Payroll Service - The Book-keepers Forum (UK)

Silly Digits · Senior Member

Payroll Service

RobH · Expert

Payroll is a great earner. I mainly offer it within the whole package but I have several clients for whom I do just the payroll for. I charge from £1 per payslip with a minimum £20 per month (unless it is owner managed Ltd co, whereby it gets swallowed up in all inclusive fee).

Generally clients will either email, fax or telephone the hours through and we turn it around that day. With the computer literate type companies, we now email them a payslip. I use Sage Payroll and it is really good (as a company I do not like Sage particularlyu but their payroll software is good).

My biggest two payroll client earns me about £250 per month each. One of them I only see at Christmas when he brings a few bottles of wine in, the other I see fortnightly when he collects the payslips. Once you know what you are doing is a really good 'hourly rate' and now that year end approaches I will charge them all a further £50 to £100 each for online submission and printing P60s (remember do not buy Sage P60s, order the hmrc free ones).

Silly Digits · Senior Member

Thanks Rob

Do you also do things like P45s when an employee leaves etc for your clients. If so do you fill in online.

Do you also set up as an agent for PAYE and obtain notices etc that way?

As with the payslip that you email to your clients, is this just a template payslip that you have set up?

Questions, Questions, Questions!! Sorry

RobH · Expert

All this is made easy on Sage so I guess most other software has it all built in. Sage connects to the hmrc gateway and so when codings come out the employees are automatically updated, P46s and P45s are all sent on line via the software and it has the email payslip capability too.

I know that there has been another payroll software recommended on here but I can't remember what it was called, so it may be worth a bit of research since it may be good value and do everything you need.

Wella · Expert

If you are an authorised agent or log in as your client, you can enter P45/P46 etc directly.

For some reason the (only) client I have payroll authorisation for has dissappeared of my list of clients but there is a new(?) link to allow me to do client onlibne filing only.

Sorry for the edit. Forgot to ask Rob, your Sage payroll software is it multi company?

Bill

-- Edited by Wella on Friday 19th of March 2010 01:59:19 PM

Silly Digits · Senior Member

Thanks Rob

Sage sounds very efficient for payroll. I have used the Instant payroll previously, things have moved on a lot since then. Thanks for your advice. Very helpful.

Marky65 · Guru

Hi

I have mentioned www.12pay.co.uk previously as a good low cost alternative to Sage. Sage is very good but it is also expensive. The three payroll clients I have were previously on Sage 50 so I purchased that to run them on for ease of data transfer but if I get any new clients I will be using 12pay

Regards

Mark

CGA Bookkeeping Services · Veteran Member

Hi Silly Digits

Please do not purchase Sage Payroll!
We have used the software for many years and are attempting to transfer all of our clients from this to Moneysoft Payroll Manager for several reasons:

1. Payroll Manager is substantially cheaper
2. The data import options are far more user friendly
3. As are the data export facilities for uploading BACS files
4. Year end processing is far easier
5. There is no update procedure comparable to Sage therefore retrieval of historic data is simple
6. Reporting options are far more user friendly

I could go on!

As for our clients, we have several clients which we do not meet in person, in some cases due to geographic location and in others just as there is no particular requirement to do so.
We send out payslips in the post generally, all other forms we file electronically.
We also use the HMRC PAYE desktop viewer which is quite useful for maintaining tax code information saving the requirement to log in to HMRC online to retreieve them.

Hope you get along ok.

Regards

Paul
http://www.cgabookkeeping.co.uk

semsley · Guru

Trouble with sage payroll is the cost, the sage cover is bascially the cost of a new package each year. One of my clients has V11 (which is under sage cover) and this year the (sage) were trying to sell them(the client) the latest version because they said next year they would have to buy a new copy next year and if they bought it this year it would save them money. It's all sell, sell,sell with sage.

lor · Guru

I do like sage payroll, but they are expensive, I use it in work, I'm sure the cheaper ones mention above would be just as good or better but definitely more cheaper.

I have downloaded IRIS PAYROLL BASICS, it reads like it does everything, PYE, updates etc, I will be trying it out when I get a chance.

Would any of you recommend IRIS free software?

-- Edited by lor on Monday 22nd of March 2010 08:26:03 AM

Maxholt · Veteran Member

I have been using Moneysoft which also incorporates CIS. The software is very easy to use (no training required) and also good value.

Maxholt · Veteran Member

I would also agree with Rob, in that payroll and CIS are good earners. I would estimate that for payroll and CIS my charges equate to an absolute minium of £60 per hour - the clients are happy as my charges are actually less than what they were paying previously. For example, one client was paying £50 per month, I charge £30 per month and the work actually takes less than 10 minutes!

All payslips, etc are emailed to clients and year end procedures are very easy as the software does it all for you - I usually charge £25 for the P35.

CGA Bookkeeping Services · Veteran Member

Thats a very impressive recovery Max!
We do not generally cost out fees at this rate even for payroll within excess of 50 employees..In my experience our accountancy work provides the best profit, with bookkeeping and then finally payroll work.

But to be honest I would expect such as anyone with a software package and a little knowledge can process payroll, which is not the case for bookkeeping and accounts work, what does anyone else think?

Cheers

Paul

-- Edited by CGA Bookkeeping Services on Monday 22nd of March 2010 09:16:18 PM

CGA Bookkeeping Services · Veteran Member

So Mark

Would you recommend 12Pay then?
I have not really looked at it.

Regards

Paul

semsley · Guru

Just processing a payroll for regular weekly/monthly paid employees is quite simple when using payroll software, however, does the service include keeping track of holidays/holiday pay, complications with overtime, irregular hours etc., etc. One also needs to know about the ever changing legislation. Deductions - before and after tax. Maybe expenses. Not always straightforward. Like book-keeping in the wrong hands expensive mistakes can be made.

-- Edited by semsley on Monday 22nd of March 2010 09:46:48 PM

Maxholt · Veteran Member

semsley wrote:

Just processing a payroll for regular weekly/monthly paid employees is quite simple when using payroll software, however, does the service include keeping track of holidays/holiday pay, complications with overtime, irregular hours etc., etc. One also needs to know about the ever changing legislation. Deductions - before and after tax. Maybe expenses. Not always straightforward. Like book-keeping in the wrong hands expensive mistakes can be made.

-- Edited by semsley on Monday 22nd of March 2010 09:46:48 PM

I don't really find it takes that much longer to process those who have differing hours each month. Clients send an email to me detailing each person, the hours at regular time, hours at 1.25, hours at 1.5, etc - once you have gone through the initial set up it only takes a minute to input the hours for each rate of pay.

Moneysoft has provision for tracking holiday entitlement, so all that is needed is for the employer to indicate how much holiday is being paid and the software takes care of everything else. The same applies to benefits, SSP, SMP, etc. The software is updated at regular intervals to account for changing legislation.

I used to deal with all payroll and CIS manually which provided me with a working knowledge of procedures, etc., and I would say that everyone should learn how to process payroll manually in the first instance. I remember one payroll company that completely came to a halt on the last day of the month because their computers crashed - and not one person who worked there had any idea how to process pay manually!!

I would agree that errors can be made if the person processing the information is not knowledgable. I have taken over work from other bookkeepers and accountants who have in house bookkeepers and have been absolutely appalled at the quality of the work. With accounting software I have found that many work blind - it is easy to input data - but you need to understand what is required in order to input the correct information - only then will the end result be worth anything. There are hundreds of bookkeepers out there who really don't have the first clue - but I have always earnt well from clearing up the mess they leave behind!!

Lisa Jo · Senior Member

I have to tell you about a payroll cleanse I done a couple of years ago now. They had a payroller in, supposedly experienced. She hadnt been putting in the payroll updates and the bandwidths were set 3 years previously. I had to start from scratch from the April 3 years previously, run reports off each week, month etc. There were post tax payments set up as pre tax payments, well you can imagine. The GAYE was set up and was taxed, a complete & utter nightmare. Anyhow after 10 hours there it was sorted, cost em 40k in tax but at least HMRC knew then the figures were correct & were happy with the correct figures & decided not to do a full inspection. Least they knew that paying ax experienced Payroller was well worth the money.

Marky65 · Guru

CGA Bookkeeping Services wrote:

So Mark

Would you recommend 12Pay then?
I have not really looked at it.

Regards

Paul

Hi Paul

Yes I would. I am just waiting for the opportunity to use it on new clients but reading your earlier post on this thread I may consider transferring the 3 clients I have over to it and maybe the new financial year would be a good place to start. Though I will have to ask the client as to which reports I give him from Sage does he use and see if 12pay offers comparible reporting.

Regards

Mark

Marky65 · Guru

semsley wrote:

Just processing a payroll for regular weekly/monthly paid employees is quite simple when using payroll software, however, does the service include keeping track of holidays/holiday pay, complications with overtime, irregular hours etc., etc. One also needs to know about the ever changing legislation. Deductions - before and after tax. Maybe expenses. Not always straightforward. Like book-keeping in the wrong hands expensive mistakes can be made.

-- Edited by semsley on Monday 22nd of March 2010 09:46:48 PM

Hi Sheila

I don't do keep holiday records or holiday pay calculations, I leave that down to the client. The clients tell me how many hours each person works and I process it along with leavers and joiners.

Regards

Mark

Maxholt · Veteran Member

Marky65 wrote:

semsley wrote:

Just processing a payroll for regular weekly/monthly paid employees is quite simple when using payroll software, however, does the service include keeping track of holidays/holiday pay, complications with overtime, irregular hours etc., etc. One also needs to know about the ever changing legislation. Deductions - before and after tax. Maybe expenses. Not always straightforward. Like book-keeping in the wrong hands expensive mistakes can be made.

-- Edited by semsley on Monday 22nd of March 2010 09:46:48 PM

Hi Sheila

I don't do keep holiday records or holiday pay calculations, I leave that down to the client. The clients tell me how many hours each person works and I process it along with leavers and joiners.

Regards

Mark

Hi Mark

Personally, I maintain a record of holiday entitlement, payments, etc for my clients as then the payslips provided detail this. I have come across some difficult employees in my time and if every payslip provided did not show any payment of holiday pay I would be concerned that an employee might make a claim against the employer. There are people who leave a job and then try and find every way possible to cause problems. Also, keeping this record only takes a minute but can provide the employer with valuable information in the event of a claim or dispute when an employee leaves - in my experience, the employers often do not keep accurate records. Regardless of that, I feel that the recording of holiday entitlement and payments made are part and parcel of the payroll service.

-- Edited by Maxholt on Tuesday 23rd of March 2010 08:01:49 PM