The increase in prevalence of remote working has significantly impacted how businesses operate today, particularly when it comes to payroll. As the workforce becomes more geographically dispersed, managing payroll becomes more complex. Traditional payroll processes may no longer be able to support a remote workforce. Businesses will need to pivot to flexible payroll solutions in order to ensure remote workers are being paid on time and accurately while remaining compliant to local employment laws and regulations.
Acing remote payroll management comes with its own set of complexities and challenges. Hence, it is not surprising that businesses today are looking at software as a service (SaaS) platform to support the payroll needs of a remote and distributed workforce.
What is SaaS payroll?
As defined by Deskera, SaaS is a software distribution model where applications are hosted by vendors or service providers. The application or software is delivered and used online or in the cloud and customers are able to access this network with an internet connection. The features and capabilities offered by a SaaS payroll is often no different from a traditional payroll software. In fact, SaaS payroll often comes with additional data security protocols and measures that ensures businesses remain statutorily compliant.
Benefits of SaaS payroll
Navigate compliance challenges
Managing payroll for a remote workforce means that HR needs to be cognizant of existing employment laws and tax regulations. Each country has its own set of compliance requirements and with the ever-changing regulations, it can be difficult for HR to stay on top of it. SaaS payroll helps businesses navigate these compliance challenges by constantly updating their software’s protocols and processes. This ensures that businesses continue to stay on the right side of the law when managing payroll for its remote workforce.
Manage statutory obligations
Statutory contributions are another key challenge that businesses have to navigate when managing a remote workforce. SaaS payroll enables businesses to maintain full compliance with statutory obligations by keeping up to date with mandatory contributions within each country. Concurrently, SaaS payroll can automatically calculate and withhold taxes based on local country requirements, helping businesses stay compliant.
Facilitate time tracking
Effective and accurate time tracking of remote employees’ work hours is another critical component of payroll management. Without a proper time tracking system in place, it can be challenging to validate employee’s work hours and compensate for overtime hours. Most SaaS payroll solutions come with online time tracking features that allow remote employees to enter and submit their work hours instead of using traditional methods of physical timesheets. An added advantage of SaaS payroll is that last minute changes to employees’ work hours or overtime and payroll review can be done before the payroll is actually processed. In a traditional payroll model, last minute changes to payroll are often not allowed once the payroll cut-off date has passed for that particular payroll month.
Generate cost savings
Given that SaaS payroll operates on a cloud-based model and available to businesses on a subscription fee basis, there is no need to worry about hardware or software installation and maintenance costs. Traditional payroll management can be expensive, particularly if the business has a geographically distributed workforce. Instead of the expensive hardware and software and upfront licensing fee that businesses have to fork out, SaaS payroll enables businesses to save on that hefty upfront expenditure.