ADP TotalSource is a professional employer organization (PEO) that provides strategic HR outsourcing. It includes services and technology to manage employee benefits, payroll, compliance, risk management, safety, and recruiting. Users have access to an online portal for things like self-service reporting, generating pay statements, and managing applicant resumes/interviews. Help from the service center and industry experts is available by phone.
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Gusto
Score 8.9 out of 10
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Gusto offers payroll, benefits and compliance capabilities. Gusto is scaled for small to mid-sized businesses, and emphasizes an easy to use interface.
$49
per month
Pricing
ADP TotalSource
Gusto
Editions & Modules
No answers on this topic
Simple: A streamlined set of automatic payroll features and benefits integrations
$49/month + $6/mo per person
per month
Plus: Comprehensive payroll, benefits, and HR tools for employers building a great place to work
$80/month + $12/mo per person
per month
Premium: Scalable payroll and benefits, expert HR, and dedicated support for the complex needs of growing teams
$180/month + $22/mo per person
per month
Offerings
Pricing Offerings
ADP TotalSource
Gusto
Free Trial
No
Yes
Free/Freemium Version
No
No
Premium Consulting/Integration Services
No
Yes
Entry-level Setup Fee
No setup fee
No setup fee
Additional Details
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Gusto offers three pricing plans for payroll, benefits, and HR.
[I think that] all other options are about 100X better than ADP TotalSource. [I also think] ADP TotalSource is too comfortable and thinks they don't need to improve to be competitive. However, the reality is, competition is eating up their market. Some ADP staff, in particular, …
Verified User
Supervisor
Chose ADP TotalSource
ADP TotalSource was selected over other competitors because it fit our needs when we were hundreds of employees. However, these days we have thousands globally and this number changes every day so it is quickly becoming a solution we can not rely on, especially compared to all …
Gusto has been my favorite option both as an end-user (ie. employee) and admin (ie. employer). It's easy to use, has all the features we need, integrates with Guideline (our preferred 401k provider), and priced well for great value.
Gusto generally wins on price compared to its competitors. Some organizations nickel-and-dime on billing with headcount, states filed, etc. while Gusto's bills are very easy to calculate and understand. Competitors generally will handle state registrations that Gusto won't do, …
I would not use this company for anything. [I believe my] employees [absolutely] hate the software and there are constantly glitches in the software which occur every payroll run, benefits enrollment, etc. [I have spent] large amounts of time on the phone with outsourced customer support[,] so think twice when comparing [the] cost to other providers. [I feel] you [will] need someone full time to deal with all of their issues. We are currently in the process of setting up another PEO company. The amount of money and time to implement ADP has been a huge loss.
Gusto is well-suited for small businesses looking for a one-stop platform for payroll, tax-related tasks, and onboarding. It has many automated features that make tasks related to running a business/running an S-Corp simpler. I have not tried any other similar platforms, so I am unsure how it compares, but the pricing Gusto offers feels reasonable compared to other providers.
Gusto upsold us labor law posters, but I later found them available for free online. Since we’re a fully remote team, I had to manually download and distribute them digitally. It would be much more efficient if Gusto offered free, auto-distributed digital posters tailored to remote compliance.
Benefits setup is unintuitive for startups
While our rep was helpful, navigating the benefits system felt complex and not tailored to early-stage companies. More guided flows or simplified options for small, remote startups would be a big help.
Limited dashboard customization for remote workflows
As a fully online company, we’d benefit from dashboard options that highlight relevant tools for remote operations—like compliance tracking, digital communications, or onboarding checklists.
Unless they break it, I'm never leaving. It's just too easy. Gusto is also really affordable, and for what I pay, it's worth having the historical record within the system. I like that I can go back and pull up W2's for year's past. This sort of easy access reporting, has been helpful especially when getting reports for PPP loans.
Wonderful overall usability – especially for the new business owner. The user interface is clean and intuitive, so it's easy to find what you're looking for. They also have great explanation pages ingrained into the process, so if you get stuck knowing what to do next, there's a link right there to walk you through the process!
ADP is a great HR solution for most organizations. It is truly all-in-one. I rated it a 7, because of the issues we experienced during implementation and the high cost of service when issues do arise.
Gusto's customer service has really deteriorated lately and they seem to have really changed their focus. It used to be when you called you were routed to an individual who knew about payroll, benefits, reporting, etc. but now you get someone who seems to have not received the correct training. My last call about a dismissal payroll took me over an hour of my time and the person still could not help me and finally transferred me to someone else.
Reach out to support immediately if you are having trouble setting up Gusto. Rather than being confused and trying to figure it out yourself, it's much better to talk to someone who knows what they are doing. Save yourself time and frustration and reach out to support
At the moment, we have not investigated any of the products available in the drop-down list provided. However, we have evaluated some other (unavailable) products and have been intrigued by the potential decrease in fees along with the potential for a much more "rich" benefit plan. We can't speak to the level of customer service observed by current clients, only to apparent cost savings.
It's been a while since I used QuickBooks for payroll, but it doesn't even come close to it. Gusto is infinitely easier, allowing for employee time tracking, handling calculations and payments of payroll and payroll taxes, managing regulatory compliance in the background, and more. I had a lot of moments using QuickBooks Payroll where I thought, "Am I even doing this right?" — it felt like you had to have additional knowledge of HR regulations in your state to do everything correctly. Gusto has it ALL handled so you can focus your time on higher-impact tasks in your business.
It has cost us more money from a financial aspect and then taken away my main/other job duties because I have to focus all of my time on ADP TotalSource and basically fixing errors that happen weekly/every time an employee is added or terminated (which is more than the normal company due to the nature of our business).
I am not involved enough to know well, but I would say that Gusto has saved me about 1-2 hours in my onboarding process with my new company compared to my past experiences trying to onboard with ADP. I have also finished the process and am not frustrated like usual.
