Today I posted out 100 flyers to businesses in my area, offering not only a bookkeeping service but now that I am qualified to do payroll - I am also offering that service. I do find payroll interesting and really hope that I get a few clients. I have been looking at 12 pay and moneysoft payroll manager and am going to use 12pay and see how I get on. It looks really easy to use and I have read lots of great reviews on here about it.
I am hoping to start working in the next month or so and come off of maternity leave now that my baby is 6 months old tomorrow (eeek) and my poor brain needs some stimulation! The major job right now is advertising, organising myself and checking out my local competititors to see what they are doing and how.
Not much point to my post really, just very excited about getting back into things, how I have missed it! I am really going to give it my all this time around and move forward learning from my past mistakes.
Any advice regarding payroll before getting my first client would be appreciated - I did a bit of payroll work last year and really enjoyed it (but that was using Sage). I guess that it is just a case of getting a client (easier said than done I know ), getting them to email me or call me with the hours worked every reporting period and turning aound payslips same day wherever possible. I have orderd some free samples of payslips from a link on this forum ( how I love this place) and I guess that it will be a learn and make improvements as I go. I did all the studying and passed the exam through the ICB but like everything else, there is a huge difference between studying it at home and doing it in the real world. I am nervous but very excited.
Right off now to research fellow payroll services in my area and check that the rates that I have in mind are competitive. What would we do without the internet eh?
Terri
PS I forgot to add that I am trying to scrap the charge by the hour and offer fixed rates - so wish me luck - I am sure that this will be a huge learning process
-- Edited by Terri on Monday 1st of August 2011 06:22:07 PM
12 pay create payslips for you, its in the programme, they are really good and look professional, and you can print them in different colours as well!!!
I advertised for payroll in our local area magazine back in April, hoping to pull in small businesses due to the "everything on line" now with HMRC, got 1 for a hairdresser who had a problem with her online submission which I went and sorted out and now have the regular payroll, plus a training job which has turned into sorting out a mess on Sage to get it back on track for the new employee who I went to train (very lucrative as the whole thing is on training rates and for a management consultants). So the advert has more than paid for itself but didn't have much luck with recruiting payroll clients. Hope you have more success and congrats on passing your exam
Fancy an everyday tale of payroll folk - it can be like a messy set of books. Got a call last week from a take-away client for whom I send out weekly payslips and he informed me that his chef had not been in work since April 22nd. lol
The chef is claiming to be sick. The client had spoken to him on the phone but put nothing in writing and had received no evidence of sickness. He was vague about whether any remuneration had been paid eg. In lieu of SSP etc.
The sickness began the very day after the For Sale sign was erected in front of the shop.
Discuss. lol
Told him the choice was to pay £1100 SSP or if he didnt believe him to commence disciplinary proceedings, albeit 3 months late. (Im sure there was more to this than the client was willing to tell) but ended up sending him a draft disciplinary procedure, a redundancy estimate and two instructions on SSP procedure.
As it happens, I admire this bloke for his entrepreneurship in the inner city, but when I sat down to write a cover letter, i found i'd advised him almost exactly the same thing in 2000 :o)
I use fixed pricing for payroll as opposed to by the hour (which I use for bookkeeping). Still not sure if I've priced it right but seems to be going ok - so does that mean I've underpriced? haha
tell me about it. My issue with the pricing is VAT as I'm in an industry competing against bookkeepers who are not VAT registered.
For Payroll my fee's are fixed for the first five employee's then I add an additional charge for each employee that I process over that per payroll run.
My prices are inclusive of P14's, P60's, P32's and P35 but I charge P11d's and P45's at an hourly rate.
Right, now try and slip that into nice easily understood terms on the prices page of my website (currently undergoing its umteenth rewrite and reformat).
__________________
Shaun
Responses are not meant as a substitute for professional advice. Answers are intended as outline only the advice of a qualified professional with access to all relevant information should be sought before acting on any response given.
Hi, what payroll course did you do? I am currently doing AAT L3 and although I do not have any payroll experience I would like to get a payroll qualifaction. I work as an accounts assistant but we currently have an external company who does the payroll. I was thinking of getting some qualifications and then suggesting to my employer that maybe I could take over payroll. I have looked at teh AAT payroll course but the nearest learning centre is 20 miles away, I have also looked at online distant learning courses but the sites do not show prices.
12 pay create payslips for you, its in the programme, they are really good and look professional, and you can print them in different colours as well!!!
Good luck with your business.
Cheers
I must have missed this thread first time round. Thanks for kind comments about our software.
Yes, 12Pay can print payslips on blank paper, A4 or A5, and there is some control of colour as well as the possibility of including the client's logo on them.
If a Bureau is worried that copier-paper payslips look slightly unprofessional (some say that, while others vehemently disagree) we also support about 20 different stationery layouts available from several third parties, including the most common Sage designs.
You also have the option of sending the client the payslip PDF file to print themselves rather than printing it yourself.
In our next Bureau release you can define your own custom report packs, which are a list of the weekly/monthly reports that you want to send to a particular client, including their payslips, and fire off the creation of a single PDF that contains all the reports with a single mouseclick. Or create a single zip file filled with a mixture of PDFs and excel/csv files. So then you just have to email one thing to the client.
-- Edited by Tom McClelland on Thursday 8th of September 2011 01:57:36 PM
The major job right now is advertising, organising myself and checking out my local competititors to see what they are doing and how.
