Do You Need a Payroll Service for Your Dental Practice?

Because you are so busy helping your patients live plaque free lives, staying up to date on changing tax and payroll laws probably isn’t at the top of your to-do list. When you process payroll incorrectly, along with unhappy employees, you can risk fines for not paying the correct taxes, or just having to pay more money to make up for it later. Before you DIY payroll, these are some things to consider.

Your Business Legal Structure

Depending on the type of legal structure you chose for your dental practice, there are different rules and responsibilities. If you own the practice on your own, there is a good chance that you are a sole proprietor. If running a practice with others, you likely fall under a type of corporation or partnership. This is important to know when running payroll because there are different tax rules for the different structures.

Employee Classifications

Do you know how to classify your employees properly? Running a dental practice, it’s likely that you have a mix of exempt and non-exempt employees. For example, your dental hygienist’s will likely be paid differently than the employees you have in reception, or other areas of your practice. If you have any employees who work on a contract, versus being an actual employee, you’ll need to account for those differences as well. Misclassification of employees could lead to painful payroll headaches because you may end up owing employees missed wages if they received the wrong classification. The general differentiators for exempt and non-exempt employees are:

Payroll and Tax Laws

Payroll is not a one size fits all approach to every state. Some examples of what your state can dictate are payroll schedules, minimum wage laws, payday rules, and income taxes. When you’re busy juggling multiple tasks at your dental practice, chances are it’s a challenge to stay up to date on payroll requirements for your state. Using an online payroll service, like SurePayroll, can help you stay compliant and abide by the tax laws for your state. We are constantly updating tax codes to make sure that your payroll will be accurate every time.

Additionally, we have a tax filing guarantee: “If any tax agency comes knocking based on a filing that we’ve made, you can count on us to resolve the issue on your behalf. And, if we’re at fault, we’ll pay all associated fines and penalties.”

Time Management

Payroll is a time-consuming task that you probably don’t have time for. Due to hectic schedules, it’s easy to accidentally forget to process your payroll, or you may be rushing and make a mistake. We understand that life happens and therefore have created some payroll flexibility for SurePayroll customers. For the times you forget to process, we offer same-day and next-day payroll options so your employees won’t miss their paychecks. Do you run the same payroll schedule every pay period? Set your payroll processing on cruise control and with our auto payroll option. And for those times you calculated wages wrong and made a mistake, hit cancel payroll and start fresh.

Bottom Line

You started your dental practice to help your patients keep their pearly whites clean, not run payroll. If running payroll feels like more work than pulling teeth, outsourcing payroll to an online payroll service is a great option. It’s important to keep in mind that not all payroll providers are the same; some charge for trials, have contracts, are expensive, and overall don’t have your back the way they should. Do your research and make sure that you’re choosing a provider who really has your best interests at heart, and let’s you get back to doing what you love.