PEOs like Justworks are a good fit for small businesses with complex hiring and potential business liability—for example, if you hire international employees or have a lot of turnover. It is also great for small businesses without in-house payroll or HR departments. Justworks is a professional employer organization (PEO) that appeals to remote teams. The company engages bookkeeping and payroll services client companies in a co-employment relationship, serving as an employer of record for your employees. Gusto is made for startups and growing small businesses with a mix of employee- and contractor-based workforces. It is best for businesses that expect to eventually expand across state lines or even globally using a workforce with a mix of contractors and employees.

How To Choose a Payroll Service

Our ranking methodologies use data from the National Center for Education Statistics, education providers, and reputable educational and professional organizations. An advisory board of educators and other subject matter experts reviews and verifies our content to bring you trustworthy, up-to-date information. Christina is a freelance editor and contributor with Newsweek’s small business team. With a passion for small business optimization and strategy, Christina has successfully launched her own business and now works to help others do the same. She has studied extensively at Arizona State University on the pre-medical track, and is now an entrepreneur, author, strategist and editor. Users can choose to either get a free trial or an introductory discount, but cannot take advantage of both offers.

How long does payroll take to process?

Full-service setup, payroll, and tax filing online, plus, valuable HR tools, and personal consultation to meet your business needs. Paychex Flex Select provides expert service to match your business needs to our solutions. Process payroll, file taxes online, and have access to online employee training and development with 24/7 support. Bookkeepers and accountants both play a role in your business’s financial health, but business owners probably chat with their bookkeepers more frequently. If you haven’t always been diligent about your financial record-keeping, most bookkeeping services will go through your old receipts, invoices and bank statements to bring your books up to date. This service usually carries an additional fee, so it’s important to price out your catch-up bookkeeping costs while searching for a bookkeeping service.

• Users mostly mention Gusto’s easy-to-use interface, which we can attest to, given our hands-on experience with its payroll process and its excellent customer service.
• Businesses that opt for full-service payroll may also receive professional assistance with regulatory compliance and have taxes filed on their behalf.
• ADP offers several payroll service options for clients under different names, including ADP Run and ADP Workforce.
• We can help you engage your workforce, increase efficiency, save time – and grow with you as your business does.
• In my experience, some parts of OnPay were easy to use while others were not.
• After inputting the code, I was asked simple questions about how I wanted to use the account, such as if I wanted to invoice clients or run payroll.

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ADP RUN is a good choice for businesses that need highly supported payroll tax compliance features in payroll software. It’s designed for companies with fewer than 50 employees, but is a good fit if you expect to grow beyond that because you could upgrade to ADP Workforce now or ADP’s enterprise platform. With FreshBooks Payroll, you can confidently pay your team in minutes. Access unlimited payroll runs, automatic payroll tax filing and payments, direct deposit, and tax forms like W-2s.

Who Is Free Payroll Software Best For?

TriNet is a professional employer organization (PEO) offering the option of payroll and HR outsourcing. Your company leases employees to TriNet—TriNet becomes an employer of record—and it takes care of HR and payroll for you. On the “payroll” page, I viewed a spreadsheet of payments earned by employees. From there, I clicked “next” and was taken to a page that flagged all issues that may hinder a successful payroll run. I could click “resolve exceptions” to work out these issues before running payroll.

• Some, like Patriot Software and Gusto, have additional fees for some services.
• You must also create thorough records for each employee, with details such as contact information, date of birth, Social Security number, salary or hourly pay rate, and number of allowances from form W-4.
• No tax prep or accrual basis accounting, even as an add-on service.
• This software is available in 67 different languages, including French, Spanish and Vietnamese, and human translation services are available for both English and Chinese.
• We look primarily at each site’s payroll processing capabilities, with additional HR support being considered a bonus.

See how Xero works for your business

• Access unlimited payroll runs, automatic payroll tax filing and payments, direct deposit, and tax forms like W-2s.
• Simply sign up and enjoy multi-user payroll software that is designed for international use.
• This was a minimal disturbance but still a disturbance that cost me time and effort to handle.
• Your accountant will probably appreciate that you’re using a trusted payroll service provider because it enables seamless data integration, reporting and payroll processing.
• Headquartered in Highland Park, Illinois, SurePayroll is one of the smaller companies on our list of best payroll services.

Online payroll software also lets you allocate funds for other earnings types and reimbursements on this same page. You can add on benefits administration for an extra fee and let employees manage and enroll in benefits through the self-service portal, as well. The employee app offers a robust self-serve interface that is efficient and not overwhelming. The initial dashboard offers key summary information and links, such as time-off and sick-day calculations, paycheck stub links, a task list and a time tracker. When running payroll manually, Gusto takes you through three steps.

The company is designed to support all business sizes, especially larger companies and those with a global presence. Its features include customizable workstreams; general ledger (GL) mapping for activity, such as earnings, deductions, and taxes; and paycheck accuracy to give businesses peace of mind. Instead, it’s an add-on to the well-known accounting platform—which offers multiple plans and pricing of its own. For the purposes of this article, we are utilizing the Essentials plan for the base accounting software price ($60 per month) and then adding a payroll plan to that monthly cost. Workful is one of the best payroll services available because time tracking features are included, while many of its competitors charge extra or don’t offer them at all. The time tracking tool automatically calculates overtime and time accrual, which can save business owners from tedious math.

• In fact, many of our clients remain with us wherever they relocate.
• ADP RUN is a good choice for businesses that need highly supported payroll tax compliance features in payroll software.
• Through TriNet’s PEO, you can outsource all of your HR and payroll functions or you can choose which functions you want to outsource and which you’d like to keep in-house.
• Two major credentialing bodies that offer nationally recognized certification or licensure are the NACPB and the AIPB.
• We use data-driven methodologies to evaluate financial products and companies, so all are measured equally.
• Adding an employee could not have been simpler in my case, though there was more manual data entry than I preferred.

Headquartered in Schaumburg, Illinois, the payroll company employs over 6,000 people, according to its website. There are also demos available, and a 30-day free trial for potential customers so you won’t buy into the service without knowing what you’re getting yourself into. While Patriot Software says its payroll platform is designed for companies with as many as 500 employees in all industries, it is not available for companies with staff working outside of the U.S. Paying workers is an essential part of any business (even a company of one). In the hustle and bustle of New York City, New York, where small businesses span diverse sectors from retail to hospitality, Bench Accounting provides a pioneering approach to online bookkeeping. ADP automatically syncs with many popular accounting software products, including QuickBooks™, QuickBooks™ Online, Xero™ and Wave, to ensure a seamless transition of your data.

ADP payroll services FAQs