Colorado is a beautiful place to run a business and you can find so, but there are still problems to contend with and employees to manage, especially given the state’s wide range of industries. HR tasks abound and payroll takes up a bit of every week, which is time that could be better spent on the tasks and decision-making only you can do. At times, one of these issues can ruin your plans and business completely off-track, and employing an in-house HR team simply does not make sense.
For these issues and concerns, we recommend working with a professional employer organization, otherwise known as a PEO company. Your business can enter a co-employment agreement with them, and they can handle the HR and payroll tasks for you, all the while you still have complete control of your business and the regular running of your business. They can provide better benefits, allow you access to excellent online tools, aid with risk management, and much more.
If you manage or own a Colorado business and are interested in working with a PEO company, we think the following five options are worth your attention:
1. Resourcing Edge
Our top choice for Colorado and one of our top choices in many states, Resourcing Edge was founded in 2003 and has rapidly expanded its services across the U.S. Working with 30,000 clients across a broad range of industries, they’re a PEO that truly understands your business and your industry.
Colorado is expanding in population, at least near the major cities, and it will be even more important to sort out the top talent from everyone else. Resourcing Edge is well-suited to help with that and offers some fantastic recruitment, retention, and management tools for clients. With them, you can have the information needed to make the right personnel decisions.
As far as everything else goes, Resourcing Edge can be a great choice if you are looking for a standard PEO that provides anything but standard service, as everything they offer is competitive, including their pricing and their benefits. We do recommend that you get a quote to see if they are a good fit, but we are confident that they are the best option for many Colorado businesses.
We recommend Resourcing Edge if:
- You expect to expand your business in the near future, want to focus on improving your staff, or want to know as much as possible about how your staff is performing.
- You are looking for a PEO that is easy to work with and get started with.
- You are looking for an all-around great PEO company that can provide top-tier customer service.
2. Amplify PEO
Our next recommendation is Amplify PEO, which is a PEO company growing in reputation that operates across the country to provide great services to businesses of nearly all types and sizes.
Amplify PEO has some of the best customer services we have found in a PEO, and from what we can tell you can always expect a prompt and professional response to your problems. Additionally, if you need help or have a question, you can always expect to talk to a human being, which is becoming harder as time goes on to get from other companies.
Amplify PEO’s services are all excellent, and whether it is payroll, HR tasks, benefits, or something else that would normally concern you, you can lay your fears to rest. The online platform does its job well, and its services are competitively priced.
We recommend Amplify PEO if:
- You are uncertain about getting set up with a PEO and want a company that will be great about helping you through the process every step of the way.
- You want to work with a PEO that has some of the best customer service available.
- Your business is not in a specialized industry or will not need specialized PEO services tailored toward those industries.
3. ADP Total Source
ADP Total source is one of the larger names in the industry and has been associated with payroll processing services for a long time. Expanding into full PEO services was a natural progression given their past with data processing, and now ADP manages half a million employees, working with employers of all sizes to provide all PEO services needed.
As you might be able to infer, ADP Total Source has one of the largest and most organized structures in the industry, which means that when we say they can provide all PEO services, we mean it. With them, you will also have more options to customize your service plan to make sure you are not paying for services you will never use, and also easily scale services up if your business grows rapidly.
Overall, some business owners might feel that ADP Total Source is a bit too big and impersonal for their tastes, but businesses just looking for good services and access to whatever they need will find a good fit with them.
We recommend ADP Total Source if:
- You are primarily looking for payroll processing help and would find the other perks and benefits incidental to your main goal.
- You are looking for a stable and well-organized PEO that will be able to adjust not only to the times but to the needs of your business, scaling up or down as needed.
- You like the idea of a PEO company that can provide just about any PEO service you can think of, and do so well.
4. Insperity
Another experienced, huge, and well-regarded PEO company, Insperity has been the choice for many businesses all over the country, and it might be the best choice for your business. They are an incredibly reliable PEO company, working with more than 100,000 businesses and millions of employees across the country, and they provide all the services you would hope for.
You should pay special attention to the training resources that Insperity offers, either online courses or materials to read, considering that their library is massive and it is one of the top reasons to consider the firm outside of their extensive experience. If keeping your employees up to date and continuing to improve is important to you, Insperity will help you do that.
They do not have as many health care options as some of their peers and Insperity will not be the best fit for the smallest businesses in Colorado, but in other aspects, they excel, and they are clearly worth your consideration.
We recommend Insperity if:
- You are looking to work with an extremely experienced and stable PEO company that can handle most issues.
- Your business could benefit greatly from the training resources and library on offer, and employee development is a priority for your business.
- You would like to work with a PEO company that can be more flexible with its services than other service providers.
5. TriNet
Our final pick for Colorado is TriNet, which is a PEO company that works with more than 15,000 clients and has been in operation for over 30 years. Working in a wide range of industries and in all 50 states, TriNet has specialized teams to help businesses no matter their circumstances, and businesses that might not find help elsewhere can find a perfect fit with them and get excellent services to boot.
Your business might especially benefit from working with Trinet if there are plenty of remote employees, especially in different states. Given their experience working across the country and their excellent online platform, they are uniquely suited to meet the needs of companies during this transition to more remote work.
Yet quality services and a strong online platform are not all they have to offer. TriNet also offers some of the best benefits available and there are plenty of perks and discounts your employees will be able to take advantage of by working with them. After onboarding, your team will be happy to work with them.
We recommend TriNet if:
- You are looking for a PEO that can handle employees in multiple states with ease or your business uses plenty of remote workers.
- You want to provide excellent benefits and perks to your employees.
- Your business is in a specialized industry that might need expert help dealing with complex regulations.
What Makes for a Top-Rated PEO Company?
Now that you have looked at some of the top options, what makes for an excellent PEO company, and what facets of one should you look at before coming to a decision for yourself and your business? How did we look at each company? While there are different specialties, there are some things that every PEO company should be able to do right.
While the following list is not everything you can review about a PEO, we recommend that you at least look over the following for every PEO company on your shortlist:
- Payroll and tax processing competency
- HR assistance and management
- Recruitment and retention assistance
- Training options and services
- Industry-specific offerings and services
- Benefit offerings and benefits administration
- Workers’ compensation insurance offerings and support
- Compliance assistance and risk-management services
- The quality of the online portal
- Availability and quality of time tracking and productivity tracking tools
- Customer service, timely response to requests,
- Positive response to feedback
- Personalization or tailoring of services
- Additional unique features or services
- The ability to deal with Colorado-specific issues and comply with local regulations.
Exactly how you prioritize these will depend on your business, your budget, and your own personal values and priorities. For this reason, only you will be able to make the perfect choice when selecting a PEO company. Yet keep in mind that your business will grow and adapt over time and might need or prioritize services or features previously ignored. All things might become important.
Why You Should Work with a PEO Company
If you are still hesitant or worried about the cost, that is perfectly understandable. Working with a PEO company can be a notable expense, and they can seem complex to those who have not worked with them before. Yet we still recommend working with one for the following reasons:
- They will be able to process payroll and handle automated HR tasks (such as time-tracking and time-off requests) with ease, and you and your employees will have far less paperwork to deal with. The saved time alone is worth it to many businesses.
- Your business will have support in navigating local and federal regulations and have assistance with risk management. By working with a PEO and taking their advice, the likelihood of unexpected events or bad incidents is likely to drop.
- The benefits offered by a PEO will generally be better than what you would be able to offer on your own in most cases and at a lower cost to both your business and your employees. PEO companies can bargain with the employee base of their full clientele, which can sometimes reach the millions.
- In general, the cost of working with a PEO company will be lower than trying to do everything in-house.
How to Select and Start Working with a PEO Company
Let us say that at this point you are interested in working with one of the above companies but do not know where to start. It can be quite a process, and honestly, we believe you should consult additional resources for the full guide. However, we can recommend that you do the following over the course of your search and onboarding process:
- Ensure that the PEO company (or companies) that you are interested in has a certificate of insurance and can provide all the services you want for your business.
- See if you can find additional testimonials and customer reviews about the PEO company, ideally from businesses in your region as well as businesses in the same industry.
- Try to set up a meeting between yourself and a representative from the PEO company, either in person or remotely. Be sure to ask questions, go over all details that you might be confused about, and do not feel like you must be committed yet. You do not need to sign anything or guarantee anything at this point, and the PEO company is not going anywhere.
- Carefully go over all paperwork and read the fine print. A PEO company listed here will not scam you, but misunderstandings are best avoided.
- Make sure that after the paperwork is signed and you know the onboarding process will start soon that you let your employees know about the transition as soon as possible. Onboarding should be simple with any of the PEO companies listed above, but it is a process your staff should know about, to avoid potential issues or friction.
Conclusion
Whatever size your company is and whatever industry you work in within Colorado, there is a PEO that will be able to meet your needs, and we are confident that one of the five PEO companies listed above will be a great fit. With a PEO, you will be able to make sure that you can focus on the tasks that matter while still maintaining control over your staff, all the while helping them get what they need as well. Whatever your current inclination, take your time and do more research into your top choices. And regardless of your final choice and path forward, we wish you the best of luck.
