Why Automated Payroll Check Signing Makes Your Life Better

I had a client, a small business owner, who told me he chose to sign each one of his employees paychecks because he liked to 'confirm the amounts of the paychecks he was issuing.'

He had 15 employees and paid them every other Friday.

Believe it or not, this is a very common practice. 

Because of this practice, this business owner was tied to his office every two weeks. Come rain or shine, wedding or childbirth, every other week he had to be there or his employees didn't get paid.

It doesn't have to be this way.

Most outsourced payroll services have a Payroll Check Signing service. They can have the business owner's signature (or multiple signatures) pre-printed on the checks when they are issued. The owner can be miles away, on vacation, with family, or conducting revenue generating business, and the payroll checks can arrive pre-signed and sealed in envelopes ready for handout.

But what about a signature stamp safe-guarded by a trusted office employee? Won't that work too?

A good point. A signature stamp does solve the problem of having to be in the office to sign checks. But then it potentially creates another problem - Check Fraud.

Phantom employees can easily be created by in-house bookkeepers or other office staff. And signature stamps can be used to authorize those checks without owner notice. Trusted staff member or not, most check fraud perpetrators are first-time offenders.

See the attached article from the Association of Certified Fraud Examiners on Ghost Employees and in-house payroll fraud. http://www.acfe.com/resources/view.asp?ArticleID=21

Not only can most Payroll Outsourcing Services pre-sign and seal paychecks, but most can produce electronic payroll registers that can be viewed by the business owner from any remote location. They can then verify the pay amounts before the checks are even sent from the payroll company.

This also makes it very difficult for in-house employees to hide ghost employees on the payroll.

This way, the owner:
1. has the same piece of mind of verifying their employees pay
2. drives down the chances of check fraud, and...
3. gains the personal satisfaction and empowerment of being a business owner who comes and goes as they please

...the way it was meant to be.