Payroll Service

The mantra for small business owners is always the same - do what you do well and contributes to the bottom line - and outsource the rest. Your time is your most critical resource - so using your precious time to process payroll is probably not the best use of time.

At a minimum, use the Payroll function embedded in Quickbooks. It's easy to use and automates many of the tedious tasks.

For almost the same price, call your local payroll service. Ask them a few questions: how long have they been in business? how many companies do they serve? are they insured and bonded? can they provide referrals? what is their average number of employees per company? who will you deal with? and most importantly - how do you submit your data? You are looking for a tech savvy company that works over the web or email - that provides input and output reports electronically - and that allows you to access your account 24/7. If they mention "Fax" - move on to the next company.

Better yet - contact a PEO in your area. The Professional Employee Organization takes payroll processing to the next level - and becomes your virtual HR department. They will handle everything from employee manuals to tax filings. Just in terms of time saved and value added - this is a great source of help for most small business owners. Beware - some PEO's use very aggressive selling techniques and hide fees that only seem to appear later. If you get the hard sell - move on to the next company. There are many PEO's serving every market - so you can be very selective. For more information - check out the PEO Association web site.