National Payroll Week

This week marks National Payroll Week, a time to celebrate and acknowledge the crucial role that payroll teams play in the lives of each and every worker across the globe.

When we started Arc back in 2008, we set an aim to have one of the best payroll operations in the industry and we pride ourselves on having achieved this goal. During lockdown, we pushed further into amplifying this achievement when we invested in our vision, aligned our goals with our values, and created an Impact Strategy that focused on tackling the three biggest issues currently threatening the hospitality industry: taking climate action, reducing barriers to employment, and tackling social inequalities.

Through our social inequalities pillar, we aim to make recruitment and staffing fairer for everyone, and that includes pay. From championing the Real Living Wage as a Living Wage Foundation Recognised Service Provider to being one of the few temporary agencies that pays holiday pay automatically on top of the hourly pay rate and allowing our team members to access up to 40% of their wages before payday through Wagestream, we care about the financial wellbeing of our team members.

We continue to have one of the best payroll operations in our industry by adhering to robust processes as determined by our ISO 9001 management system, exploiting our market-leading technology, and by the sheer skill and expertise of Ginny, our Head of Payroll and Compliance, a member of The Chartered Institute of Payroll Professionals (CIPP).

Let’s talk about life before Arc! Tell us about your background and what led you to a job in the industry?

I fell into finance way back in the stone ages when we ran our own business, but shied away from payroll as I didn’t fully understand it.

After selling the business, I continued to work in finance for 15 years before I was asked to assist with payroll administration, collating timesheets, and prepping for the Payroll Manager, so my exposure to it developed, and I found myself doing more and more to reduce the burden and began covering for holidays, etc. Unfortunately, the then Payroll Manager lost a loved one, and I was asked to step in to allow her time to grieve. Within two months of being looking after UK, Irish, and USA payrolls if I was offered the job full time and asked to find a replacement for my own role. The timing just so happened to be at year end, so I was thrown headfirst into one of the busiest (and stressful) times for payroll.

Once I had made it through that without too many scuffs and scrapes, I knew I had to develop my education and bring myself up to date with legislation, as merely processing the work isn’t sufficient; you need to understand what you are doing and why you are doing it to fully appreciate your involvement in so many areas. Auto-enrolment pensions had just become law, so that was another legislative hoop to jump through and understand in order to execute it effectively and correctly.

It would be fair to say I fell into payroll, but I genuinely love what I do. It’s such an emotive subject, and when things don’t go exactly to plan, from banking systems going down and staying up all night manually paying 650 people one by one to working Christmas day and overnight shifts, when you know that your team has been paid correctly and on time, you get a great deal of satisfaction from it.

Why did you choose Arc?

I have been part of Arc since July 2022, having been with my previous employer for seven years I felt that (furlough aside) I wasn’t being challenged enough, I wanted more exposure to the different elements of payroll processing and by joining an organisation like Arc I would find a role where I could develop my own skills and offer the benefit of my experience to work together to offer a continually improving and evolving service to our team members.

I am sometimes (gently) teased for admitting that I like a challenge and working in the payroll world continually provides me with exactly what I asked for. It’s safe to say we are kept on our toes but I wouldn’t have it any other way!

What does a typical day look like for you in your role as Head of Payroll and Compliance at Arc?

It’s safe to say that no day is the same, which is part of what keeps things interesting and challenging in equal measure. Along with your own ‘to do’ list, which can be very extensive at certain times, my role is to support our wider team and provide guidance and training in areas they may not be confident in. Both myself and the incredible team around me strive to ensure that our team members, clients, and wider statutory bodies are confident that we run everything correctly and as smoothly as possible.

We can be running visa expiry checks one morning, ensuring we keep within visa requirements and ensuring we have adequate information on term dates and course completion, calculating maternity payments and ensuring risk assessments are completed to keep our team members safe at work, to dealing with HMRC enquiries the next. No day is the same, but when you’re looking after thousands of team members and core staff, they trust you to have their best interests at heart, and we are constantly learning and developing to make sure we do everything to maintain that.

How do you ensure accuracy and compliance in our payroll processing?

An awful lot of checking, double checking, and then a bit more checking! When there are on average 16,000 individual shifts throughout the month, we are constantly running a variety of checks to ensure our team members are receiving the right rate of pay as advertised, within minimum and living wage rates. Tax codes are updated the day we receive them to ensure everything is as accurate as can be. Our new starters each month are contacted if their application is more than three months old to ensure we have up-to-date information to ensure their earnings reach them on time.

Having introduced Wagestream at the beginning of the year, after six months of quietly testing and challenging their system to ensure it works for our organisation, we now offer that benefit to our team to access 40% of their approved shifts ahead of payday as monthly pay doesn’t work for everyone. Wagestream also comes with a raft of benefits, discounts, and financial advice free of charge to assist on day-to-day basis. We are very proud of the time and effort put into this system to offer it to our wider team, as it is all processed manually in house.

What systems and tools do you use to manage payroll?

We moved to a new payroll system in 2022, which is definitely more in line with the requirements of our team and allows us to access a portal to view and download their payslips, P60’s, and pension information, and allows us to breakdown each shift worked by name and date to make payslips very clear.

All of the shift information comes from Ubeya, which each team member can view in their income section, so everything is transparent at both ends. The payroll system also provides pension information, informing our team how to opt out or in should they wish, and the details about how it all works so everyone can make an informed decision based on their own circumstances.

Whilst all of this technology assists us all, I do feel that within payroll, the personal touch cannot be overlooked, and we ensure that all of the checks mentioned previously are handled manually and, where possible, resolved ahead of payday.

How do you handle discrepancies that may arise during payroll?

With care. As alluded to, payment is a very emotive subject, and we all want to be paid accurately for the work we have done. Within our industry, we all know unexpected changes can occur. You may be booked for a shift and find yourself staying longer to assist a client, which may not be adequately communicated in time, or you may find yourself working in an area that you weren’t booked for.

We try to capture this information ahead of time, but where this is not possible, we offer an advance system whereby you receive 75% of the monies owed outside of payroll processing and the remainder within the next payroll run, or we process the difference as a shift, which can be drawn down using Wagestream. Each member of the operations team reviews these issues and communicates with us to obtain the most satisfactory outcome for the person concerned. Often, we find that unexpected tax codes can be a source of frustration, and whilst we publish information regarding this on Zendesk, which is available to all team members, we welcome direct enquiries and will provide as much information as possible.

What do you think sets our operation apart from others in the industry?

I believe you cannot work in payroll unless you care. I have worked in several organisations where the person in charge and their team consider you an inconvenience; they have done their bit and are not interested past that point.

Everyone, if they have a query, has the right to be heard, understood, and assisted. It can be easy for some to disregard queries as a lack of understanding, but how many of us were taught in school or further in life about tax, national insurance, pensions, and taxable benefits? I certainly wasn’t. I always trusted what I was paid was correct because I didn’t know any better… until I did. I have shared with the team that I work with everything I have learnt through courses, education, continuing self-development and experience to assist with queries, whether they be why tax is being paid to thresholds for pensions, so we all have an aligned, honest, and accurate response.

Within our core values, you absolutely have to be honest. If we have made a mistake on our end, which happens as we are only human, it is our responsibility to be transparent and provide an adequate resolution. And finally, we deliver on time, every time.