24/7 customer support. Many online payroll service providers offer live, real-person customer support through chat, email, and phone. Apart from this, they also provide tutorials to facilitate their users.
4. Can they scale up the services to meet the business requirements?
Another important thing is that before choosing an online payroll provider, it can scale up the services with the increasing requirements of your business. It is not practically feasible for you to change your service provider as your business grows as an employer. Therefore, it is essential to wisely choose your online payroll provider to ensure that it can handle your business needs in the long run by continuously adding services to your account.
