Managing your business’s payroll requires you to do more than just write a few checks to your employees each month. For example, when you hire a new employee, you have to collect a lot of information before you can even think about putting them to work for you. But do you know what all that information is and why it matters? And after gathering your employee’s information, do you know which forms you need to maintain in the event you are called on to be audited?
There are a lot of questions (and repercussions you want to avoid) when it comes to payroll, so Dee Gray, a certified payroll professional and client service specialist in our New Philadelphia office, is on unsuitable on Rea Radio to help us understand the payroll function a little better.
Payroll 101: DIY or Outsource?
Payroll can trigger a huge risk to business owners – risk you may not even know about it until you get a letter from the IRS. So there are distinct benefits to leveraging someone else’s expertise and processes by outsourcing it to a payroll provider: they can minimize potential problems, and then if issues do pop up, you’ll have someone who can walk you through the process of handling them.
However, if there are any errors, the responsibility and liability falls onto the business owner – so even if you’re outsourcing payroll, make sure to double check everything! We even outsource our payroll here at Rea, but we also have internal controls in place to review every step of the process.
If you are an employer or an employee, you will be interested in these other topics discussed in this episode:
- What you can do if you’re past the deadline for submitting W-2s, 1095s, or 1099s (or if you discover there’s an error).
- What employee forms you should have and maintain in case of an audit.
- How you can introduce additional controls or checks and balances into your payroll processes.
If you liked this episode of unsuitable on Rea Radio, let us know by hitting the like button or by sharing it with your followers on social media. You can also use #ReaRadio to join the conversation on Facebook and Twitter, and you can watch the podcast in action on the Rea & Associates YouTube channel. We’ve also included access to additional resources on our website at rznq.ngskmc-eis.net.
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official transcript
Click here to read the official transcript for episode 166, “become a payroll perfectionist”