HR outsourcing can be a great way to free up time and resources. Discover the six best HR outsourcing services for 2023 and learn how to choose the best provider for your business needs.
A human resources department is vital to any organization’s success. However, some businesses can benefit from outsourcing their HR tasks, particularly if an organization does not have the expertise, resources or time to handle certain HR functions themselves.
HR outsourcing software can handle many of the HR functions required by your business. HR outsourcing can be a great way to free up time and resources. On this page, we have highlighted the top six HR outsourcing tools for 2023. We have also shared our methodology for shortlisting these products and provided some tips on choosing the right HR outsourcing application for your business.
| Free trial | Employee self-service | Free phone support | Global coverage | Mobile app | Unlimited payrolls | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Gusto | Yes | Yes | No | No | Yes | Yes |
| Papaya | No | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes |
| Rippling | No | Yes | Yes | No | Yes | Yes |
| Paychex | No | Yes | Yes | No | Yes | Yes |
| Justworks | No | Yes | Yes | No | Yes | No |
| Insperity | Yes | Yes | Yes | No | Yes | Yes |
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Gusto is a cloud-based HR software platform that offers human resource management, payroll, employee benefits and more. You can use Gusto to completely outsource your HR functions, including hiring and employee onboarding. Gusto’s payroll feature is available in all 50 U.S. states. In addition, the software integrates with major accounting, expense reporting and other applications. Gusto can also be used to manage HR functions for contractors, including automatic filing and emailing of tax documents. Although international payroll is not available, Gusto acquired global payroll startup Remote Team in October 2021, so this feature might be available in future versions.
Insights and reporting: Gusto offers robust analytics and reporting tools that include reports for time-off balances, taxes, pay stub history and more. You can also customize reporting templates to analyze data based on your requirements.
Hiring and onboarding: You can use Gusto to outsource your recruitment, hiring and onboarding tasks, such as creating job posts and offers letters, onboarding checklists, and organizing and storing documents online.
Papaya Global is the best choice for global HR outsourcing needs. It offers HR and compliance support in over 160 countries. This includes an international professional employer organization service for payroll and expense reimbursement in local currencies. Companies also get guidance on international labor laws and employee visa requirements.
Employee of record: The employee of record feature offered by Papaya allows businesses to handle employment in any country around the globe without needing to set up a local entity. Papaya has in-country partners who act as local employers for each country.
Compliance: Papaya offers legal expertise to ensure employment contracts comply with local regulations and labor laws, such as mandatory benefits.
Pricing starts at $12 per month per employee for global payroll and payments. For a complete employer of record service that includes hiring, pay and benefits, the price starts at $650 per month per employee.
Rippling is a Software-as-as-Service (SaaS) company that offers cloud-based HR tools to streamline HR functions. The product includes employee benefits, payroll and HR integrations. One of the advantages of Rippling as an outsourcing partner is that it offers a full range of HR tools. It offers excellent versatility for modern businesses. Businesses can outsource their hiring, employee time tracking, global payroll, employee benefits and other HR tasks to Rippling.
Onboarding: Rippling makes it easy for businesses to grow. It can run background checks, automatically add new hires to the payroll, enroll them in benefits, and set them up with the required tools, such as Slack and Microsoft 365.
Time and attendance: You can put time and attendance on autopilot with Rippling. It will automatically track hours from clock-in to paycheck. There is no need to enter data manually or have delays in approval from managers.
Customized pricing that starts at $8 per user per month.
Paychex can handle HR outsourcing for businesses of all sizes. It is one of the industry’s leading HR outsourcing and payroll service providers, offering advanced payroll tools, such as off-cycle payments, direct deposits and contractor payments. You could also use their consultancy services to streamline your in-house HR department or completely outsource your HR to them.
Payroll and taxes: Paychex’s payroll and tax services are among the industry’s best. You can use it to track employee hours, ensure compliance with government regulations and more.
Expert HR guidance: Through its professional consultancy services, Paychex offers guidance on employment laws, regulations, and other HR matters for local or international employees.
Justworks is an HR information system designed to support small and midsize businesses. It offers extensive features, including payroll processing for small to medium sized businesses, tax filing, document storage and HR compliance assistance. The intuitive user interface, responsive 24/7 customer service, full PEO (Professional Employer Organization) support, and a complete range of features makes Justworks an ideal HR outsourcing partner.
Risk management and legal compliance: Justworks offers risk management and legal compliance with local, state and federal employment laws. This feature is most suited for small and medium-sized businesses, as larger organizations might find Justworks’ tools limited.
Employee benefits administration: The Plus plan offers a compressive range of employee benefits features. This includes health insurance, 401(k), dental and vision insurance and HSA. Employees can also benefit from using the tax-advantaged savings account, health and wellness perks, and health advocacy services.
Having Insperity as your HR outsourcing partner gives you access to its network of HR specialists. You will have a dedicated client success manager to help you navigate the intricacies of outsourced HR services. Insperity offers a full range of HR features, including HR support, benefits enrollment, data integrations, and health, dental and vision insurance. They also offer talent acquisition and onboarding services.
HR administration: One of the major advantages of choosing Insperity is that it can take care of all HR functions for your business. This includes HR administration tasks, paperless onboarding, custom-built reporting, employee self-service access and benefits enrollment.
Clean and simple interface: Insperity has managed to keep a clean and simple user interface, with all information on the dashboard and reports presented very clearly. This allows for an easy learning curve.
Customized pricing structure.
As a first step to choosing the right HR outsourcing software, you need to analyze your needs. You can start this process by mapping out the HR workflows and engaging key stakeholders across departments to get their feedback on what they need from the software.
The next step is to determine the must-have features of the software. Most of the top HR software will offer core features such as payroll and benefits enrollment. However, the unique features will help you shortlist the top candidates. For example, if you have international employees, you will need an outsourcing partner that offers global coverage. Similarly, If you are an organization with fewer than 100 employees, you may need HR software specially designed for small businesses. Such filters help narrow your search to the most suitable HR outsourcing software.
You also need to determine the true cost of the HR outsourcing software to determine the return on investment. The pricing structure can vary from one vendor to another, so you must dig deep to determine the cost to your organization. Make sure your calculations include any extra charges for implementation, technical support, initial setup and license fees. It is worth keeping an eye on the future, so you don’t end up outgrowing the software.
Lastly, you must ensure the new software fits your existing tech stack. If you already use accounting software or CRM, the HR software must be compatible with the software you are using. Otherwise, you will need to invest in new software or run separate systems, which isn’t ideal for operational efficiency and employee productivity.
To compile this list of top HR outsourcing tools, we conducted comprehensive research and analyzed several products on the market. We evaluated the software based on expert reviews, customer testimonials, pricing structure, core features, advanced features, customer service and other parameters. We also analyzed the user interface for ease of use and intuitive design. Although having a mobile app has become a standard for top HR software, we also considered the app’s quality as a factor in our research.
