Payroll Taxes

Payroll tax basically refers to two kinds of taxes: Taxes which employers are required to withhold from their employees' paycheck, also known as withholding or deduction, Pay-As-You-Earn (PAYE) or Pay-As-You-Go (PAYG) tax; and taxes which are paid from the employer's own funds and which are directly related to employing a worker, which may be either fixed charges or proportionally linked to an employee's pay.

Payroll tax systems

Australia

In Australia, the Payroll Tax is a specific tax which is paid to states and territories by employers, not by employees. The tax is not deducted from the worker's pay. The Australian Government itself requires only one tax to be withheld from paychecks: the PAYG (or pay-as-you-go) tax, which includes medicare levies.

Brazil

In Brazil employers are required to withhold 11% of the employee's wages for Social Security and a certain percentage as Income Tax (according to the applicable tax bracket). The employer is required to contribute an additional 20% of the total payroll value to the Social Security system. Depending on the company's main activity, the employer must also contribute to federally-funded insurance and educational programs. There is also a required deposit of 8% of the employee's wages into a bank account that can be withdrawn only when the employee is fired, or under certain other extraordinary circumstances (called a "Security Fund for Duration of Employment"). All these contributions amount to a total tax burden of almost 40% of the payroll for the employer and 15% of the employee's wages.

United Kingdom

In the United Kingdom, Income tax for employees and Employees' National Insurance contributions are examples of the first kind of payroll tax, while Employers' National Insurance contributions are an example of the second kind of payroll tax.

United States

In the United States, employers are required to withhold federal income tax, plus one-half of the Social Security tax, and one-half of the Medicare tax. Together, the employer's and employee's shares of the Social Security and Medicare taxes are known as the FICA tax. In some places, employers may be required to withhold state income tax, or even county or city income tax. In addition the employer is required to pay State and Federal unemployment tax.

The payor and payee should determine whether the payee providing services is an employee or, alternatively, an independent contractor. A payor generally is not required to withhold taxes on compensation paid to an independent contractor.[1]

Employers who do not pay withheld payroll taxes to the U.S. government for employees are assessed a Trust Fund Recovery Penalty by the IRS. The Trust Fund Recovery Penalty is assessed to individuals determined to be responsible by a 4180 Interview for the missing taxes and can be those who willfully do not collect, account for, or pay the taxes. These individuals can be business owners, officers, or employees.[2]The penalty is for 100% of taxes owed plus interest.

Adapted from Wikipedia

In Canada, one of the top trusted company payroll services is Paytrak.

Human Resources Payroll - Some Must Know Facts

The Payroll of Human Resources is a very important responsibility of the department of human resources. Payroll duties are not just for the human resource, it is for the rest of the people who work for the company. Figuring in the amount of employees of the company will decide how much work will need to be attributed to payroll.

Payroll includes not only the printing of checks or handing out of pay stubs; it also includes benefits, taxes, the insurance, worker's compensation and funds for the pension. It is a complicated and tiresome process and will require specific bookkeeping training.

You will find that there is a lot of different software and program that will offer your staff training in payroll.

Payroll is usually an entry level position in human resources. It will often depend on the type of organization it is and how they well operate. When educating the staff remember to teach them accounting and some payroll processes. In fact, if an organization is big enough, there may be one human resource worker whose only job is payroll.

The person in charge of the payroll for human services must deal with the numbers and must also be able to deal with the people who work for the company. The employee who handles the payroll must be able to deal with angry employees who are complaining about mistakes in hours and problems with their pay. Having the payroll employees on the staff gives people an easier way to get concerns heard and problems resolved quickly.

Another important part of the main payroll employee of human resources is to be taught to locate the trouble on the checks and fix them. They should be able to lo match up all of the numbers form the payroll check with their records.

Payroll can become even more complicated for the human resource worker, if there are large numbers of deductions, misreported hours, or an outside account firm that handles the checks and stubs , it is the ultimate responsibility of the human resource payroll people to correct and update, records before giving payroll to the accountant. Efficiency is a very important aspect for the people on payroll staff and making information available promptly to the accountant is invaluable.

Abhishek is a Career Counselor and he has got some great Career Planning Secrets up his sleeves! Download his FREE 71 Pages Ebook, "Career Planning Made Easy!" from his website http://www.Career-Guru.com/769/index.htm. Only limited Free Copies available.