Georgia has become the 21st state that Xero will offer full support for payroll in. The cloud based financial solution has been slowly adding US states to its supported list and expects to deliver more in the near future although it would be drawn on which is next. For small business Xero users in Georgia this will mean that they can move their payroll into Xero for greater control and visibility, integrating the two functions and removing double entry and a risk of error.
Commenting on the release Xero Partner John Ray from Ray Business Advisors & Bookkeeping Express of Greater Atlanta commented: “Having payroll directly integrated on the same platform as your accounting solution simplifies the life of a small business owner.
“Working in the cloud, on the same ledger and using the same set of data, also opens up a direct line of communication between a small business owner and their advisor. The simplicity of having all the information in one place cuts out the need for many manual processes, enabling small business owners to get on with running their operations and leaving the numbers to their accountant.”
Why Georgia?
This is not a small market as Georgia is the ninth most populous state in the United States with over 9.68 million people according to the 2010 census. In terms of small businesses it had just over 220,000 business registered with less than 10 employees in Q1 2015 according to the GA Dept. of Labor. There were 287,850 small businesses of less than 500 employees in the same period.
Xero’s U.S. President, Russ Fujioka commented: “Xero is truly excited to provide an accounting and payroll solution that will not only make running their business much easier but also make them much more efficient.”
So what does Xero it actually do?
The payroll solution is fully integrated into Xero financial suite. Small business owners are able to let employees use a self service function at no extra cost which allows employees to fill in timesheet data, view time off and their pay history. The solution is then able to pay employees either through direct deposit or with instant paychecks. Once completed not only can payroll reports be run but Xero will soon support electronic filing and payments for your payroll tax.
Once set up the system will also remind business owner at the appropriate time that they have to file and pay payroll taxes, increasing the chance of avoiding late payments and fines. Considering that the fine is 5% of the tax due, and an additional 5% for each additional month the return is late up to 25% it is not insignificant.
Conclusion
As Xero increases its expansion across the US, it now has 600,000 subscribers across the country. Its financial solutions already support all states and with this latest release it is now able to support 60% of small businesses in the USA. That number will be increasing over the coming months and it will be interesting how Intuit and Sage respond to this.
Fujioka is clearly pleased with the growth of coverage and closed with: “This release is also a great milestone as we are well on our way of bringing payroll support to all 50 states.”
