A Cloud Payroll Service That's Perfect For Quickbooks Users
September 28, 2016

A Cloud Payroll Service That's Perfect For Quickbooks Users

Laurence Sarner | TrustRadius Reviewer
Score 9 out of 10
Vetted Review
Verified User

Overall Satisfaction with Intuit Payroll

Intuit Payroll is being deployed and supported to various clients. The client size varies substantially from single employee businesses to organizations with up to 100 employees. Intuit Payroll fills a business's need to process payroll in house versus outsourcing to an outside vendor. Generally, the complexity of payroll with federal and state withholding taxes, social security and reporting fringe benefits requires that some sort of software infrastructure is needed to support the complex calculations and reporting that go into this accounting function.

Pros

  • Great integration with QuickBooks accounting software.
  • Good reporting functionality.
  • Great ease of use/navigation/data entry flow.

Cons

  • I believe the integration around some non-Intuit software is limited (ie. CRM systems, etc.).
  • Additional fees for sending contractor Form 1099s.
  • Pricing not extremely competitive although bundled discounts if used in conjunction with QuickBooks accounting software.
  • Positive: Less of a learning curve to train payroll accountants, as they are already familiar with using Intuit. Also, in general there are a larger pool of candidates who know this system than many of the other "niche" lesser known payroll products.
  • Positive: More options to choose from depending on the level of service needed. For example, there is a Full Service offering if needed. This might apply to an organization that doesn't have the resources available or an internal person who has the time/bandwidth to handle the entire company's payroll. Thus, it is possible to cherry pick the level of service needed depending on the type of company/situation.
  • Positive: Good audit trail. This can be extremely important and cost efficient when a business is going through an external audit by an outside CPA firm and the payroll accounting function is undergoing testing (ie. less time required by the external auditor would likely lower their bill for their services).
I like maintaining one very strong accounting/ERP ecosystem that I trust and that is why I selected Intuit Payroll. The system is trustworthy/reliable, runs on the cloud and integrates with existing QuickBooks products. The pricing becomes more competitive when it is bundled with other Intuit products. Also, Intuit tends to be a company that listens to its customers and accountant implementation partners, and if a feature or area of functionality is suggested or recommended to Intuit, they take it very seriously. They are continually improving and rolling out new features on all their products.
I believe the ideal scenario is when you are already using the Intuit family of products and the payroll bolts on to your existing QuickBooks infrastructure. Payroll software products have been around a long time, and this is a very competitive niche. Most of the companies do a good job of filing taxes promptly, reporting W-2 items properly, providing good reports, etc. Where you might really get some extra efficiency and benefit is the fact that the payroll is woven into the accounting system, creating one seamless enterprise solution. Also, where it might be less appropriate is in a really simple use case such as a one person company where there aren't complex fringe benefits to deal with. In that scenario, you can set up the ACH debits directly with the state agency and the IRS and possibly file your own 941, 940, W-2/W-3 and state equivalent forms. Of course, if you're willing to do this and are good with details, you can save yourself some money.

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