No matter whether you use payroll software or a service, payroll solutions are definitely a key way of ensuring your payroll is easy to manage, accurate, and that taxes are paid on time! And of course most importantly, that your employees get their checks. There are a few additional steps you can take to make your employees happy. Just by adding features that may already be included within your payroll solution, you may increase the happiness level of your employees!

Add direct deposit

You might just be surprised how much happier employees would be by receiving their pay directly deposited into their bank account, rather than receiving a paper check. Direct deposit allows employees to eliminate the hassle of going to the bank, and also reduces the chances of lost checks. Some payroll solutions even allow for the depositing of funds to unlimited bank accounts, allowing for Christmas savings accounts, additional checking accounts, child savings accounts, and more!

Offer pay card option

Some employees may not have bank accounts, and in those cases it can be difficult or costly for them to find a way to cash their paychecks. Pay cards can be a great way to solve this problem! Deliver employee pay on reloadable debit cards instead of paper checks and you have just made some of your employees very happy by providing them an easy way to access the money they have earned.

Translate pay stubs into employee language

Do you have employees who are not native English speakers? Depending on their language skills, these employees may be better able to understand the important details of their pay and benefits if you have them printed on their pay stub in their native language. Payroll solutions that offer this feature will typically allow you to enter the translation one time, and assign it to the applicable employee(s), and the pay stub will be printed that way automatically from then on.

Add important information to pay stubs benefit summary etc.

Are employees constantly asking how much vacation time they have left? How much they’ve contributed to their 401K? Details like this, and much more can be included on a pay stub. Surely your company has its own unique set of details which you may want to include on the pay stub, so add whatever is most important to your business and your employees.

Add online pay stub access.

Many payroll solutions are now offering the ability for employees and previous employees to access their pay stubs online! No more searching around for slips of paper to access the information they need. Provide employees or previous employees with a password, and they will be able to look up their pay stubs and even W-2 forms online, making it easy for both them and you.

Don’t assume that what you are doing is the best or only solution available! You could make your own job easier as well as bump up employee happiness by adding features you may already have in your payroll system.

Here's an interesting infographic that does a great job of explaining what comes out of an employee's pay check.

http://www.coolinfographics.com/blog/2012/2/28/payroll-and-tax-deductions.html

There is a tool included in some accounting software programs that has the power to lift a huge load off your shoulders. It helps you stay organized, and keeps customers happy by providing them the products they want, when they want them. That tool is purchase order management. If you find yourself scrambling around to decide which items you need to order, or you are surprised when you run out of your most popular selling items, or you simply don’t know what is coming when, you can benefit from purchase order management. If you think purchase order management is simply a program that lets you create pretty purchase orders to print and send, then you are missing out on the best parts of purchase order management. Here are some of the features of purchase order management you might not be aware of, which can help you keep ‘just the right’ inventory in stock.

Create suggested orders.

This feature helps you evaluate stock quantities and decide what needs to be ordered, reducing the time it takes to do it manually. When you use this tool, it looks at past sales, stock levels, and the parameters you set, to come up with a list of suggested purchase orders, which you can simply run and distribute. You can also choose to edit the purchase orders before sending.

Receive what you actually got.

Sometimes you receive an incomplete shipment for an order you placed. If this happens, and you don’t have a good way to manage it, you can easily forget about the remainder of the items you should still be receiving, or you could be confused about how many you actually have in stock. The ability to receive partial orders lets you receive what was actually shipped and place it into inventory, and then decide whether to keep the purchase order open until the remainder is received, or cancel the remaining items on the purchase order. A purchase order management system will even allow you to place the vendor invoice in your system on hold until actual shipping charges are known, or until you receive the rest of the order.

Ship to multiple locations.

If you run out of popular inventory items, chances are you will need to ship some to your customer(s) and some to yourself. Being able to place one order and have whatever quantity you choose shipped to multiple locations can save you the time of creating multiple purchase orders. This is helpful in many instances: shipping to a job site or several different warehouses, drop-shipping to several different customers, etc.

Purchase order reports: your dashboard.

The reports in a purchase order system are helpful so you stay organized and on track. Based on the purchase orders you have open, you can make cash projections, see what is left to be received and what has been received to date, and of course, view which purchase orders are open, on hold, received and cancelled. It’s definitely a huge step up from walking around the warehouse and scrambling to see what you should order!

With the right purchase order management tools at your fingertips, it will be much easier to know what to order, who to order it from, how much it will cost, and much more; all with just the click of a few buttons.

When it comes to tools to help a farmer manage an operation, is the most basic and widespread option always the best? Just think about your equipment, the tools you use out in the field. Do you buy whatever is cheapest, or do you like a certain brand or type of equipment? Do you buy the first thing you see, or research everything that is available first? The same logic applies to your agricultural accounting software. The software you use is a crucial piece of equipment that can help you stay on track and be profitable. Don’t trust it to whatever is easiest to find or cheapest! Instead, have a careful look at your options and what fits best for your farm. At least then if you decide to purchase the cheapest and most basic package, you will do so with your eyes wide open, and you will know exactly what you are getting. So a good question here is, with so many basic software packages available, who needs Ag software?

Farmers who want information in their own language.

You probably won’t find anything about enterprises, farms, fields, production, or other farm-related activities within a basic accounting program. That’s because those programs have to fit a huge variety of business types. Ag software presents tools and features to you in a way that is familiar and makes more sense.

Farmers who want to know how they are doing compared to established guidelines.

Did you know there is now a software tool available to help you understand where you should be with industry benchmarks? This same tool can also help pinpoint areas of strength and weakness in your farm, so you can increase your profits and reverse negative trends. This tool is ratio analysis, and some Ag software has this as one of its features. Ratio analysis includes guidelines, ratios and indices that are specific to Ag, so you won’t have to guess how you are doing; you can see it for yourself, using the numbers you have already entered into your system.

Farmers who want to plan how much profit they will have, and where it will come from.

Software specifically for Ag gives you tools to track information in the way that is most useful to you, whether it’s by profit center, by enterprise, by account, and much more. Tracking information helps you understand which areas of your farm are profitable, so you can focus on your income generating enterprises and increase your profits. Another helpful tool for planning is the ability to run ‘what if’ scenarios. Doing this allows you to project future sales, cash flow, income states, and assets and liabilities. Once this information is tracked and reported consistently, managing your finances becomes much easier and can become more goal-oriented.

Using an Ag-specific program to run your farm can make your information much easier to enter and understand. No matter which program you choose, make sure it can provide you with the financial information you need, in the way you want to see it.

If you are a business, your business name is likely somewhere out there on the internet. This is a good thing, since most people turn to the internet to do their research before buying a product or service. You may not be aware that there are places on the internet that encourage people to review your business and its products and/or services. Here are some of the places you may want to check out to be sure your business information is listed correctly, and also to see what people are saying about you!

Google Reviews:

Your business is probably listed with Google, even though you didn’t put it there yourself. The majority of businesses are there! You can go in and claim your listing within “Google Places”. It’s free to claim your listing, and you can add your hours of operation, company images, and even coupons, all at no charge to you. A very compelling reason for you to go in and claim and enhance your listing is that is the information people will see when your Google Places account shows up in the search results. One other thing you will see on your Google Places account are the reviews and star ratings that people have left for your business. While you cannot control which reviews are shown, you can go to your Google Places account and respond to the reviews as the owner, or you can flag a review as inappropriate if necessary. Feel free to visit Red Wing Software’s Google Places page and leave your own review by clicking here.

Yelp.com:

Yelp is a Web site dedicated to providing real customer reviews for virtually any business. Customers can go in and leave a star rating as well as feedback for you and your products or services. Again, you have no control over what is being shown, but you can go in and leave a reply as the business owner. Yelp also offers FREE tools for business owners to promote their business: the ability to set up special deals for users and also the ability to join the conversation on their site.

Don’t be afraid of customer reviews! Embrace the technology that is available, since people will be leaving reviews for your business either way. Enhance your customers’ experience and join the conversation, and your reputation and service will be all the better for it.