Payroll is our Specialty!

With the new payroll year just beginning businesses have been thinking about outsourcing their payroll or changing their provider.  Now is a good time to make that change.  

When you are a small business with just a few employees you rarely have to deal with any complex situations but when one comes along it can be confusing and there is no-one to go to advice.

As a payroll provider we deal with complexities on a monthly basis.  There will always be at least one business that we work with that has statutory sick pay or statutory maternity, paternity, adoption or parenting pay and we have to know the rules around this.  Other complexities include salary sacrifice, child care vouchers and apprenticeships, all of which have rules relating to minimum and living wage rates.

Then, of course, there are the different National Insurance letters which need to be applied according to the age of your employee.  No longer is there the standard A rate for those under retirement age and the C rate for those over retirement age. We now have M and H rates too for those under 21 and under 25.  

Businesses can claim the employment allowance of £3,000 against their employer NI contributions but there are even rules around this and there are some payrolls which are not entitled to claim it.

Some businesses will pay expenses and benefits through the payroll and it is important to know which of these have tax deducted, which have tax and NI deducted and which are not subject to any deductions.

Auto enrolment has caused more payroll complexities where employees who are not eligible to join suddenly have to be auto enrolled because they have been given an extra one off payment.  Even in this situation the payroll has to make the pension deduction and report them to the pension provider as well as providing the relevant pension communication to the employee.  There are also situations where employers and/or employees want to put more of their salary into the pension and the payroll software needs to be set up for individual employees rather than being the same for everyone.

As a payroll provider to a variety of businesses these are the things we deal with every month.  We keep abreast of the changes to payroll rules and inform our payroll customers of the changes which are relevant to their business.  Small business owners - the ones with the least amount of time and support - have to deal with all sorts of new rules being introduced and it can be overwhelming.  Outsourcing your payroll is one task that can be easily outsourced.  It is straightforward to provide the information to us and we can guarantee that it will be done correctly and on time.

Whilst we work with small businesses that have just one or two employees we also provide payroll services to employers who have more than this and in particular to a number of child care nurseries who have up to 50 employees.  Payroll for nurseries in particular has many complexities - lots of sickness, maternity, different national insurance rates and auto enrolment so we really do have to understand the rules as well as the employment contracts.

We can also take on your payroll on a temporary basis - perhaps there is a period of absence or illness and you just need someone to take the worry away for a short time rather than explaining it to someone who really doesn't understand payroll.

Payroll is generally straightforward and it seems anyone can do it until you have a situation which is not so straightforward!  Interpreting the information from the HMRC website can be confusing so that's when the knowledge gained from a payroll qualification and from practical experience is important.  Our payroll team are all qualified and keep up to date with the changes to payroll rules on a regular basis.

Getting payroll wrong makes a very unhappy employee who will question you and want to understand why their pay is different to normal.  We are proactive where our customers' employees are concerned and if they receive a tax code which seems unusual to us we will check that they understand why they have received a change.  

We want our customers to be happy with the payroll service we provide and their employees to know that they are being paid properly.

Payroll is our specialty so if you would like peace of mind with your payroll give us a call and see how we can help you.