The Future of Payroll Is Employee Self-Service

Here’s why employees should do their own payroll:

“My check is wrong!” How often do payroll professionals get caught in the middle of “mistakes” that are simply breakdowns in communication? Whether a manager forgot to tell Payroll that someone was due a bonus or a reimbursement or whether established procedures were simply not followed, there always seem to be occasions of employees being unpleasantly caught off guard by their pay statements. These oversights leave a bad taste employees’ mouths and make them feel under-prioritized and undervalued.

Employees’ level of visibility into how their checks are calculated may also directly impact the amount of trust and loyalty they feel toward their employer. Research shows that employees value employer transparency and are even more engaged and trust their employers more when transparency is greater. One survey even found management transparency to be the number one factor in employee happiness. This includes visibility into business strategy, practices and processes (like payroll).

The New Way to Approve Payroll

Paycom has engineered a brilliant, yet surprisingly obvious solution to this problem: Have the employees approve their own automated payroll process. Companies already have employees approving their time sheets and managing their own requests for benefits enrollments, expense reimbursements and time-off requests, so it makes sense to allow employees to be the first set of eyes to approve their own pay statements prior to the payroll quality check and submission. This strategy also fosters a culture of transparency and accountability that encourages employees and managers to close the loop properly with Payroll.

This solution is called Beti, and Paycom touts that Beti can result in:

● improved data accuracy (fewer direct deposit reversals and less reentry of data)
● reduced employer liability (fewer payroll funding fees for corrections and adjustments)
● increased process oversight
● unparalleled employee insight into their pay

The cost savings in reduced overhead hours are also a huge benefit. By reducing or eliminating manual corrections and all of the back and forth correspondence between Payroll, managers and employees, companies can save a significant amount of time and money.

One current Paycom customer shared her experience with us:

“We had probably 15 to 20 post-payroll changes, but now we’re able to do it on the front end, and with Beti, it was fantastic. I loved it. We were able to submit our payroll on Tuesday morning this week. So that’s already taken off, probably a day and a half of our process,” according to VP of HR in a 350-employee auto rental company.

The employee experience is also top of mind with Beti, as Paycom’s mobile-friendly platform also allows employees to review and approve their payroll from any mobile device.

Solutions like Beti are a win-win for companies and employees. By empowering employees to approve their own payroll, employers can increase transparency and improve employee engagement, accountability and trust. Employee self-service payroll also reduces company overhead costs, errors and liability.

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