When you are choosing a payroll software system for your small business you should always focus first on your business needs. Before you even compare the needs that you have in this regard you should have a proper idea of what your business would need from such a system. Some questions can be immensely helpful in these cases. How big is your business? How many workers do you have? Do you have employees per se or have you contracted people to work temporarily? Are you paying benefits to your employees? Who is looking after the payroll?
The features of the system
The answers to the questions that have been asked above would determine the kind of features that you need in such a system. Depending on those answers there would be some features that you cannot do without and some that would be bonuses for you. There are however some features that are essential for such systems. They may be enumerated as below:
One of the hardest parts of running a payroll software system is the tax filing. Your payroll system should make such work easier for you.
How costly is it?
The money that you spend on your payroll software would depend on the needs that you have from the same as well as the kind of service that you choose. The price variations in this regard can be pretty high. In most cases, these services do not have a flat fee that you have to pay every month. Rather they would charge you for the usage of the software. This is based on the features that you are using in such software. There are, however, a few factors that you need to watch out for such as the base costs.
What kind of support does the service provider offer?
Most of the companies that offer payroll software services to small businesses help them make the best possible use of such a system. A lot of them also provide support over phone and email. This comes in handy in case you are facing any issue with the system. However, at times, they may charge you for such support. This is why you need to ask them about the costs beforehand. This will help you create the budget keeping such expenses in mind.
How easy is it to use?
You should ideally not face any issue in operating such a system. Once you have installed it and entered all the necessary details such as employee names and records you should forget about it. This is just as important as paying the people working in your company. If you have to possess accounting knowledge to use such software there are some issues with the ease of use of the software in question. The software should be so simple that all your employees should be able to use it with ease. The best software is normally one where you can do what you want with just a few clicks.