5 Reasons to Offer Payroll as an Easy Add-On Service to Your Clients

For most accounting practices, payroll is not generally considered a profitable service. In fact, it’s often referred to as a time and resource-intensive activity prone to errors. If you’ve spent time working on large complex UK payroll, you probably know what we are talking about. However, this notion is changing with advances in technology and the availability of payroll outsourcing providers specializing in skilled offshore resources with full knowledge of PAYE and specialist payroll software.

Your clients have choices

Traditionally, your clients either processed payroll in-house or used payroll bureaus. But that’s changing. Both choices are still available, but they neither want to do it in-house nor do they want to outsource payroll to a payroll bureau and accounting work elsewhere.

To your client, payroll is all about tax and they want it taken care of by one supplier. They want a one-stop solution.  What’s interesting about payroll is that it is not a tough sell. Your clients understand the benefits of a one-stop solution. However, it pays to pitch your services carefully.

This is where payroll outsourcing services can be critical. Considering your clients’ changing needs and preferences, it is wise to add payroll to your service portfolio with the help of outsourcing.

Five reasons to offer payroll services to your clients

1. Higher Retention of Clients

Offering payroll services leads to a high client retention rate. If your client has the need for payroll but you don’t offer it, they will go elsewhere. One clear advantage of adding it to your service offerings is that it binds clients to your practice.

Several outsourcing firms provide payroll services for small businesses to help them add payroll to their portfolio.

2. Create a Better Customer Experience

As mentioned above, payroll is an extra service that clients always want, along with accounts, tax, and bookkeeping. When they get all services under one roof, it keeps things simple. They don’t need to deal with multiple providers; you get more revenue and can offer a better client experience. A better client experience, in turn, guarantees a higher success rate for an accounting firm.

3. Help Your Clients Make Better Business Decisions

Cloud payroll software that lets you connect to other cloud applications is becoming more sophisticated. This allows your clients to get a deeper insight into their business data in new and useful ways. It also means you are working with the most up-to-date information.

With such reports, facts and figures available in real-time, it’s far easier for your clients to make better business decisions. In fact, they may even need your assistance with this, which is great because they’re now viewing you as an advisor and thought leader.

However, small and medium-sized practices do not always have the capacity to add a new service or provide advisory assistance to their clients. Outsourcing payroll services for accountants is a great way to make this happen and create capacity for your practice.

4. Reduce Their Workload

If you’re already doing your clients’ accounting work, they need to regularly send you their payroll data to be entered into their ledger. By taking on their payroll work, that step is no longer required. You’ve effectively reduced the amount of work your client needs to do, which they will probably be happy about.

5. Build A Deeper Relationship

At this point, your clients already trust you with their financial information. So, it only makes sense for them to entrust you with their payroll function as well. When only one supplier looks after all the accounting functions and financial data, it becomes much easier to maintain and keep it secure. With payroll outsourcing, you not only improve the efficiency of your clients’ payroll process but also ensure its complete protection and security.

Your relationship with your clients is based on trust, and you want to do your best to ensure it doesn’t falter. By offering payroll services to your clients, you strengthen the relationship you already have and provide the scope to make processes more efficient.

Make Profits on Payroll Without Doing the Work with Payroll Outsourcing

We live in an increasingly integrated society where accountants have access to a wider talent pool across national borders. With technology becoming the driving force of globalisation and the advances in internet and telecommunications, it has become easier for accountants to partner with payroll outsourcing companies not just in the UK but all over the globe.

Instead of hiring payroll staff in-house and adding more overheads to deliver payroll to clients, accountants can now opt for payroll outsourcing services and instantly remove all the headaches whilst increasing profits and adding value to clients. Outsourcing payroll allows you to offer the service to your clients without taking on the headache of maintaining a full-fledged payroll department.

When is the best time to offer payroll services?

Ideally, any time is the best time to let your clients know that you can also take on their payroll work. All you must do is partner with a top UK payroll outsourcing provider and onboard your offshore payroll team.

However, a good natural transition point is a couple of days before the UK financial year starts. This is a good time because clients would be more open to making changes and you won’t have to cross-check duplicate data in two systems. It also means there won’t be a need to transfer your year-to-date financial data from their old system to yours.

First and foremost, do an initial assessment for each of your clients as switching over to you means a fresh start to their financial year.

Making Payroll Profitable

To make the maximum profits from payroll, it is essential to move to an outsourced model. It is a straightforward way to turn a low-margin service into something that turns a profit, while also removing the time you spend on it and the investment you need in terms of software and hiring specialist payroll staff. Learn how to make payroll profitable for your practice using the free guide below.