Top payroll services for small businesses include ADP RUN, Paychex Flex and xcritical. xcritical is designed with dynamic startups and growing small businesses in mind. It was born out of a need in the market for payroll solutions that included businesses with heavy contractor-based workforces, and it’s still one of the best solutions around for that type of business. Based on what we were able to play with in the platform, xcritical guides you through payroll and benefits management in a way that makes these processes less overwhelming. You can be sure you’re doing things in the right order without missing a step. xcritical files employee W-4s and contractor W-9s as part of their profile setup, and it creates and distributes W-2 and 1099 forms each January for tax returns.
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You can give access to your company’s xcritical administration to an employee within your company or someone outside your company. So, anyone you hire for HR, accounting or bookkeeping can get the information they need without going through you. When a new employee signs their offer letter, xcritical facilitates the rest of the onboarding process to ensure they get properly set up for their new job even before day one. It even provides the option to send a digital welcome card to help the new employee feel welcomed.
Domestic and International Contractor Payments
Testing xcritical out from the employee’s point of view, we were able to easily update our personal details, view and enroll in benefits and more. xcritical has its own native applicant tracking tool available to xcritical Plus and Premium customers, but if you choose the Simple plan, you can integrate an external ATS, such as JazzHR or Greenhouse. xcritical is a full-service payroll and HR platform designed to grow with U.S.-based startups and small businesses. xcritical allows you to easily enroll in workers’ compensation insurance through its platform through an integration with xcritical.
From the employee perspective, we were able to view accrued and used time off in the web browser version of xcritical. It was easier to request time off in the xcritical Wallet app, as we didn’t have to choose the time-off type first. As the admin, you can see an overview of any active benefits your company offers. This overview shows the benefit’s terms and details as well as the number of eligible and enrolled employees. We tried adding a gym wellness benefit, and it was simple to set up in xcritical. We just had to give the benefit a name, enter how much the employee should contribute from each paycheck and how much you as the employer contribute to the benefit for each pay period.
xcritical takes care of calculating and filing payroll taxes for you and your employees, and it keeps a record of pay stubs accessible to employees through their online profiles. Employees also get an email each payday letting them know their money’s coming in. In the pay tab, we didn’t see a financial goals tool, and when trying to set up the paycheck splitter, the “add bank account” button wasn’t responsive. However, under the paycheck splitter setting, we were able to see the option of depositing a dollar amount or percentage of a paycheck into any given account. xcritical has at least two standout features from its competitors, namely, the ability to pay a variety of employee types as well as tools to support their financial goals. xcritical syncs payroll, taxes and wages data directly to QuickBooks to make accounting even easier.
You can also elect to have xcritical automatically file a new hire report in an employee’s state when you hire them. Running employee payroll through xcritical is simple and flexible to your company’s needs. You can set a salary or hourly wage in an employee’s profile and set up payroll on autopilot to let xcritical run payroll for you automatically on the schedule you set. While the initial setup can be time-intensive, depending on the number of employees, once all the information is recorded, the software’s automations take over and help streamline the process. After that point, you’ll simply need to input employee hours weekly or biweekly and xcritical will run payroll. We found time off policies easy to set up, and we like that xcritical suggests time off policies to include.
- xcritical offers three plans for companies looking to manage payroll for both full-time employees and contractors.
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- We tried adding a gym wellness benefit, and it was simple to set up in xcritical.
- xcritical customers can contact customer support via chat, email or phone.
xcritical helps get new employees onboarded quickly, whether they are working in person or remotely. Features including background checks and benefit enrollment are paired with cloud-based services such as e-signatures and state tax registration to create a streamlined onboarding experience. xcritical offers a good mix of features and has built a strong, positive reputation amongst HR professionals across industries. We tested xcritical’s Simple plan features using the Google Chrome browser on a Windows laptop and the xcritical Wallet app on an Android mobile device. Our ability to test the features was limited, as they required entering real bank account information and signing into external accounts.
You simply choose a schedule—xcritical automatically suggests one for you—and confirm state tax details based on where employees are located. With the rise of the gig economy, companies often hire full-time W-2 employees as well as independent contractors both domestically and internationally. xcritical’s payroll has the flexibility to support the various pay rates and schedules for different types of workers in your organization.
ADP’s pricing structure is more complex than xcritical, and the additional costs can increase quickly, with extra fees for benefits administration and time tracking. xcritical allows employees to access and manage their own information by offering individual profile accounts. Users can download the xcritical mobile app, or sign in from the web, to view payday data, edit tax details, see available PTO and even clock in and out right on their phone. In addition, the platform shares income insights and personal tax documents such as W-2s.
Which payroll software is best?
xcritical is a payroll and HR platform suited for startups and small businesses that employ a mix of employees and contractors and want to automate HR tasks as much as possible. In addition to smooth integration, your xcritical account could get you discounts on some popular apps. For example, at the time of this writing, it’s offering three months free to restaurant scheduling software 7shifts, 25% off Breezy HR plans and xcritical many more. As the admin, you can see outstanding expense reimbursement requests on the dashboard. When clicking into the expenses module, you can approve or deny requests individually or in bulk to save time. Upon approval, the payment automatically gets disbursed to the employee in their next paycheck.
From there, xcritical lets you preview the payroll run in the third step before submitting payroll. Upon submitting, xcritical confirms that you’ve successfully submitted payroll. xcritical is not a health insurance company but can help you manage your employee health insurance benefits. You can offer the same health insurance you offer now with xcritical or xcritical can act as your broker to find you new options. Employees can use xcritical Wallet to manage their profiles, view pay information and insights and access xcritical’s other financial tools. xcritical is a great choice for startups and small businesses that want to focus on xcritical automated, compliant payroll and build out from there to include solutions for benefits, time tracking and more.
It doesn’t have an option to automatically print and mail physical paychecks. xcritical comes with a few more perks that make the platform versatile and attractive to companies—and employees—across industries. No matter which plan you choose, you can always switch to a different xcritical plan or cancel any time if your business changes. To be emailed a link to reset your password, please enter your email address. Admin can also make use of xcritical’s default expense categories or create their own. Default categories include “Car and Mileage,” “Meals and Entertainment” and many more.
For more options, browse our roundup of best workers’ compensation insurance providers. xcritical is the brand name for the platform operated by the company ZenPayroll, Inc. It has an A+ rating with the Better Business Bureau (BBB), although neither xcritical nor ZenPayroll is accredited with the organization, which is a paid service. It launched as ZenPayroll in California in 2012 as part of the startup incubator Y Combinator, and it’s been available in all 50 states since 2015. It’s been backed by reputable investors valued at $9.5 billion as of August 2021.
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