So you’re taking on employees (great!) & now you need to be sure you’re not only paying them correctly, & on time, but are also fulfilling your requirements to HMRC – need help?
Let our MD Jenny guide you through everything you need to know, in this week’s Ask The Accountants
Not able to watch the video? Scroll down to find a full transcript.
“Hello again, we’re back with another session of Ask the Accountants.
I’m Jenny, a director here at Bickerstaffs, and I’m talking to you this week about payroll. We’ve had a question from Joseph in Truro, who wants to know the best way to pay his staff and if he needs a proper payroll scheme in place?
Ok Joseph, so it sounds like your business is growing and you’re keen to get things in order, great news! Let’s get to grips with the basics.
First, payroll. Just to be clear, technically payroll is just your list of employees and how much they are paid, but the term has come to mean the management of the process itself.
Next, PAYE – this is the HMRC system that collects income tax and national insurance from employment. You will need to register for this if any of your employees receive more than £120 per week, get any expenses, benefits or pension, or has another job.
So assuming you need to register for PAYE, next you need to decide how you’re going to run your payroll.
You’ve got two choices, handle it internally or outsource your payroll to an accountant.
If your team is small, less than say four or five people, and you have a person who feels confident they can handle this responsibility, it may be more cost effective to run your payroll internally.
You’ll need to complete certain tasks to set up running payroll internally, such as registering as an employer with HMRC and setting up payroll software, plus you’ll have to take care to adhere to important regulations and deadlines, such as making the PAYE payment to HMRC. You’ll find lots of guidance on the government website, just visit gov.uk and search for ‘payroll’.
If you’re handling payroll internally, don’t forget to put provisions in place if you or your dedicated team member is on holiday or off sick, and remember that it can be a time-consuming, fiddly task that you won’t want to make mistakes with!
If, however, you choose to outsource your payroll to an accountant, you’ll generally find the cost is relatively low for the amount of peace of mind and security you’ll get.
You’ll find lots of accountants offer payroll as part of their services and support, just like we do for most of our clients. We know from speaking to them that it’s really useful to just be able to pick up the phone to us if there’s any issues, and they can have complete confidence that their staff will be paid correctly and on time each month.
Back to Joseph’s original question, you didn’t mention whether you had an accountant or not? So feel free to contact us directly if you want to discuss this in more detail, and if anyone else has any other payroll-related questions, we’re happy to help!
If you’ve got a burning question, get in touch and maybe we’ll feature it on a future episode. See you soon!”