Does your company need to hire a Payroll Manager?

Business owners face a number of choices every day. Whether working out such matters as supply lines or hiring priorities, there will come a time when you need to start planning your company’s future.

Growth, of course, is positive for any business. However, failure to manage this area properly can lead to stagnation or delays. One important area is Payroll. After all, staff must be paid and managing a rapid influx of new faces can be time-consuming enough without ensuring their finances are taken care of.

The solution, therefore, is to hire a Payroll Manager. While usually unnecessary for smaller firms, these individuals are often essential for the day-to-day running of medium to larger corporations. At the very least, they should allow you to concentrate on growing your business.

When do I need a Payroll Manager?

There are a few tell-tale signs that your growth is big enough for you to hire a Payroll Manager to work in-house. As your business grows even larger, it might be prudent to hire an entire payroll team to streamline the process even further.

If any of the below sounds true, hiring a Payroll Manager might be an excellent business decision:

• Too much time is spent on payroll. Often to the detriment of other work.
• Mistakes have occurred in recent payrolls.
• A large number of new employees have come onboard
• Your company is struggling to adjust – or is even unaware of – new payroll legislation.

Ask the experts – when should I hire a Payroll Manager?

Although we’ve worked in payroll for decades and know what we’re talking about, it’s important you don’t just take our word for it. We approached the Chartered Institute of Payroll Professionals (CIPP) and asked them for their advice:

When should companies hire a Payroll Manager?

“If an organisation operates payroll inhouse, it is advisable that they recruit a Payroll Manager regardless of the number of employees.  This is because there is complex legislation relating to pay in the UK and it is essential for businesses to ensure that they comply with the legislation to avoid non-compliance penalties and reputational damage for breaches in payroll legislation, such as national minimum wage.”

“Even if an organisation outsources their payroll function, the CIPP advises that someone within the organisation is up-to-date and knowledgeable on payroll, or where to go for support, so that they can get the best level of service from their provider.  Quite often service provider/client relationships are negatively affected by misunderstanding of the service and client expectation, having someone who understands how payroll works and the complexity behind it, will assist in improving relations with your supplier.”

What can a Payroll Manager bring to an organisation?

“A Payroll Manager can bring understanding and knowledge relating to complex payroll legislation to limit reputational and financial risk to an organisation. There are significant penalties for non-compliance, and a Payroll Manager can mitigate this risk.  A Payroll Manager can also bring experience, skills and knowledge which can lead to efficiency savings within an organisation, which can ultimately save on the organisation’s bottom line.”

What happens if I don’t hire a Payroll Manager?

“It could lead to increased costs in delivery and time being spent on queries back and forth, time which could be better spent on business operations.”

“There is also the risk of non-compliance penalties costing an organisation money, or costing reputational damage which could also impact the bottom line.  Organisations are named and shamed for non-compliance against the National Minimum Wage legislation for example.  This could impact on customers’ opinions of the organisation and therefore whether they are willing to continue to give their custom, but it can also impact on potential employees’ decisions whether to join the organisation, meaning that your business could lose both money and talent.”

Any questions? Get in touch

For more information on whether you should hire a hire a Payroll Manager – or finding the right one for your needs –  get in touch with one of our specialists today. Our Recruitment Consultants are adept at finding the very best payroll professionals on the market and will work with your company to ensure we approach the very best people for the job.

Call us on 020 7247 9455 for a chat, or email recruitment@portfoliopayroll.com and we’ll get to work filling your vacancy.