The Burden of Payroll

And I am not talking about the actual time and cost ofwould be: 10 days vacation + 5 days sick + 8 holidays
getting your employees paid, but all those costs often= 23 paid non-working days. $800/5 days = $160 per
not considered when providing a customer anday paid wages. $160 x 23 non-working days = $3,680
estimate or proposal or not included in budgets and(yearly cost of non-working days). There are 260
financial planning.possible working days in the year (52 x 5) less the 23
The cost burden of payroll includes all expensesnon-working days = 237 working days. These 237
incurred over and above an employee's wage. To getworking days need to be burdened with the cost of
to the true hourly cost of an employee you need tothe 23 non-working paid days. Divide the expense of
take these into consideration. The employer's share ofthe non-working days by the number of working days
FICA, Medicare, and State and Federal unemployment($3,680/237) which is $15.53 per day. Divide the $15.53
taxes are common examples of payroll burden,by 8 hours and you have your hourly burden cost for
however there are others to include in your payrollpaid days off. Depending on your company you may
costs.have employees working overtime or even less than a
Workman's compensation and part of your general40 hour week occasionally. Unless you think this may
liability insurance premiums are based on wages paid.affect your burden substantially you can base your
These rates vary from state to state as well as jobfigures on the "usual order of business".
classification and these costs are part of your payrollOther expenses you should consider are health, dental,
burden. You can find out the cost of the premium perand/or disability insurance premiums paid by the
wage dollar paid from your insurance agent.company (net of employee contributions). And if you
The cost of paid vacation, sick, personal and holidaysare providing a vehicle to your employee the cost of
should also be included in the cost of payroll. To do this,purchasing, financing and insuring that vehicle may be
determine the number of paid days off an employee isan expense to include. Also any other employee
entitled to and multiply that number by the employee'sbenefit cost that the company provides should be
average daily wage. Then divide by the number ofconsidered as part of the payroll burden charge.
working days in a year (for example - 52 weeks lessWhen all is said is done, the wage you pay your
2 weeks vacation equals 50 working weeks). Andemployee for a day's work is just the beginning of the
then divide by the average number of hours worked incost of that employee. Not determining the cost of
a week resulting in an average hourly cost of paid timeyour payroll burden can shave profits from your
off. For example an employee paid $800.00 per a 40bottom line. And without profits we can not continue to
hour week with two weeks paid vacation, 1 week ofstay in business.
paid sick leave and eight paid holidays computation