Managing Director
12 September 2020
Digital transformation has been a hot topic for well over five years, enveloping every industry and seeping into every corner of the enterprise. While many HR functions are already well advanced in the journey of digital transformation, the global mobility function seems to be the bad pupil of the class.
The global mobility function is often criticised for being too slow to digitise many of its manual processes, and the adoption of cutting edge technology is minimal in most organisations. It’s not uncommon to see enterprise-level global mobility teams still running operations with Excel spreadsheets and manual processes.
This apparent lack of interest in technology is surprising as numerous processes connected to international mobility lend themselves perfectly to a digital improvement and can be automated.
The traditional approach to shadow payroll
As an example, let’s have a look at employment tax process for mobile workforce commonly known as the shadow payroll. This process contains perhaps the greatest amount of administrative activity of any HR process, with monthly shadow payroll calculations demanding accuracy, timeliness, and well-planned coordination across multiple organisational entities.
The shadow payroll process is a combination of repetitive manual tasks where each department is reliant on the next to complete the manual shadow payroll calculation and necessary monthly reporting. This makes shadow payroll prime candidate for automation.
The five key drivers for automation in the shadow payroll:
The value of shadow payroll digital transformation
Considering, the key characteristics of the shadow payroll as just described, by automating and digitising the shadow payroll process, global mobility leaders could improve operational effectiveness and deliver bottom-line savings.
Savings opportunities
Apart from the obvious operational improvement advantages, digital transformation can present also significant and tangible opportunities to generate bottom-line savings across the shadow payroll process.
Operational improvement
Automating manual processes provides immediate improvements in operational efficiency, productivity, availability, and performance. Here are the typical areas where digital transformation can play an important role to enhance the overall shadow payroll process:
This illustration shows the benefits your organisation can achieve by taking advantage of the Certino employment tax intelligence platform.
In conclusion
The way traditional shadow payroll process is handled today is inefficient and costly, both in terms of resource allocation and the increased risk of human error.
Due to its repetitive, rules-based nature, shadow payroll is a major candidate for digital transformation, as an automated approach provide the opportunity to achieve operational excellence and create savings opportunities simultaneously.
Digital transformation presents a rare opportunity to simultaneously improve the consistency and quality of service in shadow payroll while also driving down the total cost of delivery.
Global mobility, payroll and tax leaders should therefore be excited at the possibilities that the Certino automated shadow payroll platform can offer. The initial implementation process typically takes just twelve weeks and significant payback can be realised within the first year through multiple efficiencies with up to 20% savings in international employee tax and 50% on the cost of managing the shadow payroll.
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