Having the right tools and processes can make all the difference for small businesses, especially during trying times. Payroll is an integral part of business operations – after all, if you don’t pay your people, they won’t do the work.
Creating a streamlined payroll calendar can help simplify this repetitive and often tedious task. This resource identifies when employees get paid, deadlines, pay periods, and significant tax dates. Here are five tips for creating a payroll calendar that helps keep your business moving forward.
Implement Smart Software
Using smart payroll software can help simplify processes, create reminders about important dates, and ensure everything is accurate and compliant with regulations. According to the experts at Checkmark, it can also provide advanced cybersecurity features such as data back-up to protect your important information (visit website for more details).
Using software helps reduce human error during your payroll process, both on the employee side and the employer side of things. Invest in intuitive software that makes timeline tracking and deadline reminders a breeze.
Create Date Alignment for Different Employees
Choosing the right payment dates can make a huge difference when trying to streamline your payroll calendar. It allows payroll processors and accounting staff to do batch work with a more efficient workflow. This streamlined approach can also save you time and money in processing fees.
The challenge is that many businesses have a variety of employees with different work and payment structures. For example, one company could have monthly salaried employees, bi-weekly hourly employees, and contracted employees working on a retainer.
Ensuring the payment dates are aligned is a quick, efficient way to use a payroll calendar to streamline your business. Just ensure your payment frequencies are compliant with state regulations. Again, using payroll software can help with this issue.
Clarify the Holidays
It’s important to understand what is expected in terms of holiday and statutory pay for your business and employees. There are a lot of variables to consider. While compensation is required for some holidays, it isn’t on others. Additionally, hourly employees might receive different compensation, depending on their schedules and terms. Furthermore, some businesses choose to pay on typically unpaid holidays as a business perk.
Take the time to clarify which holidays are paid, which are unpaid, and which have special considerations. Highlight these holidays on your payroll calendar with different labels or color themes to ensure you are prepared for variations.
Outline the Process and Corresponding Deadlines
Payday isn’t the only important thing to highlight on a payroll calendar. You’ll also need to highlight the different deadlines leading to payday. For example, employees might have to submit their timesheets four days before payday. Additionally, business owners may need to process payroll three days ahead of payday to ensure everything goes through.
The key dates and deadlines will vary from business to business, based on the software and payment structure you use. Outlining these key considerations on a payroll calendar will make it easier to create standard business processes and make payroll processing routine.
Another critical component of your payroll calendar will be the tax deadlines that are relevant to your business. Depending on your business size and structure, you may have various tax deadlines throughout the year. Missing these deadlines can cost the company a great deal of time and money.
Manage Expectations
Finally, be sure to clarify payroll dates with employees and ensure they know what’s expected of them. Manage their expectations and clearly outline their responsibilities, so that they understand what happens if they fail to submit their time sheets by the deadline. Using payroll software can help centralize important information (like time sheets) and send helpful automated reminders to you and your staff.
With these five tips, you can create a useful payroll calendar to keep your core business processes on track.
