Payroll is indispensable for businesses as it is crucial to ensure steady paychecks for the workforce. As such, it requires you to invest considerable time to calculate checks, properly manage benefits, take care of withholdings, and process direct deposit and checks – yeah, that sounds like a time taking and tedious process to complete, and that too, without mistakes!
With all that time spent on payroll, one would think that payroll must be error-proof and immune to mistakes, but unfortunately, it is otherwise and payroll is actually very prone to mistakes. And, businesses incur huge penalties as a result of mismanaged payroll processes.
So what do we do to avoid these mistakes and consequent penalties? Well, turn to automation and deploy the right payroll software catering to your specific requirements!
The challenge here is not a lack of the availability of an effective payroll management solution. There are many options available in the market, but you have to pick the right one.
Comparing the Top Payroll Software Solutions
Since you probably wouldn’t like to undergo the hard work of going through and testing all the available options, we have done all the footwork for you. How? Well, we tested different payroll software options to come up with a list of the top 5 solutions for you. In our research, we have compiled this list of top payroll software options, ranging from newcomers (relatively speaking) on the scene like Gusto making a good impact, to familiar old faces like Rippling and (of course) UZIO.
- Gusto –
Gusto is certainly one of the most user-friendly full-service payroll, HR, and benefits’ solutions available out there. This makes Gusto one of the obvious leaders in the category. Because of this attribute of being user-friendly, Gusto is expected to see further growth in its share on the market.
Gusto Pros – Reasons to go for Gusto
Gusto is known for its good user experience with a reasonable four-tier-pricing scheme. Its pricing is comparable with most of the competition. Gusto has a separate contractor version with its least expensive pricing scheme.
Gusto also has an excellent employee self-service portal and mobile access.
Shortcomings
Gusto is not very good with several features like data migration and a good activity dashboard. Moreover, it requires you to download some reports instead of letting you view them online.
- Zenefits –
With its various intuitive features, Zenefits has a strong presence in the league of market leaders in the payroll software category. It hosts all of the standard payroll software features required for the job and has an easy to manage platform.
Zenefits Pros – Reasons to go for Zenefits
Includes year-round comprehensive benefits administration, thorough record-keeping, and data migration functionality with a good activity dashboard.
Zenefits is also very good with business intelligence reports and has a robust mobile app for employees.
Shortcomings
Although Zenefits boasts of a robust mobile app for employees, it is not capable of handling all admin tasks. Moreover, Zenefits usually gets overwhelming for small businesses.
- UZIO –
As a strong contender for the title of the market leader in the payroll software category, UZIO streamlines the management of payroll, benefits, and compensation of employees very effectively. Its comprehensive features help you automate the smooth administration of all the payroll requirements of both the employees and the employers.
UZIO Pros – Reasons to go for UZIO
The main reasons to go for UZIO are streamlined HR and payroll workflow, improved productivity, and value for money.
UZIO is an integrated solution providing brokers, employers, and employees with centralized access to data related to HRIS, benefits, and online payroll processing.
UZIO provides brokers with a client control hub, making the process of proposal management and enrollment easy for them.
Shortcomings
Although UZIO is known to automate the smooth administration of HR and Payroll tasks, some people find navigating the tool a little sophisticated and difficult.
Similarly, despite providing various useful reports, it at times is quite difficult to work on ad hoc reports with UZIO.
- OnPay –
OnPay also comes in our list of top 5 choices for best payroll software. Hailed as an excellent value for money like UZIO, OnPay provides all standard features expected of a payroll software along with some additional features clients certainly would enjoy.
OnPay Pros – Reasons to go for OnPay
OnPay is fast and is very cost-effective with exciting new tools for Human Resources. It has flexible payment schedules relatively economical when compared with similar platforms.
OnPay’s employee self-service portal is great.
Shortcomings
OnPay does not provide prospects with detailed pricing tiers like many of its competitors do. It also lacks in terms of performance management tools.
OnPay’s Mobile version does not have some functions its desktop version has.
- Rippling –
Rippling is a good benefits administration tool that also offers excellent payroll-processing capabilities. Expanding its periphery beyond benefits, the tool now encompasses payroll, benefits, HR, and IT. This makes the range of its functions wider than its competitors.
Rippling provides an easy, customizable, and highly organized user experience.
Rippling Pros – Reasons to go for Rippling
Rippling’s Payroll provides a seamless and intuitive user interface. The tool is easy to set up for employees and lets various stakeholders create an array of custom reports with all of their employees’ data at their disposal.
Shortcomings
The reporting features provided by Rippling are far from sufficient and leave a lot to be desired. Furthermore, the native mobile app of the tool does not support benefits.
