Running payroll for a construction crew isn’t the same as cutting checks for a retail store. You’ve got guys working different rates on different jobs. Prevailing wage on the school project, regular rate on the private work, union scale on the hospital. Fringe benefits calculated one way for DOL reporting and another way for the contractor. Per diem. Travel time. Overtime rules that vary by state.
A generic payroll company doesn’t know what to do with any of that. And when they get it wrong, it’s your name on the DOL audit.
What We Handle
Certified payroll reporting. If you do any public work, you know the certified payroll headache. We prepare your weekly certified payrolls accurately and on time. Proper formatting, correct wage determinations, fringe benefit calculations, all ready for submission.
Prevailing wage compliance. Different projects. Different wage determinations. Different fringe rates. We track which crew members worked which jobs at which rates, calculate the fringe obligations correctly, and make sure your documentation is tight enough to survive an audit.
Union reporting. If you’re a union shop, we handle the reporting requirements: hours reported to the hall, benefit fund contributions calculated and submitted, remittance reports prepared. The reporting burden stays off your desk.
Multi-rate crew tracking. Your foreman might work three different jobs in a week, each at a different rate. We track the hours, apply the right rates, and make sure the labor cost hits the right job in your books. Your job cost reports reflect what you actually paid, broken out by project.
Payroll tax management. Federal, state, and local payroll taxes filed and paid on time. Quarterly returns handled. Year-end W-2s and 1099s prepared. If you’re running crews across state lines, we manage the multi-state withholding.
Why Generic Payroll Doesn’t Work for Contractors
Most payroll services are built for companies where everyone earns the same rate every pay period. Construction doesn’t work that way.
When your payroll provider doesn’t understand prevailing wage, they either calculate fringe wrong or ignore it altogether. When they don’t know how to handle certified payroll, you end up doing it yourself on top of paying them. When they can’t allocate labor by job, your job costing is useless.
We’ve seen the cleanup that follows. DOL audit findings. Fringe underpayments that turn into back-pay liabilities. Certified payrolls rejected by the GC because the formatting was wrong. These aren’t hypotheticals. They’re the situations contractors call us about.
What Changes When We Take Over
Your crews get paid right, every time. Your certified payrolls get submitted on time without you chasing your payroll company for corrections. Your prevailing wage compliance documentation is audit-ready. And every dollar of labor cost shows up on the correct job in your books.
You stop spending your evenings double-checking payroll reports against time sheets. You stop explaining to your payroll company what a wage determination is. You stop worrying about the DOL letter that might be sitting in tomorrow’s mail.
Who This Is For
Contractors doing public work, prevailing wage projects, or union jobs where payroll complexity goes beyond what a standard payroll service can handle. If your payroll involves certified reporting, fringe calculations, or multi-rate crews, this is built for you.
This works as a standalone service or as part of our monthly accounting engagement. Either way, your payroll data feeds directly into your job costing so the numbers stay connected.
Let’s Talk About Your Payroll
We’ll review your current payroll setup, your compliance requirements, and your biggest pain points. If what you have is working, we’ll say so. If it’s not, we’ll map out exactly what needs to change.