A Payroll Service Can Help You Manage Your Laundry – And Save You a Bundle in the Process
If you are a laundry owner like me and your laundry is attended, you are inevitably faced with the task of managing payroll for your employees.
And options abound.
These choices for managing payroll range from simple accounting software options like QuickBooks to hiring a CPA to do it for you… to using full-service providers like Paychex or ADP, which specialize in providing payroll services.
However, what laundry owners may not know is that, depending on the level of payroll service they choose, there are many ways to use these services to better manage their self-service laundries.
In speaking with other laundry owners, my impression is that many use basic accounting software, which can get the job done for as little as $35 per month. With this type of service you, the owner, write the paychecks yourself, and the accounting software generates a report that you then give to your CPA to file and pay payroll taxes.
For about $45 per month, accounting software will add labor law poster compliance and calculate the payroll taxes for you – and automatically fill in the tax forms that you must then submit.
For approximately $85 per month, accounting software will provide the same services, but also file the tax returns and pay the taxes for you, guaranteeing accuracy in case any tax issues arise later.
If you treat payroll as an expense, then any of these options are fine, depending on how much work you want to do yourself.
However, if you shop around, you may find even higher levels of payroll service, which may help you better manage your laundry. For example, for about $200 per month, I use a full-service payroll provider that offers all of the services as the highest level of accounting software – but with several additional features.
Administratively, these features include printing and delivering the checks to each of my laundries, as well as paying my workers’ compensation insurance each pay period, which is sometimes referred to as “paygo.” The full-service payroll provider also offers the ability to write manual paychecks and handles my unemployment claims.
Printing and delivering the paychecks frees up my time and schedule to do what I want to do, including taking a hassle-free annual vacation with my family. The workers’ comp paygo feature helps me better manage my cash flow by eliminating estimating and reconciling workers’ comp insurance, which is normally done on a quarterly basis.
And the manual paycheck feature is especially helpful if an employee resigns or is terminated. Depending on your state law, the final paycheck may have to be paid before your next payroll is processed and, even if the payroll is processed in the correct amount of time, I find it far better to give an employee his or her final paycheck on the spot, if terminated, rather than having them come back for it. Managing unemployment claims alleviates the burden of having to file the response myself, and all deadlines are met by the full-service payroll provider, including all appeals. All I have to do is provide the employee hire date, separation date and reason for separation.
The additional administrative features further free up my time and make my job as a laundry owner a bit easier – but what I really like about using a full-service payroll provider is the confidence I receive as a small-business owner in a world full of employment laws, rules and regulations. As a laundry owner focused on the day-to-day operations, it is comforting to know I have a payroll provider in my corner to help me navigate all of the employment complexities I should try to avoid and may encounter. Once you become aware of what you are up against, you may even be able to save some money or, at the very least, avoid an expensive mistake.
Fortunately, my payroll provider offers what it calls an “HR Helpdesk,” which is a toll-free number I call when I have a human resources question. Although the person on the phone is not providing legal advice, I’m made aware of the laws and regulations concerning my particular question, and I’m usually presented with several options on how to resolve the problem. What a relief!
Let me say that again – what a relief! I will spare the nitty-gritty details on some of the employment predicaments I’ve dealt with – and I’m sure there are other laundry owners with plenty of their own employment stories – but isn’t it nice to know there is someone you can call in an instant when a problem presents itself? I will add that there is probably a law, rule or regulation for just about every employment issue imagined, and I’m willing to bet that I would be in violation of some of these requirements, if not for consulting the “HR Helpdesk.”
Perhaps more importantly, the “HR Helpdesk” also provides me with a number of forms and procedures I can use to manage employees and prevent problems before they occur. For example, at no extra charge, I received an employee handbook template, which I customized to the needs of my laundry business. In addition, I received disciplinary forms that I have used to review employees and provide corrective measures to improve.
If there is a form you need to manage your employees, the “HR Helpdesk” very likely has it. I estimate that these forms alone, excluding the consultations, are worth hundreds, if not thousands, of dollars. And the “Helpdesk” gurus also are great at anticipating potential problems.
For instance, one day one of my laundries was audited to see if we had the correct labor laws posted. When my employee on duty called me with the inspector present, I was asked on the phone how often the posters are updated. Thanks to the “Helpdesk” experts, I knew the correct answer was not once a year, as proposed by the inspector, but rather whenever any laws change. Without this knowledge, I most likely would have paid a fine.
If you are the do-it-yourself type and are still somewhat skeptical, let me suggest another way a full service payroll provider can help pay for itself…
Early on, I learned from the “HR Helpdesk” gurus the correct steps and procedures to take for disciplining employees. Unfortunately, a few of these employees had to be terminated and, in some instances, they filed for unemployment benefits. If you take the time to discipline employees properly and use a payroll provider to manage and track unemployment claims, you also may be able to reduce the amount of unemployment insurance your laundry pays.
How significant can the insurance be? The answer depends on the state in which you’re located, but it can be thousands of dollars.
For example, in Texas, where my laundries are based, the unemployment insurance rate can vary from as little as 0.47 percent to as much as 7.49 percent, with an average rate of 1.54 percent. Your rate is determined by how much unemployment insurance is paid out, so the fewer claims you pay the lower your rate is. Assuming a payroll of $50,000 per year, you can quickly see how much you could save simply by reducing the unemployment insurance rate by just 1 percent.
#Public #BusinessManagement #Article #PlanetLaundry #FeaturedArticle #HumanResources
