As payroll complexities increasingly drain accountancy firms' resources, pioneering solutions that offer greater integration offer a path to turn this burden into an automated, profitable value stream.
Payroll management is a time-consuming and error-prone process that plagues accountants and bookkeepers across the industry. Many accounting firms struggle with inefficient payroll workflows involving multiple tools and manual interventions.
With payroll eating into valuable hours that could be spent on higher-value services, it’s no surprise that accountants strongly desire a unified, automated solution. And yet only 9% of AP departments are fully automated today, according to the Institute of Financial Operations & Leadership.
For many firms, the modern payroll reality can be a frankensteined assembly of disconnected tools—spreadsheets, tax tables, pension portals, and more. Maintaining this patchwork of systems is not only cumbersome but also increases the risk of costly errors that can severely impact client satisfaction and compliance.
In addition, market research conducted by Intuit QuickBooks revealed that 52%* of accountants and bookkeepers found gathering client information to be a challenge in helping them run payroll efficiently.
“Running payroll itself isn’t the time-consuming part; the real effort is gathering all the information beforehand. It’s the collection of necessary information such as timesheets, changes in pay, expenses, bonuses, and updates on new hires or leavers,” says Nick Williams, UK product director at QuickBooks.
“Then there are pension enrolments, calculating pay and deductions, creating and issuing payslips, and creating and filing routine reports to HMRC. All of this takes time, and there are compliance risks.”
Adding to the frustration, payroll staff must constantly keep up with ever-changing regulations regarding tax codes, pension rates, and employment laws.
“We’ve even seen many large organisations falter with national minimum wage legislation,” says Williams.
Beyond these operational inefficiencies, payroll itself is often an area of thin margins for firms. Rising software licensing costs, the need to support multiple payroll products, and hidden fees for additional pay runs or client onboarding can quickly erode it as a strategic driver for the business.
With payroll being such a resource-intensive service offering, it’s no wonder many firms see it as more of a burden than a value generator.
To unlock the full potential of payroll as a revenue stream, firms must adopt modern solutions that unify and automate the entire process chain. By consolidating payroll for all clients into a single, powerful platform, firms can standardise workflows and drive seamless scaling as they take on more business.
Automation is key, eliminating the drudgery of manual tasks like pay runs, RTI submissions, pension uploads and tax code updates.
“Automation reduces the administrative burden, allowing accountants to focus on more strategic aspects of their role. This shift enhances compliance and data security and minimises the potential for costly errors and reputational damage,” says Williams.
Integration is another cornerstone, ensuring a cohesive experience by connecting the payroll system with the firm’s existing accounting software stack, such as Xero, Sage and FreshBooks.
“It is common for accountants to ask their clients to use their own FMS or the software their clients already use. Using an integrated solution eliminates the need for multiple payroll software and knowing how each works,” says Williams.
“This is in contrast to learning and utilising the payroll module offered by each FMS provider. Using a single, consolidated payroll solution also means one login with all payroll tasks in a single, consolidated dashboard – no more flipping back and forth between multiple payroll tools and client views.”
This unified view translates into better client service, richer payroll insights, and tighter oversight over profitability metrics.
Designed specifically for accountancy firms and bookkeepers, QuickBooks Bureau Payroll stands out as a comprehensive standalone payroll solution operating fully in the cloud.
“In the same way that we can do almost everything with our mobile phones, it’s the same with accounting software. You want to do as much as you can automatically, reduce errors, and mitigate reputational damage,” explains Williams.
“With Bureau Payroll, accountants can save time by having employers provide this information via push notifications. Setting up employee details upfront can reduce back-and-forth inquiries. We can’t also forget the impact it has on business resources.”
Its robust automation capabilities streamline pay runs, RTI filings, pension fund updates and more. Crucially, it integrates with major accounting platforms like QuickBooks Online, Xero and Sage for a seamless digital experience.
What sets QuickBooks Bureau Payroll apart is its simple, transparent fixed-fee pricing model tailored for firms, not employers.
With no hidden costs for onboarding new clients or running additional pay cycles, profitability becomes predictable and scalable. Powerful reporting dashboards provide payroll analytics firms need to monitor performance and margins in real-time.
“By adopting an automation-centric solution like QuickBooks Bureau Payroll, accountants can save significantly on the cost of labour through efficiency gains, enabling them to do more with less or to use their most valuable asset, their people, for more strategic initiatives,” says Williams.
The payroll challenges endemic to the accountancy field are clear: inefficient processes, mounting labour costs, error risks, and razor-thin margins. However, firms equipped with the right technology can turn payroll from a costly obligation into an optimised profit engine.
“A unified system streamlines operations and ensures secure data transfers to pension providers, preventing the risk of data mishandling or misreporting, which are major concerns,” says Williams.
“From a QuickBooks perspective, the importance of integration—and our achievements with it—is something we know the market needs.”
With QuickBooks Bureau Payroll, payroll becomes a scalable value-add that delights clients while boosting the firm’s bottom line.
* Intuit QuickBooks surveyed 1500 accountants, bookkeepers, and small businesses to identify common payroll needs and pain points. The study sample included 397 accountants and bookkeepers, along with 1088 SMBs that have between 0 and 99 employees.
