Factoring companies provide staffing factoring or payroll factoring to staffing agencies so they can bridge the pay gap caused by employee payroll and customer invoicing. Staffing agencies have inherent cash flow issues because customer invoices don’t get collected until 15, 30 or 45+ days, yet they have to pay their employees on a weekly or bi-weekly basis. Payroll funding pays you up-front for your invoices, so you don’t have to wait for invoice payments.
How payroll factoring works
Payroll factoring, also referred to as payroll funding, is the cyclical process of the following:
- Perform staffing services for your customer.
- Pay your employees’ salaries or wages.
- Bill your customer for the staffing services performed.
- Get immediately funded by your factoring company.
You generate invoices from your employees’ time sheets, then send the invoices to your factoring company. Your factoring company verifies the invoices are correct, then sends you a cash advance for 85 to 95% of the invoice amount.
Factoring companies usually provide funding within 24 to 48 hours of receiving and verifying your invoices. Once the invoice becomes due, your customer pays the factoring company directly. The factoring company sends you the final payment depending on the advance rate. Factoring fees are taken from the final payment.
Temporary staffing
Temporary staffing agencies hire their own employees and assign them to their clients to fill vacancies or shortages due to maternity leave, worker shortages, seasonal spikes, or special projects. Staffing agencies usually specialize in certain industries such as administrative office work, warehouse and factory jobs, housekeeping personnel or catering services.
Contract staffing is a type of temporary staffing that is done on an individual basis, according to contractual requirements between the staffing firm and the client. Contract staffing employees are typically highly skilled and professional. Common contract staffing positions are in the areas of accounting and finance, information technology, telecommunications or engineering.
Temporary staffing employees enjoy the variety of work assignments, as well as the opportunities for long-term employment (temp-to-hire). Some employees continue working in a temporary role to meet their lifestyle desires or makeup for disabilities and hardships.
Permanent placement
Permanent placement firms or recruiting agencies match job seekers with clients needing permanent employees. Businesses outsource recruiting to placement agencies in order to save time and take advantage of an agency’s expertise in a particular industry. Recruiting agencies usually specialize in certain areas such as accounting, technical, or executive job placements.
Many factoring companies don’t provide factoring services for permanent placements due to the contingencies and potential problems with payment. Clients may not be happy with the employee and demand reduced payment or offsets. Employees may quit and the agency has to find a replacement, causing payment to be delayed or cancelled.
Payroll factoring companies
Factoring companies can approve your factoring application quickly, often within one to two weeks. Invoice factoring is a simple and easy way to pay your staffing employees and contractors on a regular basis.
Staffing agencies can focus on core operations, making strategic plans, and servicing their customers rather than dealing with the headaches and hassles caused by meeting regular payrolls. Staffing factoring also provides the cash to grow and take on more projects and customers.
Some factoring companies also provide full-service payroll processing. They pay your staffing employees and handle the payroll taxes, liabilities and accounting. This is very convenient for staffing companies that normally outsource these tasks, since they only have to deal with a single company for both payroll funding and payroll processing.
