Fuss-Free Payroll: 5 Tips to Streamline Your Business Payroll Process

Payroll. It has to be done, but it’s not a task we tend to look forward to. There are ways to make the business payroll process a little easier and more simple, however, and it’s not difficult to implement them.

If you’re interested in making the process less complicated, check out our five tips below.

1. Go Paperless

It’s 2020 — there’s no need to be using paper in your company’s payroll process, be it for checks, pay stubs, or anything else.

Simplify and streamline the process with payroll processing software. You can access a modern pay stub generator here, while you can utilize electronic time tracking too. Then there’s direct deposit—this gets rid of the need to print checks, get them to employees, and deal with any lost or misplaced checks.

2. Outsource the Payroll Process

This is a good option for smaller businesses in particular, as it can make the process a lot more efficient. Perhaps you struggle to afford full-time workers to deal with payroll, or it’s just not cost-effective for you.

Outsourcing your payroll will not only make your business more efficient but get rid of excess costs too. You can pay more attention to other aspects of your company, safe in the knowledge that the payroll process is being taken care of by people who know what they’re doing.

3. Ensure Systems Are Connected

It’s sensible to go for a payroll process system that integrates both tracking software and payroll software together, particularly if your employees track their own time.

Instead of spending valuable business time entering everyone’s hours into your payroll system, you can let the information transfer over and check that everything’s right. Mistakes are less likely too, as the data is transferred over by the system — there’s less opportunity for human error.

4. Create a Checklist

Make sure that you follow the same process each time.

It makes everything easier, and reduces the chance of little mistakes popping up — both yourself and your employees will thank you later!

Put together a checklist complete with every task you need to do, potentially consulting an accountant in the process until you feel comfortable working with the checklist. Then, you can create more checklists to deal with arriving and departing employees, as the procedure here will of course be different.

5. Timesheet Delegation

Rather than outsourcing, or employing a specialist in-house team, you could let employees manage their own timesheets.

Once they’ve filled out their timesheets, you’ll just need to approve it — fortunately, your employees are likely to fill out and process their timesheets accurately, as they’ll want to be paid properly. You can set up a digital system for them to submit their timesheets to you for approval, making the process a lot easier.

Getting Started

The payroll process can be long and often more complicated than it needs to be. If you’re wondering how to process payroll, get started with one or two of these tips and see if they increase your company’s efficiency and lowers costs too — of course, not all tips will be appropriate for each individual business, so consider what works for you!

Looking for more business tips? You’re in the right place — check out some of our other posts.