Live Q&A: Ask us anything about Square Payroll

[katieand]

On Tuesday, December 4th at 11am PST, we will host a Live Q&A about Square Payroll. If you’ve been thinking about switching payroll providers, or you’re just curious to learn more about Square’s full-service payroll product, you should check this out. The best time of year for changes in how you run payroll is now! This is because you can start fresh with a new provider at the beginning of 2019, simplifying your setup and tax filing process.

In this Q&A we’ll explain how our product works and introduce our newest features, including benefits like health insurance and retirement savings for your and your team, automatic tip splitting, integrated timecard importing, employer and employee mobile apps, and our nationwide availability. We’ll have Square Payroll General Manager, Caroline Hollis, here to answer all your questions and help you get the most out of Square Payroll for your business.

@caroline has been part of the Square Payroll team since its inception in 2014. In her time on the Payroll team she has been an integral part in building the product from the ground up. She understands that Payroll is critical for both small business owners and their employees. For employers, payroll is often the business’ largest recurring expense. For employees, a paycheck makes up most or all of their income.

A few example questions:

• What does ‘full-service’ payroll mean, and what is included with my subscription?
• Do you really do all my payroll tax calculations and filings?
• What are my benefits options with Square Payroll?
• How does payroll work with the rest of my Square account?
• What can my employees do with the Square Team App?
• Can I run payroll from the Square Payroll mobile app?
• Why did Square build a payroll product?

[J2B]

I have been a beta tester for multiple pay rates (which is a good start) but until it is integrated into payroll it's not that helpful. As a smaller restaurant, we have staff that works FOH and BOH and paying 'additional pay' on their paychecks is a nightmare for tracking purposes on both ends. This seems like a pretty standard feature for 99% of payroll companies and I thought Square would have been able to offer this by now. You're so good at everything else. Time to step up 🙂

[caroline]

We hear you loud and clear, @J2B! Our team is currently building out support for multiple pay rates within Payroll. We will let you know as soon as the feature is available. If you want to be added to the list to receive early access, please reach out to our Payroll Customer Success team at payroll@help-messaging.squareup.com.

Once multiple pay rates are enabled in Payroll, you will be able to add multiple jobs on each team member’s payroll profile. You will have the option to title each job and select a pay rate (hourly or salary).  

The Employee Management and Payroll multiple pay rates integration will allow your employees to seamlessly clock in and out from the point of sale and the specific job. When it comes time to run payroll, hours will import directly into payroll for each specific job and payroll will automatically calculate overtime and doubletime rates based on hours worked at each job.

[RashedaM]

Why does it take 4 business days for contractors to receive direct deposit?  Is there any way to speed up this process?

[caroline]

👋 @RashedaM, Direct deposit takes 4 business days because it is a standard ACH transfer. Square debits the funds from your employer bank account and waits for those funds to hit our account, which takes 3 business days. Once Square has the funds, we’re able to transfer the funds to each of your employees’ accounts the same day if they’re depositing to a Cash App account, or the next business day if they’re using a bank account.

If our direct deposit processing time is not a fit for your business, we’d love to learn what your ideal schedule looks like!

[mediam9011]

The ideal for us would be to be able to have automated payroll set-up be able to pay bi-monthly on the 1st business day of the month and the 15th. Can it be set-up to start 3 days ahead of those dates to successfully direct deposit them by the required days?

[Helen]

Hello @mediam9011, I checked with the Payroll team and they confirmed it's not possible to set up Automatic Payroll this way, I'm sorry! 

There's more information about Payroll Payment Scheduling in our Support Center or you can call our CS team and speak to a Payroll specialist about how to set up Payroll for your business.

[WickedWrenchCo]

@caroline I have 3 businesses I run payroll for...only one we use Square for, the other 2 are older businesses and we use SurePayroll, I submit payroll on Wed by 2pm and they debit the account on Thursday, employees are paid Friday. Square seems to take longer which confuses me also and hence why I have hesitated on switching the other 2.

[Helen]

Thanl you for your post @WickedWrenchCo! A member of our Payroll team is going to reach out to you by email to get a bit more information about your businesses - and see if we can help with a solution! 

[rivesphoto]

Our payroll runs every 2 weeks.  One thing I wanted from Square payroll was a reminder that payroll needs to done on the day after payroll periods ends.  I am getting a reminder but it is on Monday after pay period ends.  Example:  Pay period ended Nov.22nd  I run payroll on the day after payroll period ends so I want a reminder on Nov. 23rd (morning)   I did not get a reminder until Monday Nov. 26th.   How can I get this setup to work?

[caroline]

Our reminder email to login and run payroll should be sending the day after your payroll period ends. I’m sorry to hear this is not the case for your account @rivesphoto. Can you contact our team so they can get this sorted out for you? (You'll just need your customer code to call us!) We’d like to look into this further!

[browdownstudio]

Hello! 

I use square payroll in my salon to pay my artists, who are all independent contractors. Is there any way to pull sales by category (by artist) and include tip info, which can now only be found in “Transaction Reports”? Are there best practices from other salons you can share?

Thank you so much! 

[caroline]

Hi @browdownstudio - We have several Salons using Square Payroll to pay their team, and they often ask us this same question. If you aren’t already using Employee Management, we recommend signing up for this Square service. With Employee Management, you can track your artists’ sales, including any credit card tips earned.

When it’s time to run payroll you can pull a sales report by contractor to see the total amount each contractor earned in sales and tips for the pay period. You will then enter this information into payroll. Unfortunately, we do not support automatic tip and sales importing for contractors at this time. We can certainly notify you as soon as this feature is available!

[capitolcitycine]

We are a small, independent theater in Jefferson City, Missouri. Is there any way to go back and edit each employee's prior payroll amount? I know it asked when we first set it up, but we would like to be able to go back and change because some employees we need to change. 

Thanks,

Dalton Turner 

Capitol City Cinema 

[caroline]

There are two ways Square obtains your employees’ year to date pay information, @capitolcitycine. First, we check each employee’s profile under the 2018 YTD amount section. Then, we also ask employers who are switching from another provider to upload a YTD report from their previous payroll provider’s system during the set up process. Our tax team reviews your YTD payroll report to make sure each employee’s YTD amount on their profile matches what we have on the YTD report. If there is a discrepancy, we make adjustments on your behalf.  Once this process is complete it can take 2 - 3 weeks for the correct YTD amount to show on each employee’s pay stub.

If your employees’ YTD amounts are still incorrect after this, you can reach out to our Payroll Customer Success team. They will request a payroll report that contains missing pay history. From here they will work with our tax team to upload the additional report on the backend and update your employee’s YTD pay.

(Our support team can be reached by phone M-F 6am - 6pm PST at[Redacted] or by email at payroll@help-messaging.squareup.com. Just remember your customer code!)

[capitolcitycine]

Hi, @caroline, and thank you for answering our questions. Would I be able to give the customer care team each employees YTD gross/net pay and they will calculate the appropriate taxes, or will they need send an overall summary of each employee's YRD? 

[caroline]

Please send a report with taxes included! We need it broken down by pay stub. Usually this is the most detailed report you can obtain from your provider 🙂

Here's more info from our Support Center. 

[frameexpert]

Can I determine when I run a payroll or does it have to be on a regular schedule. If my cash flow is tight, I will sometimes skip a payroll (I am just paying my own salary). Or, I may want to run an extra payroll. When I first looked into Square Payroll, they told me I had to be on a regular schedule.

[caroline]

Hey @frameexpert - When setting up your Square Payroll account we will ask you to pick a regular pay schedule (weekly, biweekly, semi-monthly, or monthly), however, you do not have to stick to this regular schedule. You can process payroll as many times as you need within the month at no additional fee. If you need to skip a pay period, simply do not run payroll. Square will not process anything on your behalf and your pay period automatically updates to the next pay period. If you need to process an irregular pay run outside of your typical payroll schedule, you will have access to our Off-Cycle payment feature. This feature allows you to customize the date range of your pay period and will process the same day it is submitted. Employees paid by direct deposit will receive their pay four business days after the off-cycle payroll is sent.

@lizdederer I think this answers your question too! 🙌

[Steve4]

Hi - We recently learned that Square Payroll can't adjust our State Unemployment withholding to match the rate our state requires.  Its not too high, its too low.  We have a positive balance with our state (New Hampshire) and are only required to withhold 0.1%.  Square payroll can't withhold less than 0.3%.   Why is that?  Can we choose to have 0% withheld and file the State unemplyment payments ourselves?

Otherwise - we love Square Payroll and find its mix of services and fees a perfect fit for our small business.

Thanks!

[caroline]

@Steve4 - Unfortunately this is correct, the lowest UI rate we support in New Hampshire is 0.2% since it is applicable to most employers in the state. We apologize for the inconvenience but we do not have a good estimate on when this will be fixed to allow employers to enter a rate lower than 0.2%.

In the meantime, you can use Square Payroll with the higher NH UI rate and contact the state regarding a refund for the positive balance. While we understand this is not ideal we hope this helps in some way!

And we ♥️ you too! 

[carters2018]

I need clarification on how square works and deducts my emplyoees local taxes ie. county, city and school tax.  I am starting to hear (after I have already switched to square payroll) that this is not an option.  Please help me figure this out ... I cannot find anyhting online about it.