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    Overview
    ProductRatingMost Used ByProduct SummaryStarting Price

    Gusto

    Score8.9 out of 10
    N/AGusto 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

    Submittable

    Score8.9 out of 10
    N/ASubmittable offers tools to launch, measure, and grow social impact programs, locally and globally. From grants and scholarships to awards and CSR programs, Submittable partners with users to make a difference. The vendor states Submittable has supported over 95,000 social impact programs, receiving nearly 20 million applications, and that teams save an average of 12 hours per week and launch in an average of 14 days.

    $10,000

    per year

    Pricing
    GustoSubmittable
    Editions & Modules
    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
    No answers on this topic
    Offerings
    Pricing Offerings
    GustoSubmittable
    Free Trial
    YesNo
    Free/Freemium Version
    NoNo
    Premium Consulting/Integration Services
    YesYes
    Entry-level Setup FeeNo setup feeNo setup fee
    Additional DetailsGusto offers three pricing plans for payroll, benefits, and HR.—
    More Pricing Information
    Features
    GustoSubmittable
    Payroll Management
    Comparison of Payroll Management features of Gusto and Submittable
    Feature
    Gusto
    9.1
    611 Ratings
    9% above category average
    Submittable
    -
    Ratings
    Pay calculation9.5587 Ratings00 Ratings
    Support for external payroll vendors8.58 Ratings00 Ratings
    Benefit plan administration8.7417 Ratings00 Ratings
    Direct deposit files9.7592 Ratings00 Ratings
    Salary revision and increment management9.0462 Ratings00 Ratings
    Reimbursement management9.0196 Ratings00 Ratings
    Best Alternatives
    GustoSubmittable
    Small Businesses
    Patriot Payroll
    Score8.6 out of 10
    Blackbaud Grantmaking
    Score9 out of 10
    Medium-sized Companies
    APS
    Score5.7 out of 10
    No answers on this topic
    Enterprises
    ADP Streamline Payroll
    Score6.1 out of 10
    No answers on this topic
    All AlternativesView all alternativesView all alternatives
    User Ratings
    GustoSubmittable
    Likelihood to Recommend
    9.1
    (633 ratings)
    9.0
    (83 ratings)
    Likelihood to Renew
    10.0
    (14 ratings)
    10.0
    (6 ratings)
    Usability
    9.4
    (457 ratings)
    7.9
    (79 ratings)
    Availability
    -
    (0 ratings)
    10.0
    (3 ratings)
    Performance
    -
    (0 ratings)
    10.0
    (3 ratings)
    Support Rating
    4.3
    (27 ratings)
    10.0
    (5 ratings)
    In-Person Training
    -
    (0 ratings)
    8.1
    (2 ratings)
    Online Training
    -
    (0 ratings)
    10.0
    (1 ratings)
    Implementation Rating
    9.1
    (3 ratings)
    10.0
    (4 ratings)
    Configurability
    -
    (0 ratings)
    7.0
    (3 ratings)
    Contract Terms and Pricing Model
    -
    (0 ratings)
    8.3
    (4 ratings)
    Product Scalability
    -
    (0 ratings)
    7.0
    (3 ratings)
    Professional Services
    -
    (0 ratings)
    9.4
    (2 ratings)
    Vendor post-sale
    -
    (0 ratings)
    10.0
    (3 ratings)
    Vendor pre-sale
    -
    (0 ratings)
    9.0
    (3 ratings)
    User Testimonials
    GustoSubmittable
    Likelihood to Recommend
    Gusto
    I think Gusto is well-suited for any business, big or small, to use for accounting purposes. It makes it easy to keep track of many things, such as pay stubs, benefits, paid time off, and much more. Where I could see it being less useful is maybe for enterprise businesses with way more employees.
    Incentivized
    Read full review
    Submittable
    Submittable is great for grant management, grantmaking, and scholarship awards. It's a very useful tool also when there are multiple reviewers and committees involved in the assessment of the application. The table feature is helpful, but to download the information in a usable report is a pain. Overall a very useful tool for funding.
    Incentivized
    Read full review
    Pros
    Gusto
    • New employee/contractor onboarding - all the documents are stored and easily accessible (the same goes for off-boarding).
    • A one-click option for syncing hours worked with payroll.
    • The option to run payroll on auto-pilot.
    • Ensuring I'm tax compliant with the states we have employees in.
    • Always having digital records of payroll runs.
    Incentivized
    Read full review
    Submittable
    • Form-logic: Allows application forms to adjust based on answers to crucial questions (if-then-else) so that all applications don't have to see extended questions that may not apply to them or their situation.
    • Messaging Platform: This platform allows interactions with applicants or internal review teams to be associated with the specific submission, allowing for an easier, complete view of an application being considered and as an audit trail.
    • Good Voting/Polling Management: It makes it easier to record the latest vote/feedback from assigned team members and allows customization of the vote/feedback review as a form. It also summarizes the votes for easy review in a submissions dashboard view.
    Incentivized
    Read full review
    Cons
    Gusto
    • Digital compliance tools for remote teams
    • 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.
    Incentivized
    Read full review
    Submittable
    • We are some of the earliest users of employee volunteerism, so there have been some things to work out. However, because of that, we've gotten a lot of one-on-one support to help make minor tweaks to the system in a way that works for us.
    Incentivized
    Read full review
    Likelihood to Renew
    Gusto
    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.
    Read full review
    Submittable
    We use this software annually to help with our grant processes. Without it, I'd be so lost! Our team relies on the data from our past years to sift applications and we try to prioritize those who have applied and been a finalist but perhaps didn't win in years prior
    Incentivized
    Read full review
    Usability
    Gusto
    Gusto is pretty user-friendly, and the website is easy to navigate overall. They also offer good, responsive customer support and have helpful articles available when needed. So far, I have not had any major issues with the platform and am overall very happy with it.
    Incentivized
    Read full review
    Submittable
    A submittable requires a great deal of thought to set up. It would be best if you really did an outline and flowcharting. Once you have a detailed plan and set up the system, you have to think of the process that you would manually do step-by-step to deal with the what-ifs; it’s beautiful. The ability to Clone events is invaluable. The onboarding can be complex, but the ease of use afterward is worth it.
    Incentivized
    Read full review
    Reliability and Availability
    Gusto
    No answers on this topic
    Submittable
    We have thankfully never experienced an outage nor been affected by a technology issue on Submittable's side that has delayed our grant process. We have instead been able to distribute over $6M in donated dollars to AAPI small business owners because Submittable is trustworthy and available
    Incentivized
    Read full review
    Performance
    Gusto
    No answers on this topic
    Submittable
    We've had a quick and efficient submittable experience that has always been easy to use. When we need a report it downloads within seconds, even the larger reports are 30 seconds or less to download. Pages are quick to load and reports complete in a more than reasonable time frame
    Incentivized
    Read full review
    Support Rating
    Gusto
    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.
    Incentivized
    Read full review
    Submittable
    I think that they are good at answering our questions and solving our problems. We occasionally get reports from applicants about problems the Submittable team has not solved, but I do not know what the applicant has done to get the problem solved.
    Incentivized
    Read full review
    In-Person Training
    Gusto
    No answers on this topic
    Submittable
    We have been using this for many years but my memory is that we had a
    human walk us through how to use basic features. We also used the
    resource library to learn about specific topics or issues as they came
    up.
    Incentivized
    Read full review
    Online Training
    Gusto
    No answers on this topic
    Submittable
    10/10 because we were able to meet virtually and still get all of our questions answered! Online was effective too because we could easily record the sessions and review them later. Since we had to onboard our reviewers virtually, it was actually convenient that this was the same method we learned how to use the entire program virtually too.
    Incentivized
    Read full review
    Implementation Rating
    Gusto
    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
    Incentivized
    Read full review
    Submittable
    I would say, provide Submittable as much detailed information on your planned use of the platform and your desires with the platform as possible, and the implementation will be tailored to accommodate your organization with minimal lag time and issues/problems.
    Incentivized
    Read full review
    Alternatives Considered
    Gusto
    While I never actually got to the point of trying out ADP, I had several conversations with an ADP representative, and it seemed that they would be able to provide the same (if not less) level of service for a significantly higher price
    Incentivized
    Read full review
    Submittable
    Submittable isn't in the same league as these other platforms. It's trying to get there but it's been a rocky road. Neither customer support nor the account people we've dealt with at Submittable seem particularly knowledgeable about how the product actually works for foundations and can't provide detailed recommendations for how to use the product more effectively. The decision to use Submittable was made before I came on board. We are moving to another platform next year, probably SmartSimple.
    Incentivized
    Read full review
    Contract Terms and Pricing Model
    Gusto
    No answers on this topic
    Submittable
    I wish we could choose our own number of applications we want for the year and have the price be changed because we are in-between buyable numbers and always have to add more applications at the end of the year
    Incentivized
    Read full review
    Scalability
    Gusto
    No answers on this topic
    Submittable
    We have been easily able to grow. Not only are we able to process different applications, but Submittable makes it easy to add applications onto our plan. Additionally, their eligibility form before the application does a good job of screening applicants so we do not pay for extra applications.
    Incentivized
    Read full review
    Professional Services
    Gusto
    No answers on this topic
    Submittable
    Very professional
    Incentivized
    Read full review
    Return on Investment
    Gusto
    • Time tracking + payroll calculations me 30-60 minutes every time I run payroll.
    • Integrated workers' comp, so I didn't have to find an outside carrier and get quotes—it's all taken care of in the same platform.
    • Improved employee experience with onboarding.
    Incentivized
    Read full review
    Submittable
    • Time is money! Submittable has eliminated many tasks I used to do manually, thus freeing my time for other work.
    • Decreased support calls and emails from applicants- Our applicants are able to successfully access and apply for our grants.
    • No internal IT support needed to use this platform. That team is able to focus on their larger business projects and needs.
    Incentivized
    Read full review
    ScreenShots

    Gusto Screenshots

    Screenshot of Gusto's automated payrollScreenshot of the time-off tracking interfaceScreenshot of the source of truth for HR data