#payroll
Payroll management, processing, and compliance for businesses of all sizes
Small-group health insurance faces a median 11% proposed increase for 2026 based on 318 insurer filings — the sharpest in over 15 years. This guide shows small employers how to translate that median into dollars, understand the cost drivers, and evaluate renewal, plan design, and ICHRA alternatives before signing.
A guide to camp bookkeeping showing why early-bird deposits should post as deferred revenue under ASC 606, how to build a 12-month cash flow forecast from an 8-week season, and how to track KPIs like cost per camper and collection rate by deadline.
An ICHRA lets employers reimburse employees tax-free for individual health insurance instead of buying a group plan. Covers the 2026 affordability threshold of 9.96%, QSEHRA vs ICHRA rules, the 11 allowable employee classes, required notices, and how to book reimbursements without losing the tax advantage.
Moving companies earn 55-60% of revenue between May and August, then face a 50-70% winter trough. Job-cost every move, depreciate trucks under MACRS 5-year rules, hold a 12-18% peak-season reserve, and run a 13-week cash forecast so summer profit funds winter.
For wages paid on or after January 1, 2026, employers must report qualified tips in W-2 Box 12 Code TP and the Treasury Tipped Occupation Code in Box 14b, or tipped employees lose a deduction of up to $25,000 under section 224.
A contract-level bookkeeping system for cleaning and janitorial businesses—job costing by contract, a payroll-to-revenue dial that says when you can hire, and a 10-minute supply inventory method—so you can bid with real numbers and spot losing contracts before they drag the quarter.
The federal FLSA salary threshold for the white-collar exemptions is still $684 a week ($35,568 a year) in 2026 after the 2024 DOL rule was vacated and rescinded, but six states set higher floors - Washington $1,541.70/week, California $1,352.00, New York $1,275.00 in the NYC metro and $1,199.10 elsewhere, Colorado $1,057.69, Alaska $938.40, and Maine $871.16. The threshold that applies is the one for the state where the work is performed, and a failed classification exposes two years of unpaid overtime (three if willful) plus liquidated damages that double the recovery.
Schedule 1-A is the new IRS form for tax years 2025-2028 holding four below-the-line deductions — up to $25,000 for tips, $12,500/$25,000 for the FLSA overtime premium, $10,000 for new-car loan interest, and $6,000 per person age 65+. Each phases out on its own MAGI threshold, and this guide covers who qualifies, how the math works, and what records defend the claim.
IRS Publication 15 (Circular E) sets the rules small employers must follow on every paycheck — federal income tax withholding via the wage-bracket or percentage method, 6.2% Social Security to the annual wage base, 1.45% Medicare plus 0.9% above $200,000, EFTPS deposits on a monthly or semiweekly schedule set by the $50,000 lookback test, and Forms 941, 940, W-2 and W-3. This guide translates each rule into what to do, when it is due, and which ledger account to book it in — including the failure-to-deposit penalty ladder of 2%, 5%, 10% and 15%.
Employers using electronic Form I-9 systems must update to the 05/31/2027 expiration date by July 31, 2026. This guide covers which editions stay valid, what changed in the 01/20/25 revision, the three-years-after-hire-or-one-year-after-termination retention rule, and which paperwork errors ICE now treats as substantive rather than technical.
The IRS has no single seven-year rule. Income tax records run 3 years, employment tax records 4, substantial income omissions 6, bad-debt and worthless-security losses 7, and unfiled or fraudulent returns never expire — while property records run until the limitations period closes on the year you sell. This guide maps each clock to the documents it governs and gives a retention schedule small business owners can follow.
More than 20 state and local jurisdictions raised their minimum wage on July 1, 2026 — Alaska to $14.00, Oregon and D.C. on their annual schedules, plus 17 city and county increases across California, Illinois, Maryland, Minnesota and Oregon — lifting pay for over 360,000 workers by roughly $221 million a year. A seven-step checklist for employers who owe the highest rate where work is performed, including how to split a straddling pay period by work date rather than pay date.
