Is it worth outsourcing payroll? What it costs and what to check

When is outsourcing payroll worth it?

It tends to be worth it when one or more of these is true:

• Pay runs keep needing corrections after they are paid.
• Several awards or classifications apply across your roles.
• One person holds all the payroll knowledge, and their leave stalls the run.
• Payroll and your books do not agree at month end.
• Super timing now has to work every payday, and your process was built for quarterly payments.

Care, disability and community services employers are a common case of the second signal. If your team is paid under the Social, Community, Home Care and Disability Services Industry Award, classifications and award-rate changes are the part of each run to check most closely, and the Schedule E changes set out what is changing for home care and disability work.

It is not worth it for every business. If a handful of salaried staff are paid through payroll software with a simple set-up, the software may be all you need. Visory is not the right fit when you have a handful of salaried employees on a simple monthly pay run, with no award rates to keep current, that you can manage yourself in your payroll software.

How are payroll services priced?

Providers use one of three models, and the same business can get three quotes that look nothing alike.

How you are charged	What the price usually counts	What to check
Per payslip	Each payslip in each pay run, so a weekly payroll costs more than a fortnightly one	Whether STP reporting, super and year-end finalisation are in the price or extra
Per employee each month	Each person on the payroll, whether paid that month or not	What happens with casuals, terminations and new starters
A flat monthly fee for a scope	An agreed set of work, often payroll with bookkeeping	What the scope includes, and what makes the fee change

Before you compare any two quotes, ask the same six questions of each. Does the price include Single Touch Payroll reporting with every run? Is super calculated with every pay run? Who updates award rates when they change, and who confirms each role’s classification? Are leave, terminations and back pay charged separately? Is year-end finalisation extra? Is there a set-up or onboarding fee? A low per-payslip price with these charged separately can cost more than a higher one that includes them.

What does running payroll in-house cost?

Jobs and Skills Australia puts the median full-time pay for payroll clerks at A$1,606 a week, from the ABS Survey of Employee Earnings and Hours for May 2025. Across a year that is about A$83,500, and the super guarantee, at 12% of qualifying earnings, adds about A$10,000, for about A$93,500 before payroll tax, leave cover, software and the time you spend approving runs and answering questions.

If you do not employ a full-time payroll clerk, payroll is a slice of someone else’s week, often an office manager’s or a bookkeeper’s. The cost is that slice plus the risk that everything about how it works sits with one person. As an example, if payroll takes one day a week of that role, it costs a fifth of the figure above: about A$18,700 a year, before the extras. Work out your own slice the same way, then set it against what a provider would take off that person’s desk.

What does a payroll mistake cost?

Payroll runs to deadlines set in law, and an error lands in your team’s pay. Employers must give pay slips within one working day of payday. Since 1 July 2026, under Payday Super, super must reach each employee’s fund within seven business days of payday, so a late run now delays super every cycle, not once a quarter. Underpaid wages and leave have to be back-paid.

Since 1 January 2025, deliberately underpaying wages can be a criminal offence under the federal wage theft laws in the Fair Work Act 2009. Honest mistakes are not covered. Super that is late or missed brings the super guarantee charge. For most businesses the bigger cost of a recurring error is the time spent correcting it and what it does to your team’s trust in being paid right, and lost trust costs you people. If your runs keep needing corrections, look first at how each run is checked before it is approved, and by whom. Software that calculates the pay is not the same as a person who reviews it.

What does Visory charge for payroll?

Visory does not price payroll per payslip. You can take payroll on its own, scoped and priced in your proposal based on the size of your team and how complex your pay is, or run it alongside your bookkeeping in Finance Operations. Either way it is one flat monthly fee for the scope we agree, with no timesheets and no hourly billing. For the wider finance function, most engagements land between about A$1,250 and A$4,000 a month, ex GST, with Finance Operations, which starts with bookkeeping and adds payroll as you need it, typically from A$1,250 a month, ex GST. Your proposal fixes the number. Bookkeeping alone is a valid starting point, and most businesses add services as they go.

For payroll, the fee covers pay runs prepared and checked, your approval before payment, Single Touch Payroll reporting with every run, super calculated each cycle, and payslips and records kept. Your Payroll Officer runs your payroll. Delphi AI prepares and checks the routine work in the background, and you approve before a dollar moves. At onboarding, your Payroll Officer builds the award that covers each role into your payroll, and the new rates go in before your next pay run after a Fair Work change. You confirm the award and classification for each role, and the team keeps them current. Rostering and time-and-attendance systems, employment contracts, HR advice and income tax returns are not included.

There is a one-off onboarding fee. For payroll, it covers a review of your current payroll set-up (awards and classifications included), system set-up and integrations, building the pay run workflow, and the transition from whoever runs payroll today. The fee is fixed in your proposal before you commit, and the number on your proposal is the number on your invoice, until your volumes change.

That makes a per-payslip quote and a Visory proposal hard to compare line by line. One prices the pay run. The other prices the finance function the pay run sits in, with the books it posts to closed and reconciled each month. Compare what each covers first, then the total you would pay for that scope.

How do the options compare?

The first three columns are categories, not named providers, and what each includes varies from one provider to the next.

	Software you run yourself	An in-house payroll person	A payroll bureau	Visory
Who runs each pay run	You or a staff member	Your employee	The bureau	Your Payroll Officer
How it is checked before approval	By whoever runs it	Usually by the same person	Varies, so ask	Prepared and checked before it reaches you, with Delphi AI checking the routine work in the background
Who keeps award rates current	You	Your employee	Varies, so ask	Your team, with you confirming each award and classification
Payroll reconciled to the books	Separate job	Separate job, unless they also keep the books	Usually separate	Part of the same monthly close
How you pay	Software subscription	Salary, super and on-costs	Per payslip or per employee	One flat monthly fee for the agreed scope

Frequently asked questions

Do we stay responsible as the employer if we outsource payroll?

Yes. A provider runs the process, but the ATO holds the employer responsible for its obligations, including super reaching each employee’s fund on time, even when a payroll provider or clearing house is involved. That is why every Visory pay run goes to you for approval before anyone is paid.

Does Visory pay super for us?

Visory calculates super with every pay run and prepares it for your approval. The payment comes from your own account, and we walk you through how it runs for your business so it reaches each fund within Payday Super’s seven business days.

Can we keep our payroll software?

If it is Employment Hero Payroll (formerly KeyPay) or Xero Payroll, yes. Visory works with both for pay runs, and your records stay in your own file.

Is there a set-up fee?

Yes, a one-off onboarding fee. For payroll, it covers a review of your current payroll set-up (awards and classifications included), system set-up and integrations, building the pay run workflow, and the transition from whoever runs payroll today. The fee is fixed in your proposal before you commit, and there is no published figure because it depends on your current set-up.

Can we outsource payroll without bookkeeping?

Yes. You can take Visory payroll on its own, scoped and priced in your proposal based on the size of your team and how complex your pay is. Payroll can also run alongside bookkeeping in Finance Operations, where pay runs post to the books the team keeps.

Book a discovery call. We will map your pay runs, awards and super, and fix the fee in your proposal before you commit.