In most large and medium organizations payroll is an essential monthly activity, which is fairly routine in nature. Depending on the size and nature of the organization, this activity can be fraught with complexities related to calculations, deductions and statutory regulations.

Keeping payroll software in-house is more practical than outsourcing the task. Doing so offers a high level of flexibility, affording businesses the ability to make changes with relative ease and to keep records maintained according to their unique needs. Even tasks such as reimbursement of expenses to employees may be easier when payroll software is used. Payroll software enables companies to compute:

*            Salaries including statutory computation of PF and ESI

*            Income Tax & maintain record of Investments

*            Reimbursements as per CTC norms

*            Keep track of Employee Leave taken and Loans availed

*            Maintain correspondence with employees in respect of  Letters and E-mail

Payroll software can be used to standardize the way a company handles the calculation and processing of its payroll. Payroll software can be utilized not only to calculate money due to employees, but also to provide for easy management of employee information and accuracy of employee data. Essentially, payroll software can help to streamline the entire process, making the task of processing payroll less time-consuming and error free

Payroll calculations relating to salaries, taxes, reimbursements and leaves can be completed in a fraction much faster than doing it manually.

Also a good payroll solution assists companies to save on costs and become paperless, salary reimbursements can be a good example. Instead of issuing ‘hard copy’ pay slips today companies issue pay slips via email which helps on saving printing and distribution costs. Alternatively pay slips can be uploaded on the intranet via a ‘Personnel Information Portal’

Another area of human resource management that can be error prone is leave calculations of employees. Keeping track of leaves taken, necessary approvals and the nature of leaves (casual or sick) can be a tedious task. Leave module in payroll software allows the user to define various types of leaves that the employee is entitled to and set different leave parameters for different categories of employees.  

It keeps track of leaves taken by employees and maintains a daily attendance register which is transferred at the end of the month to the payroll module. Leave applications can be generated from with in the system and submitted to the appropriate person for approval.     

SME and SMB’s in India has always looked for a stable payroll software which should work seamlessly in Indian corporate environment. If we look at various payroll software vendors in India they look like more appropriate for overseas companies rather than for Indian environment.

Even if they talk about customization as per client requirements, it overshoots the budget of SME and SMB’s most of the time. Sage Software India a subsidiary of Sage Group UK has launched their Payroll software “Sage Pocket” which has been developed according to Indian Environment. We can get more details on their website http://www.sagesoftware.co.in

In future we might see a lot of action from various software companies in this segment. Though few companies has bundled payroll software with their ERP and CRM solution, still pricing is the Key issue for SME and SMB’s in India, which these companies need to answer.