Online Class: Payroll Management 101

Courses Frequently Bought Together:

Accounting & Bookkeeping 101 for Everyone

QuickBooks 101

Accounts Payable Management

Course Motivation

The most important reason for any person to work is the "bottom line": being paid. For most workers, the simple fact of the matter is that, depending on their shift, they will turn up for work in the morning and leave in the evening; and, when the month is over, they will get their paycheck and their salary will go into their bank. It is perfectly simple. What few people give any thought to is that somebody puts the money in their bank account or cuts the check. There is, effectively, an invisible link between the work they do and the money they earn for it.

The truth is that that invisible link is actually one or more persons whose job is to ensure that a company's employees get their remuneration in full, on time, and without any need to request it themselves. It is far from automatic and actually requires quite a bit of work on the part of the people responsible for making the payments. These people are the payroll staff. Their job is, in some people's minds, an afterthought; but there is one simple fact that we need to keep in mind: If the payroll staff were not there, or did not do its job, then the very reason these workers are turning up in the morning would be thrown into question. If people did not get paid, there would be quite a lot of turmoil involved.

WHAT DOES THE PAYROLL DEPARTMENT DO?

The payroll staff is a vitally important part of any large company. Although the department name lends itself to a belief that its members are concerned solely with pay matters, the payroll department plays a major part in the human resources side of most companies. Often when a person is involved in some sort of scandal, his past employers get dragged into the media furor and respond to all questions by simply saying, "This individual is no longer on our payroll." The term "payroll," to a large extent, has become shorthand for the overall workforce of a company. In this respect, a company's payroll department has many responsibilities regarding the overall workforce. The department is not only important, it is essential. Not only does it have responsibility for seeing that the staff gets paid, it has a major administrative role in the company.

The payroll department needs to hold a lot of additional information on staff members, though. With the large variation of benefits and deductions that are connected with an individual's salary, the payroll department needs to know from month to month what a person is owed in terms of these benefits and what that person must pay in terms of deductions. These deductions will include taxes but may also apply to healthcare packages, student loan repayments, pension plans, and savings accounts.