Business Payroll Policy Tips
November 12, 2018
Your payroll is the lifeblood of your business, and it’s imperative that you know how to manage payroll correctly if your business is to succeed. Even if you are a small business, payroll policy is critical for reducing mistakes and avoiding confusion both within your organization and when dealing with the IRS. Here are four systems you should be sure to have in place when it comes to payroll procedures.
1. New Employee Processing
If you ever plan to have new employees in your organization, you must have a plan in place to get them into the system quickly and make sure they start getting paid as soon as possible. Your system should allow you to differentiate between contractors and employees quickly. Plus, whoever processes the new employees should know exactly what paperwork needs to be filled out — tax withholdings, direct deposit, benefits, etc. — and how it should look when completed.
2. Hourly Employees
Unless all your employees are salaried, you need to have a system in place for hourly employees to accurately record their hours for every period they work. There are software programs that take the place of the classic “time clock” for this purpose, but you need to have a way to verify the hours are being logged correctly to avoid overpaying employees.
3. Paycheck Preparation
Remember, the number on your employee’s payroll is not just the raw amount of their salary broken down into a bi-weekly or monthly total. Those are your employee’s gross wages. You must also calculate any benefit costs they are responsible for, social security and Medicare withholdings and tax withholdings. Again, any mistakes here could create government red tape you would like to avoid.
4. Paycheck Issuance
Most companies today are realizing direct deposit is a far more efficient way of paying employees than handing out a paycheck manually every couple of weeks. Employees prefer it because they know they will get paid faster and according to schedule, and employers don’t have to worry about making sure to connect employees with their paychecks.
Still, it’s important to make sure your direct deposit system is working as it is supposed to and that all employees are inputted into the system correctly. This can sometimes get tricky when some employees call in sick or go on vacation, or when you’re dealing with part-time or temporary employees.
Count on BCM Payroll Serivces, Inc. for All Your Payroll Needs
If all these policies seem like a bit of a headache, you’re not wrong — they sometimes can be. That is why many companies are turning to third-party payroll services like BCM Payroll Services, Inc. for their payroll management. We can handle it all, from inputting new employees into the system to managing direct deposit and making sure to manage all your tax issues correctly. You get to offload the headaches of payroll to us and concentrate on doing what makes your company great.
If the idea of eliminating the stress of payroll management from your company sounds appealing to you for your business in southcentral Pennsylvania or western Maryland, please contact us at 717-264-7374 or get in touch with us online for a free quote.
