Bi-Weekly vs Semi-Monthly Pay Periods HR Blog

Regular evaluation of your payroll system helps ensure it meets the needs of both the business and its employees. Choosing a payroll schedule is a critical decision with many factors a business must consider. Among those 44 hours, 28 hours fall in one pay period (before March 30), while 16 hours in the current one (after March 30). If you’re planning to switch to this model, the most important part is understanding why it benefits your people and your organization.

What’s the Difference Between Biweekly and Semi-Monthly Payroll?

It is a payroll system—the company compensates the employees twice a month. The fixed annual salary of an employee is divided by 24 to determine the amount of each paycheck. However, for employees who receive hourly wages, the paycheck amount depends on hours worked till payday—working hours multiplied by the hourly wages. When an employer elects for a weekly pay schedule, employees get paid once per week, for example every Friday. Under a monthly pay schedule, employees will get paid once per month, typically on the 1st of the month.

Employee Preferences and Semi-Monthly Pay

Another difference between semimonthly vs. biweekly pay is your payroll cutoff (aka what day of the week you run payroll) and which day employees receive their paychecks. Tracking key payroll metrics is essential for evaluating the efficiency and accuracy of the semi monthly payroll system. Monitor metrics such as the number of payroll errors, the time taken to process payroll, and employee satisfaction levels related to payroll.

• This means that if you earn a gross income of $70,000 annually, you will get a gross pay of $2,692 with each paycheck.
• For example, say you pay a salaried employee $72,000 annually using a semimonthly payroll calendar.
• You follow the semimonthly pay frequency, but pay periods can end in the middle of a workweek.
• If you want to keep your budget consistent and put the same amount of money into payroll each month, a semi-monthly payment model would be a no-brainer.
• Regular audits and checks can help identify and correct discrepancies before they impact employee paychecks.
• In the end, choosing the right payroll schedule for your business requires balancing competing priorities.

Benefits of semi monthly payroll

Payroll software can assist in automating these calculations, reducing the likelihood of errors and ensuring compliance with tax and labor laws. One of the most significant https://www.bookstime.com/ advantages of semi-monthly pay is its consistency. Because employees are paid on specific days of the month, they can better plan their finances and budget accordingly.

An overview of the main pay schedules

The semimonthly payrolls can also be confusing for employees that work on hourly rates. This is because the calculation of hourly rate salaries and wages may also include overtime premiums. In these cases, businesses may have to switch to other payment frequencies for their hourly rate employees. As discussed, this is because biweekly payrolls consider weeks rather than months. The consistency of semimonthly payrolls also makes them better for budgeting as compared to biweekly payrolls.

These pay schedules are actually quite different due to the number of weeks in a month. Receiving up to two additional paychecks per month compared to a semi-monthly pay schedule is certainly a bonus for employees. For months where additional planning was not put in place, a small business may not have sufficient funds semi monthly vs bi weekly for a three paycheck month compared to a two paycheck month. Weekly pay schedules require 52 paychecks to be processed over a year, making it the most expensive and time-consuming pay schedule for employers. This, however, works best while employing contract or freelance workers who work irregularly or are paid hourly.

• This compensation comes in the form of salaries, wages, overtime premiums, bonuses, holiday pays, sick pays, commissions, etc.
• For example, many organizations choose to pay their employees on the 1st and the 15th of each month, or the 15th and the last day of the month.
• Also, if a semi-monthly payday lands on a weekend or holiday, plans will need to be made in order to pay employees either before or after the break in the week.
• Since anything over 40 is considered overtime hours, you pay for 28 regular hours in the previous pay period and 12 regular and 4 overtime hours in the current pay period.
• Using a semi monthly payroll system helps companies manage cash flow more effectively by spreading out payroll expenses over two pay periods each month.

What is Biweekly Payroll and How Does It Work?

If Zachariah works for 100 hours in the first half of May, find out the paycheck amount received by him on 15th May 2022. Other common types of pay schedules include weekly, bi-weekly, and monthly, with bi-weekly being the most popular. For example, if you choose the 15th and the 30th for this type of payroll, that could fall on a Wednesday and a Thursday one month and a Friday and a Saturday the next month. The frequency of payroll is a critical factor in the overall payroll function of the business. When deciding on the frequency of payments to employees, the HR department should choose a frequency that benefits both the business and its employees.

One such decision is regarding the frequency of the payments made to employees. The employees of a business provide their services to the business in exchange for compensation. This compensation comes in the form of salaries, wages, overtime premiums, bonuses, holiday pays, sick pays, commissions, etc. For example, let’s imagine that your gross annual income is $70,000. If you decide to get paid semi-monthly, that income will be divided into 24 paychecks, which equals a gross pay of $2,916 for each payment. When it comes to salary and wage payments, employers have several frequencies from which to choose.

• On the other hand, only 19.8% of employees are paid using the semimonthly payroll frequency.
• Knowing the difference between biweekly vs. semimonthly payroll can prevent financial setbacks, keep your business legally compliant, and more.
• There are a few advantages of operating a semimonthly payroll for businesses.
• For example, a bi-weekly pay frequency on a Thursday would mean employees get paid every other Thursday of the month.
• While semi-monthly pay can be beneficial for both team members and employers, there are also some disadvantages to consider.

In addition, Clockify has many other features, such as a free payroll tracker. Make it easier for production and supply staff to communicate their availability and time off with our software. You’re doing direct, simple math, so there’s no need for any advanced semi-monthly pay calculator. These questions are some of the core challenges of semi-monthly pay that we’ll discuss in this post.