What is a PEO?

A PEO stands for "Professional Employer Organization". PEO's are an outsourced human resource service that eliminates all the tedious employee administration for business owners. All your employee needs are professionally handled under one roof ...allowing business owners to focus on driving business, and not on time consuming tasks such as W-2’s, child support payments, wage garnishments, employee claims, payroll issues and benefits.

Is a PEO recognized as an employer?

The Internal Revenue Service acknowledges that a PEO may be the employer for federal income and unemployment taxes. Seventeen states provide some form of licensing, registration, or regulation for PEO. Moreover, many states statutorily recognize PEO as the employer or co-employer of work site employees for purposes of workers compensation and state unemployment insurance taxes.

What is a PEO agreement?

A PEO arrangement involves all or a significant number of the client
workplace employees in a long-term, non-project related,
employment relationship. The PEO assumes the employer
responsibility for employment tax, benefit plans, and other human
resource purposes. Through the use of a PEO, relationship, client
companies make a long term investment in their workers, because the PEO can provide health insurance, retirement savings plans, and other critical employee benefits for their work site employees.

Who uses a PEO?

The typical client customer of a PEO is a small to medium sized business with 1 to 500 employees, though larger businesses also find value in a PEO arrangement. These business customers include every single type of business.

Why would a small business use a PEO?

Small business owners want to focus their time and energy on the "business of their business" and not on the "business of employment." Business owners don't have the necessary human resource training; payroll and accounting skills; knowledge of regulatory compliance; or backgrounds in risk management, insurance and employee benefit programs to meet the demands of being a human resources manager.

Does the small business owner lose control of his or her business?

As co-employers, the PEO and small business owner become partners in the employment of their workers. The client retains ownership of the company. As co-employers, the PEO and client contractually share or assume employer responsibilities and liabilities. The PEO assumes most responsibilities and liabilities associated with a "general" employer. The PEO assumes a real and factual employer role. PEO's are responsible for payroll and employment taxes, maintaining employee records, reserve the ultimate right to hire and fire, and have the authority to resolve employee disputes. By shifting these responsibilities to the PEO, the client gains more command of the "core" revenue generating aspects of their business.

Who is responsible for the employee's wages and employment taxes?

The PEO assumes responsibility and liability for payment of wages and compliance with all rules and regulations governing the reporting and payment of federal and state taxes on wages paid to its employees. The Internal Revenue Service recognizes the PEO as the employer for federal income and unemployment taxes, and case law affirms the principle that the PEO is responsible for payroll taxes.

Who is responsible for state unemployment taxes?

As the employer for employment tax and employee benefits, a PEO assumes responsibility and liability for payment of state unemployment taxes, and most states recognize the PEO as the responsible entity. A few states require the PEO to report unemployment tax liability under its clients' account number, and four states have laws that hold the client and PEO jointly liable for unemployment taxes.

Who is responsible for workers' compensation?

Many states recognize the PEO as the employer of work site employees for purposes of providing workers' compensation coverage.

What is the future of the PEO industry?

American businesses are undergoing a fundamental change in human resource management, and the PEO industry is one response to market demands for change. The expertise required to manage the human resource elements of a small to mid-sized business has outgrown the experience and training of many entrepreneurs who started these small businesses. The PEO industry is demand driven as business owners seek solutions to the increasingly complex "business of employment." A PEO is one of the growth industries of the 1990’s and into the next century.