Some HR platforms bundle payroll into the same system with all the other features. It sounds simple: one log-in, one product vendor, one bill for HR and payroll. But it also means you are now locked into the same system to handle facets of your business that can have very different requirements depending on the size of your organisation and the makeup of your workforce.
If you find either set of tools doesn’t suit your business, you have to decide whether to change the whole bundle.
MyHR takes a different approach: one HR system that integrates seamlessly with leading New Zealand payroll providers that your business is probably already using: Xero, iPayroll or PayHero.
The two systems work together as one, but the decisions and vendors stay separate. You have the flexibility to choose the tools that are best for your needs, and you also have access to two teams of experts to help with any payroll or HR queries.
There are a lot of payroll providers in New Zealand, ranging from full-service software offerings to companies that manage payroll on your behalf. Some providers, like PayHero and iPayroll, are NZ-owned and operated while others are publicly-listed companies.
Engaging payroll software is a common early investment for growing businesses, as it helps improve accuracy, efficiency, and compliance with tax and leave regulations.
When small business employers look to engage an HR platform to handle people and employment management, they often already use payroll software, so it makes sense to engage a HR system that integrates with your existing payroll. Buying an all-in-one HR and payroll package means ditching the payroll tools you already use.
PayHero: Built by FlexiTime, featuring smart time-tracking, GPS/mobile clock-ins, annual leave stored in weeks, and Xero/IRD links. Parent company FlexiTime has more than 4,000 customers across its platforms.
iPayroll: A cloud-based pioneer and official IRD PAYE intermediary offering an employee kiosk, leave tools, and extensive third-party integrations (including MyHR). Over 12,000 customers on both sides of the Tasman.
Xero Payroll: Built directly into the popular Xero accounting platform for seamless unified financial and pay reporting. In NZ, Xero has 650,000 total paying subscribers.
Smartly: A web-based payroll and people admin system backed by Datacom, supporting automated IRD/KiwiSaver filings and Xero integration. Serves over 22,000 Kiwi SMBs.
PaySauce: Designed for small businesses with mobile apps, digital rosters, and flexible pay-per-active-month pricing. Over 8,000 active customers.
Thankyou Payroll: An IRD-accredited software option that automates wages, tracks leave, and provides human-backed support. Also reinvests its profits back into local communities. Services over 7,000 customers across NZ, including small businesses and charities.
Crystal Payroll: A NZ-built, cloud-based payroll and timekeeping system with industry-specific functions and a number of pricing plans. Has over 100,000 customers.
Affinity Payroll: Specialised enterprise software and managed payroll services tailored for mid to large-sized organisations (150+ staff). Manages payroll operations for over 500,000 customers across NZ and Australia.
Rocket Payrolls: A 100% Kiwi-owned outsourced bureau managing full calculations, Payday Filing, and employee kiosks.
The Paymasters: Nationwide provider offering outsourced payroll processing and legacy MYOB migrations, with New Zealand Payroll Practitioners Association-accredited support staff.
KeyLink: Outsourced New Zealand payroll processing for local businesses, global companies, and charitable trusts.
Frontier Software: Christchurch-based outsourced and hybrid payroll/HRIS management covering NZ and regional operations.
Bundled software refers to software programs or applications that are packaged and sold together as a single unit. Bundled software can be convenient, providing multiple tools out of the box without the need to deal with multiple vendors.
However, using one product means you not only have a single point of contact, you also have a single point of dependency. The platform may have features that suit your business set-up, but it may also contain features that you do not need (sometimes called “bloatware”), tools that don’t work for your requirements, or you have to pay extra for add-on features - e.g. rosters, time-tracking or HR advice.
Also, if you use a bundled solution and anything changes - e.g. there’s a pricing change, a feature change, or a bug in one part of the system - the whole system is affected, because it's all one product.
A major limitation of bundled platforms is that they are designed to make it harder to break with them. That is fine when every part of the bundle fits your requirements, but it can be a problem when one part doesn't. If you want to swap out one facet, it means changing the whole system and switching vendors.
If, for example, you used the payroll tools in a bundled solution but came to find them inaccurate, inefficient or they didn’t have the specificity your company required, you would need to change the whole payroll and HR system at the same time. That means migrating contracts and employee records (including pay history, leave balances, tax codes, and KiwiSaver settings), re-installing and learning a new interface, and spending time re-training staff. On top of that you may have to pay cancellation fees for the old platform and set-up costs for the new system(s).
If you use integrated systems, you could swap your payroll software without changing your HR platform (or vice versa), so all the features along with your data, contracts, leave history, and performance records remain intact.
For most businesses, there are a lot of moving parts to payroll and HR, especially if you have shift workers or employees on flexible schedules. Your payroll and HR solution needs to be able to handle your requirements and ensure your pay calculations are accurate, and you meet all your responsibilities under NZ employment and tax laws.
The requirements of your business don’t remain static and what you need at sign-up is likely to change as the organisation grows and you take on more workers, some of which could be part-time, on a fixed-term, or independent contractors.
Specialist payroll providers exist to do one thing: ensure your people are paid what they are entitled to, when they are entitled to it. That means ensuring payroll is accurate and legally compliant, including IRD payday filing, Holidays Act calculations, KiwiSaver contributions, and ACC levies. If you have questions or tricky situations, they have the specific payroll knowledge to provide support (or they charge you extra for it).
Similarly, a specialist HR provider (like MyHR) is solely focused on providing a platform that takes care of the employment lifecycle, from recruiting and onboarding new employees, to managing leave and performance, and handling issues that arise. An all-in-one solution backed by the expertise of local HR professionals.
A vendor trying to provide HR and payroll in a single solution has to spread its product and compliance focus across all aspects of the service, rather than focusing on payroll or HR specifically. That could mean you are caught out if the system is clunky or inefficient, it doesn’t provide the tools you need, or the support doesn’t have sufficient expertise to resolve problems or answer complex queries.
MyHR is uniquely focused on providing a single powerful, easy-to-use HR platform that combines expert human advisory services backed by advanced AI. That means you have one HR platform for employment agreements, onboarding, leave, and performance management, and comprehensive workforce analytics. With over 15 years’ experience of making HR easier for NZ employers, our support team knows how to ensure your HR processes are properly tailored to your requirements and fully compliant.
We entrust payroll to the experts, with seamless integrations with NZ’s leading providers (as well as recruitment and automation software), giving you the flexibility to combine MyHR with the tools that are best suited to your business.
With a single point of data entry and seamless syncing you’ll save time, while never feeling like you are using isolated systems. MyHR’s integrations aren’t simply automated features, you get the combined expertise of two specialist support teams, further reducing the chance of errors entering your payroll or leave calculations.
Learn more about the MyHR payroll ecosystem.
MyHR integrates with New Zealand’s top payroll providers: PayHero, Xero Payroll, and iPayroll.
MyHR’s integrations ensure you never feel like you are using two separate systems. HR and payroll are automatically synchronised, so any data you enter in one system seamlessly flows to the other. If you make changes in one, they automatically populate in the other.
A bundled HR and payroll platform might seem to save time, but separate software that is correctly integrated works just as quickly, while you have the added benefit of two synchronised systems that are built specifically to handle HR or payroll, with access to two sets of specialists.
A bundled software solution can be a cheaper long-term option, but only if the features are perfectly suited to your company’s requirements and you are in the market for both systems at the same time.
If you already use a payroll provider, engaging an HR platform will likely be cheaper than a bundled HR and payroll software. You will also save time and hassle migrating your payroll information, while gaining an integrated solution that works seamlessly with your existing payroll system.
If you are looking for a complete HR and payroll solution for your organisation or you already use a payroll platform that integrates with MyHR’s system and want to sort your HR and people management, book a MyHR demo now.