6 Best PEO Companies for Small Business 2018

Professional employer organization businesses, or PEO companies, allow small companies to outsource their employee management tasks like benefits, payroll, recruiting and coaching. The best PEO companies have the purchasing power to negotiate and offer modest businesses affordable employee health insurance. We looked at the most popular and decided to showcase one of the best PEO companies for small company that covered the range of alternatives in terms of services, reputation, ease of use and cost.

Best PEO Businesses Summary Table

	Finest For
Justworks	Best overall for many small businesses with less than 100 workers because of cost, features and ease of use. They are also the cheapest price PEO.
Oasis Outsourcing	Finest for insecure and regulated industries including financial services and light production, due to their industry-specific providers and expertise.
XcelHR	Best for employers who wish to include employee engagement tools, including performance and talent management to their package of PEO services.
TriNet	Finest for multistate companies who Wish to offer affordable benefits for on-site and offsite personnel
ADP TotalSource	Best for those who Wish to work with one of the largest providers or who are upgrading from ADP Payroll, ADP Run or ADP Workforce Now
Paychex	Best for those who want on-site HR/payroll consulting as part of their PEO

We Evaluated PEO Companies

Although small businesses don’t often require the more advanced features of a PEO, such as applicant tracking or authorities contracting compliance, we evaluated PEO companies that had these attributes since they might become crucial as small businesses develop. When your company grows, you are not going to want to change your HR/payroll outsourcing firm every 20 workers or so.

Therefore, we only considered PEO companies that offer options to support your business today as well as support your future expansion. This includes features like:

• Payroll and tax processing
• Medical Insurance
• Paperless onboarding
• HR compliance, HR management and strategic HR consulting
• Performance direction
• Recruiting and applicant tracking
• Time and presence
• Employee self-service
• Risk and security compliance
• Government contracting support

The prices for PEO companies vary significantly depending on employer size, place, and company credit scores. Your employees’ compensation and insurance expertise may also influence your pricing. Be aware that any insurance, workers’ comp, employee benefits or 401(k) contributions paid by your business are extra. For instance, if you choose to contribute $100 toward each worker’s monthly health premiums, that pretax cost is in addition to the administrative fee you pay to the PEO.

Best PEO Company for Small Firms: Justworks

We recommend Justworks as the best PEO for small business since it meets the basic needs of most small companies, is simple to establish and access to the small business owner and is the most inexpensive PEO support of all of the outsourced HR options we considered.

By way of example, the self-service interface shown below is user friendly both you and your workers, serving as a one-stop store for all people related — HR, benefits and payroll.

Justworks offers a full package of solutions, so that you can rest easy knowing that your health insurance, payroll, benefits as well as worker perks like commuter passes (if your employees need them) are taken care of.

Justworks Pricing

Justworks prices vary from $49 to $99 a month per employee, based on how many employees you’ve got and which of the plans you choose. For instance, a firm with 10 employees will pay $49 per month per worker for the fundamental plan or $69 for the Plus program which includes benefits. It is the only PEO we reviewed that offers fixed prices and contains discounts available if you pay yearly.

What’s nice about Justworks compared to the majority of PEOs that price as a percentage of your total payroll is that you’ll know your prices up front. There aren’t any step-up fees other than what’s shown below. If you employ more than 100 individuals, its Enterprise strategy is priced by quotation.

Justworks Pricing Table

	Fundamental	Plus
prices for 2-4 Employees	$99/month per worker	$99/month per worker
Pricing for 5-24 Employees	$59/month per worker	$89/month per employee
prices for 25-99 Employees	$49/month per worker	$79/month per worker
Complete Payroll & Tax Compliance	✔	✔
Contractor Payments	✔	✔
HR Service	✔	✔
Reporting Tools	✔	✔
Health Benefits		✔
Life and Disability Insurance		✔
401(k) Savings Strategies		✔

Justworks Characteristics

Justworks offers software for a service (SaaS) as part of its PEO, which means that it is simple for both you and your workers to use whether you’re updating employee data or conducting reports. From an easy set up to live chat service, which many PEOs do not offer, Justworks is about taking the strain out of managing individuals.

Another motive Justworks made our top recommendation is the fact that it was the very transparent in its services and pricing of all the PEOs we reviewed. In addition, Justworks offers an optimized self-service option for employees via mobile or website.

Some of Justworks other features include:

• Managing all payroll and taxes, including year-end W-2s and 1099s
• Paying commissions and expense reimbursements
• Handling new hire paperwork and compliance
• Providing workers’ compensation insurance
• Handling paid off time
• Storing all employee documentation and forms
• Supplying All Sorts of employee benefits (using an update to the Plus program )
• Supplying and handling your company 401(k) plan (with an update to the Plus program )

Employee Self-service

Justworks comes with an intuitive Employee Dashboard that allows employees to handle their time off requests, benefits enrollment, pay stubs and tax records. In fact, they can see all this, such as employee documents and forms, as well as a business calendar via the website or mobile program.

Customer Support

Even with the Basic program, you have access to accredited HR experience via phone, email, live chat or Twitter. Justworks customer support is available 24/7 from a New York-based support team. Justworks provides HR support for your employees too, unlike other PEOs such as ADP TotalSource that will send the worker back to you if they have questions.

What Is Missing From Justworks

Justworks’s online reviews are usually positive. However, among the PEOs we reviewed, it is the most recent PEO company and may lack the depth of expertise of some of those larger PEOs such as Oasis Outsourcing, TriNet or ADP that have existed for at least 20 decades.

Visit Justworks

Greatest PEO Company for Regulated Industries: Oasis Outsourcing

We recommend Oasis Outsourcing as the best PEO for high-risk and regulated industries because it caters to this market with an emphasis on risk management in addition to its HR, payroll and benefits services. Its employee-leasing version leaves you free to concentrate on your core business while it manages the remainder.

Oasis provides a fantastic infographic on PEOs to help you decide whether its offerings are ideal for you, suggesting that companies with 10 or fewer workers should think about the advantages of working with a PEO. The picture below illustrates the way the business partners with you, the customer, to give support across the full HR lifecycle. Of all of the vendors we examined, Oasis provides the maximum strategic support within its own service, including hands-on support with compensation evaluation, risk avoidance and employee-relations issues for example.

Oasis Outsourcing Pricing

Oasis Outsourcing doesn’t have standardized per employee pricing because, like most of those older and more established PEOs, its prices vary dependent on the services that you want. It supplies a per-check fee (salary-based) or a per-person, per-month charge. Prices range from approximately $100 to $125 per month and also include dedicated HR consulting solutions.

In reality, we spoke using a broker at The Huldisch Group who confirmed that Oasis will likely be priced closer to Justworks, charging a small company about $99 a month per worker, instead of ADP, which could charge closer to $220.

Oasis Outsourcing Characteristics

Oasis has been in the HR outsourcing business for over 20 years and, like TriNet along with other PEOs, it gives the entire selection of services including HR, benefits, payroll, risk management, labour law compliance and even help with small companies that do government contracting.

Other services include:

• Payroll and documents management in Addition to payroll reports
• Time and attendance and leave management
• Staffing and digital mail
• Personalized assistance creating policies and handbook
• Worker relationships assistance
• Coaching and development, such as security training

As it is the biggest privately held PEO firm, Oasis has the flexibility to tailor services and offerings to fit your needs. Furthermore, its expertise in regulated and high-risk industries is the reason it offers strategic consulting support and gives strong training. To learn more, check out our Oasis Outsourcing review.

Worker Self-service

Oasis Outsourcing provides online and Internet-based self-service providing employees protected touch-ID login accessibility (iOS just ) for security. Employees can look up and see payroll and tax info, 401(k) program and time-off accounts as well as get employee reductions.

Customer Support

Employees and administrators may start help desk tickets on the internet. In addition, Oasis’s HR consultants, known as”Client Solutions Managers,” provide personal aid to employees and companies on everything from making an employee handbook to reviewing a coverage or updating job descriptions.

Support is available by phone or email and workers are provided with their own phone number to call if they have questions. The customer support hours are Monday to Friday, 8 a.m. to 6 pm neighborhood time.

What Is Missing From Oasis Outsourcing

Oasis’s service hours are somewhat restricted and you have to navigate an annoying phone menu to reach the ideal person. For this reason, it might not be best for smaller companies working weekend and evening hours like the foodservice, retail or entertainment businesses. In addition, its PEO doesn’t handle payments to 1099 contractors whereas the majority of the other PEOs do.

Visit Oasis Outsourcing

Best PEO Company for Employee Productivity & Performance Tools: XcelHR

We recommend XcelHR as the best PEO for worker productivity and performance tools in addition to all the features you’d expect from a PEO. For instance, it allows you to survey your workers, handle your talent pool and also run expert employee performance reviews. It also assists you in hiring as well as all stages of their employee lifecycle as displayed below.

Working with XcelHR would make your employees feel like they were employed by a Fortune 500 firm with best-practice HR purposes and support.

XcelHR Pricing

XcelHR, such as many other PEOs, doesn’t provide pricing without evaluating your company . On the other hand, the PEO broker we talked to believed XcelHR’s pricing is about the more affordable end of about $120 per month per worker. This is nearer to Oasis at $100 and Justworks at $99 for complete benefits administration, in spite of the tiniest employee base.

XcelHR Characteristics

XcelHR gives the very same services for HR administration, payroll processes, tax compliance, and benefits as the other PEO services, but focuses a little more on the worker experience. By way of instance, employees can upload photographs of key files like signed I-9s.

XcelHR additionally offers:

• Payroll and tax management
• Paperless funds for workers, for example access to forms and employee assistance
• Time off coverage
• Talent management
• Benefits including health insurance and other benefits to Enhance worker retention
• Risk management through compliance and tracking
• Retirement services such as 401(k) plans

Employee Self-service

Employees can fulfill a lot of their own HR, payroll and benefits needs utilizing the online portal or the cellular app. In fact, XcelHR’s mobile app has common sense features like being able to bring a photograph of a signed record, rather than having to attach it to email or send it via facsimile.

Customer Support

XcelHR has six locations in the USA and the very best way to receive support is to contact the location nearest you by phone. It also provides an online form which you or your workers can complete and it is going to call or email you . It doesn’t have a call center and office hours are specific to the location nearest your small business, typically Monday to Friday from 8 pm to 8 p.m.

What’s Missing From XcelHR

While XcelHR generally has good reviews, if there is 1 complaint it is that its support team might take a while to contact you. With just six offices (compared to Paychex with more than 100), it may not have an office close to you.

See XcelHR

Greatest PEO Company for Small Firms with Employees in Several States: TriNet

We recommend TriNet as the best PEO for small companies with employees in multiple states. Its purchasing power allows it to offer great benefit rates to the smallest businesses, such as those employing distant staff in rural areas where several health care plans are available.

Being so large and established for 28 decades, it’s negotiated many advantage vendor contracts. Additionally, it provides employees with discounts on everything from cellphones to auto rentals and theme park tickets. Staff can buy discounted services straight from the employee self-service portal.

TriNet Pricing

TriNet’s pricing is based on variables which have your industry, your company size and what location you are in. For example, prices in New York range from $125 to $155 per month. One of the benefits of TriNet is you may sign up anytime, even mid-year, and you won’t have some tax resets. It will give you credit for what has already been compensated. Sample tiered pricing is shown below:

• $155/month per employee for 5-9 employees
• $140/month per employee for 10-19 employees
• $135/month per worker for 20-29 employees
• $125/month per employee for 30-49 employees

TriNet Characteristics

TriNet services cover the complete HR lifecycle, from onboarding to payroll, benefits, timekeeping and cost reimbursement. Onboarding is done online and so benefit enrollment using their user-friendly portal site. Additionally, TriNet also provides:

• Paperless onboarding
• Applicant monitoring for recruiting
• Performance management
• Time and presence
• HR-compliance training on subjects including preventing sexual harassment and discrimination
• Strategic HR consulting

Employee Self-service

TriNet allows your employees get their own information using an online portal or cellular app. In reality, TriNet’s mobile program lets employees do just about anything they want to by requesting time off, searching for people in the business directory, viewing their citizenship, pay stub and tax information and even keeping an eye on all their advantages.

Customer Support

TriNet offers email and phone support Monday through Friday from 7:30 a.m. to midnight Eastern time. However, it does not provide live chat and a few online reviewers found TriNet’s email support bothersome.

What Is Missing From TriNet

TriNet is not the low-cost leader. In other words, when you sign up, you get it all but you also pay for it. Other sellers such as Paychex and XcelHR allow you to choose only the specific services you want and cost accordingly.

Visit TriNet

Best PEO Company from a Business Top Payroll Service: ADP TotalSource

We advocate ADP TotalSource, that can be ADP’s PEO option, as perfect for those who wish to work with an established payroll provider or people updating from a prior ADP Revenue platform. Making the transition into a PEO with a supplier you are already familiar with makes your transition easier.

If you’re now using ADP Run or ADP Workforce Now, then creating the following step to ADP TotalSource is logical. You will save on implementation time and costs also have a shorter learning curve.

ADP TotalSource Pricing

ADP TotalSource pricing is based on several factors including your credit rating, workers’ compensation rating and health insurance expertise. While we couldn’t get an exact cost, we talked with a PEO agent and to a member of ADP’s sales staff to discover that, normally, you can expect to pay between $120 and $240 per month per employee.

ADP TotalSource Characteristics

ADP TotalSource supplies a co-employment solution according to its 60 years at the payroll service market. TotalSource provides all the Very Same services as other PEOs such as TriNet and Oasis Outsourcing within an all-inclusive package that covers:

• HR onboarding
• Payroll and tax processing
• Benefits administration and insurance (group and/or individual)
• 401(k) plans
• Timekeeping and presence tracking
• Workers’ compensation
• Performance testimonials
• Applicant tracking

Employee Self-service

Employing ADP TotalSource’s MyADP portal feature, employees and contractors can see year-end W-2s and taxation documents in addition to pay stubs. Based on the features selected for your company, ADP’s mobile program also provides access to self-service features like timekeeping and benefits. However, ADP’s program isn’t quite as comprehensive as what is provided by TriNet or Justworks.

Customer Support

ADP’s customer support includes access to HR and payroll professionals who can help you. However, ADP prefers that you handle your employee difficulties and just provides online assistance or a form for employees to complete and submit. By way of example, if an employee can’t log in to see their pay stub, ADP will not offer assistance and the worker will have to come to you for assistance resetting their password.

What’s Missing From ADP TotalSource

ADP TotalSource is not as integrated with other ADP goods as it ought to be. Each item — ADPRun, ADP Workforce Today and ADP TotalSource — has been managed in separate divisions of the same company. Additionally, as a co-employer of your own staff, ADP likely won’t provide the employee experience you desire. Other HR support-oriented PEOs such as Oasis and Paychex offer much better HR support, such as assisting with employee relations problems.

See ADP TotalSource

Greatest PEO Company for On-site HR Consulting Services: Paychex

We recommend Paychex as greatest PEO for small businesses that want the benefit of certified HR generalists to provide on-site consulting. With HR staff available in more than 100 U.S. places, Paychex asserts to be the only PEO that sends HR experts to you, therefore it is more than an internet co-employer. Dealing with Paychex is like having your own HR rep.

Another benefit of Paychex is that although it possesses all the HRIS software itself, it does not ask you to utilize all of its offerings. For instance, if its group workers’ compensation rates are higher than what you pay, it won’t expect you to change. Meanwhile, with ADP TotalSource, you only have one choice for workers’ comp — its very own.

Paychex PEO Pricing

Paychex bases its PEO pricing on variables like place, what says your workers work in and also the amount of pay periods you have. Prices begin at under $100 per month per worker should you run biweekly payroll. You may sign up with as few as five workers whereas other PEOs prefer you have 10 or more workers to start with.

However, contrary to other PEOs that price based on a percentage of taxpayers, Paychex’s administrative fee, as soon as you choose the services you want, comprises everything except workers’ compensation, health insurance and benefits premiums, dependent on your business and worker choices.

Paychex PEO Characteristics

Many are familiar with Paychex’s standing as one of the bigger payroll providers. Its PEO alternative builds on this citizenship experience with the addition of full-service HR, benefits and compliance offerings. As a PEO, it pools your workers with 90,000 other company’s workers to obtain better prices on benefits, insurance and 401(k) plans.

Paychex provides:

• HR, payroll and benefits administration
• Payroll and tax compliance, such as year-end forms
• Benefits registration and health insurance programs
• 401(k) plan direction
• Performance reviews
• Timekeeping
• Coaching

With Paychex, you can choose which attributes to begin with and add as you go. Paychex allows the company itself to determine (and pay for) the various HR features it needs to use.

However, joining Paychex’s PEO requires you meet its strong criteria. By way of example, to safeguard its existing clients, it merely takes on new companies that don’t add danger. That means it will evaluate your company, run a background check, check your own credit and look into your business’s unemployment history and workers’ compensation claims before agreeing to be your co-employer.

Employee Self-service

Paychex offers a worker services portal for your employees to handle their own tax deductions, print and view their pay stubs and, based upon your setup, enroll in benefits or register for online courses. But, Paychex’s self-service portal site is menu oriented and antiquated, unlike self-service portals along with other PEOs such as Justworks and TriNet, that are considerably more intuitive to use.

Paychex does have a mobile program for workers to get pay slips, W-2 forms and to upgrade personal information like name, address and direct deposit bank account. However, it is not as robust as other sites concerning allowing users to ask PTO or view benefits data in their smartphones.

Customer Support

Paychex provides support to your employees via online help documents. It offers phone and email to you as an administrator 24/7. In addition, if you need assistance with HR-compliance questions, it supplies certified HR staff who will work with you or at your job site.

What’s Missing From Paychex PEO

Paychex software is not as up-to-date as most of the additional PEO providers we reviewed. In addition, its due-diligence process may indicate that firms in riskier businesses, such as building or light manufacturing, might not be accepted for co-employment unless they don’t have any prior workers’ compensation claims.

Visit Paychex PEO

Bottom Line

The most important piece of information when it comes to partnering with a PEO company is to perform your own due diligence. You want your PEO as an HR outsourcing seller to be financially stable and to offer excellent customer service and worker support. In addition, you need to balance cheap insurance and health benefit choices for your workers with reasonable administrative fees for you.

We propose getting quotes from several PEOs. This will provide you with additional information and direct you to the right option. While we at FitSmallBusiness utilize TriNet to encourage our remote workforce, the ideal PEO for you might be based on other elements.

Therefore, we recommend you contact a PEO broker such as The Huldisch Group to get an expert opinion on which PEO is ideal for your specific needs. Its PEO broker services are free.

See The Huldisch Group