Zoho HR & payroll partner in the USA · Los Angeles, CA
Recruit, People, Payroll and Expense share one employee record, so a new hire gets typed in once.
Led from Glendale, our team (a certified Zoho Advanced Partner in the Los Angeles area) wires Zoho’s HR apps into one hire-to-pay system for US employers: the signed offer, I-9 paperwork, timesheets, time off, payroll taxes and mileage refunds all hang off the same person. We configure it, bring your history over from Gusto, BambooHR or ADP, and stay with you through the first live payday.
Advanced PartnerCertified Zoho HR consultants
01One employee record, four apps
Each app does one job and then passes the person along with everything it learned. Recruit knows the start date and pay rate, People knows the manager and the hours, Payroll knows the withholding and the bank account, and Expense knows what the company owes back. Nobody re-enters a field another app already holds.
1
Zoho RecruitDoes the work
Job posting, candidate pipeline, interview feedback and the offer letter, sent out for e-signature.
Hands on
Legal name, job title, start date, pay rate and the work location of the person who said yes.
2
Zoho PeopleDoes the work
Employee profile, onboarding checklist, I-9 documents, leave policy, shifts, check-ins and timesheets.
Hands on
Approved hours, overtime, unpaid leave and the state the person actually works in.
3
Zoho PayrollDoes the work
W-4 withholding, benefit and 401(k) deductions, direct deposit, then federal, state and local tax filing.
Hands on
The pay schedule reimbursements can ride on, and a journal entry for every run in Zoho Books.
4
Zoho ExpenseDoes the work
Receipt scans, mileage logs, card feeds and policy checks, routed to the right approver.
Hands on
Approved claims, repaid with the next paycheck or by ACH, and coded expenses for the books.
02Thirty days, one new hire
Follow one sample hire, a site supervisor in Nevada, from the day the offer is signed to the day the first mileage refund clears. Five moments matter. Pick one on the strip to see which app handles it and who on your team touches it.
Mon, Oct 26 · Zoho Recruit
The hiring manager approved the candidate on Friday. Recruit filled the offer template with title, $31.50 an hour and a November 2 start, and the candidate signed it from a phone on Monday morning. The record flips to Hired and Zoho People opens a new employee profile with the same details.
Mon, Nov 2 · Zoho People + Zoho Payroll
The new supervisor fills in the W-4 and direct deposit details in the Zoho Payroll portal and uploads I-9 documents to an onboarding task in Zoho People. Six other tasks (safety video, handbook, equipment, a buddy, a site login, a 30-day check-in) are already assigned with owners and due dates.
Fri, Nov 6 · Zoho People
Mobile check-ins at the job site add up to 41.5 hours, so the overtime rule marks 1.5 of them. The supervisor submits the timesheet and asks for Friday, Nov 27 off. The manager approves both from a phone, and the leave balance updates on the spot.
Fri, Nov 20 · Zoho Payroll
Approved hours from both weeks are already in the pay run. Payroll reviews the preview on Tuesday, approves it, and the deposit lands Friday with taxes queued for filing. The stub shows up in the employee app and the pay run posts to Zoho Books as one journal.
Tue, Nov 24 · Zoho Expense
On Nov 17 the supervisor logged trips between two job sites in the Zoho Expense app. The claim passed the mileage policy, the ops manager approved it, and the refund went out by ACH a week later. The expense is coded to the right job in Zoho Books without anyone touching it.
Sample hire and figures. Pay schedules, overtime rules and approvers are set to your own policies during setup.
03Payday readiness checker
Describe the team you pay and the checker lists every place payroll still depends on someone copying numbers by hand, next to what Zoho HR and payroll would do instead. It also tells you which Zoho apps and which payroll plan fit.
6places a hand-built pay run can slip for this team
| Check | By hand | In Zoho |
|---|
Apps this team needs
04Four apps, US editions
Four apps cover hire to pay for a US employer. You can license them one by one or take People and Recruit together as Zoho People Plus, then add Zoho Payroll. Prices below are Zoho’s US list prices per month, billed yearly, in USD.
The Corporate HR edition is the one for employers hiring their own staff. Hiring managers review candidates without a paid seat, since licences count recruiters only.
People is where the employee lives after hire. For hourly crews it adds check-ins, shift rosters and overtime rules, which is what makes payroll hours trustworthy.
Full-service payroll: it works out every paycheck, then pays and files the payroll taxes owed to federal, state and local agencies. Zoho says it covers all 50 states. Standard runs one state; Professional adds multi-state.
Expense closes the loop on money the company owes its people. Field teams log miles and snap receipts in the app, and approved claims go back with pay or straight to a bank account.
Monthly billing runs higher: Recruit $30 and $60, People $4, $6 and $10, Payroll $39 + $6 and $59 + $8.50, Expense $4 and $6. Zoho revises HR and payroll pricing now and then, which is why we price each licence line again on the day you order.
05Multi-state and tax filing
Zoho Payroll is listed by Zoho as available in all 50 states. It works out, pays and files payroll taxes at the federal, state and local level. Paying people in two or more states needs the Professional plan. Choices that need judgment, like benefit plans or worker classification, stay with your advisors.
Local taxes vary by city and county. Before your first live run we list each work location your people report from and confirm how payroll treats it.
06Permissions
Not unless you want them to. This is the access map we start from on most Zoho HR and payroll projects. Managers approve time, leave and expenses for their own team; pay rates and bank details stay with payroll, finance and the owner. Pick a role to see its view.
| Data | Owner | HR | Payroll / finance | Managers | Employees |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Candidates and offers | Full | Full | No | Own openings | No |
| Profiles and documents | Full | Full | View | Team, limited | Own |
| Timesheets and leave | View | Full | View | Approve team | Own |
| Pay rates and salary | Full | View | Full | No | Own |
| Pay runs and approval | Approve | No | Prepare | No | No |
| Bank and tax details | View | No | Full | No | Own |
| Expense claims | View | No | Full | Approve team | Own |
Every cell can change. Zoho Payroll Professional adds custom user roles, and People, Recruit and Expense each have their own role settings, which we line up so one person’s access matches across all four.
07Books, CRM, bank and your old tools
Payroll is only half done until the books agree with it. Each pay run posts to Zoho Books as a journal, reimbursements land against the right accounts, and wages reach employees by direct deposit. If you’re leaving another HR or payroll tool, the tabs below show what comes across.
Wages, employer taxes and deductions posted per run to the accounts your accountant picks. Contractors are paid as vendors here, and their 1099s are e-filed from Books.
Sales teams on Zoho CRM can have closed-deal commissions sent to payroll as an earning, and new reps set up as CRM users when People onboards them. We scope both as integration work.
Zoho Payroll debits the company account for net pay and taxes, then deposits to each employee. We make sure the company bank account is verified in Zoho Payroll well before real wages move.
Moving from
08Licence calculator
In the US, Zoho People Plus bundles People and Recruit (plus Expense on Enterprise) for $8 or $12 per employee a month, billed yearly, with a five-user minimum. Zoho Payroll is licensed on its own in both cases. Sometimes the bundle wins and sometimes separate apps do, so try your numbers.
Zoho People Plus Premium
$0a month
Lower costSeparate apps
$0a month
Lower costAll figures are Zoho list prices for US accounts, in dollars, before sales tax. People Plus Premium includes Recruit Corporate HR Standard and People Workforce; Enterprise includes Recruit Corporate HR Enterprise, People Enterprise and Expense Standard. If you already have Zoho One, Payroll Standard and the HR apps may already be in your licence.
09Three ways to start
Most US employers we meet land in one of these. They differ by how many links in the chain go live, and the scope of each is pinned down on paper before any configuration starts.
For teams keeping their current payroll for now
Priced as a fixed fee in a signed BRD, before we import anyone.
Where most teams start
For employers leaving Gusto, ADP or a spreadsheet payroll
Our fee is fixed in a signed BRD that also names your first live pay date.
For multi-state or field teams that want the whole chain
One fixed fee in a signed BRD, with a dated go-live for each app.
The first call costs nothing. If your setup needs a closer look first, say several states or a messy payroll history, we offer a paid assessment and tell you its price before it starts.
10How the rollout runs
We never let a first Zoho pay run be the real one. Your old payroll keeps paying people while Zoho runs the same period beside it, and we only cut over once the two match line by line and you sign off.
11Hourly and multi-state teams
The bundle pays off fastest where hours change every week, crews cross state lines and people spend their own money on the job. These are the US industries where we see that most.
12Before you switch
State coverage, mid-year switches, contractors, who bills what and who sees pay. If your question is about your own pay calendar, it’s faster to ask it live.
Zoho lists Zoho Payroll as available in all 50 US states. On Standard you run payroll for a single state; once anyone works in a second state, Professional covers it, reciprocity rules included. City and county taxes differ, so we check every work location on your roster before your first live run.
No. In the US, People Plus Premium bundles Zoho People Workforce and Zoho Recruit Corporate HR Standard, and Enterprise adds People Enterprise, Recruit Enterprise and Zoho Expense Standard. Zoho Payroll US is licensed separately from $29 per company plus $5 per employee a month, billed yearly. Zoho One is the exception, since it includes the Payroll Standard plan.
On Zoho People Plus Premium billed yearly, 25 employees cost $200 a month, and Zoho Payroll Standard adds $29 plus $125, so about $354 a month or $4,248 a year in Zoho licences before tax. Our setup is a separate fixed fee written into a signed BRD.
Yes. We load each employee’s year-to-date wages, taxes and deductions into Zoho Payroll so the year-end W-2 can cover the full year. Starting on the first day of a quarter keeps that quarter’s 941 with one provider. Mid-quarter works too, with more reconciling, and we confirm with your old provider which filings each side makes.
Zoho Payroll US is designed for paying W-2 staff. Contractors sit better in Zoho Books: we set them up as vendors in Zoho Books, pay them from there and e-file their 1099s from Books, which keeps contractor spend in the same ledger as payroll.
Zoho bills your licences directly on your own Zoho account, at Zoho’s prices, and you can see every line there. Our fee covers the setup and migration work only, and it is fixed in a signed BRD before work starts.
Only if you allow it. Our starting role map lets managers approve their own team’s timesheets, leave and expenses while pay rates, bank details and pay runs stay with payroll, finance and the owner. Custom roles in Zoho Payroll need the Professional plan.
Zoho accounts opened for US companies on zoho.com are hosted in Zoho’s US data centers. During setup we confirm the data center on your account and set who can export employee data.
People Plus is the HR-only route and suits companies that already run sales and accounting elsewhere. Zoho One licenses each user for the whole suite, including CRM, Books and the Payroll Standard plan, which can work out cheaper once you need several departments on Zoho. Bring your headcount to the call and we’ll price both side by side.
It depends on headcount, number of states, how much history moves and which apps go live. The signed BRD dates every step, including the parallel run and your first live payday, so you know the date before we start.
Yes. Each app can run on its own, so you can start with Zoho Payroll and keep your HR tool, or move HR to Zoho People and keep Gusto for a while. Linking a non-Zoho tool to Zoho is integration work we scope in the BRD.
Yes. Zoho Payroll applies deductions for health plans, retirement plans such as a 401(k) and wage garnishments on every run. Choosing the plans and carriers stays with you and your benefits broker; we set up the deductions they give us.
13Let’s talk
Book a free consultation with Elite Tech Global. We review your Zoho, AWS, Shopify or WordPress setup, show where AI / SI agents can save time, and agree the next step. If we work together, every requirement and a fixed price go into a signed BRD before the build starts.
Real people, one team. Led by co-founders Ikramul Karim and Khris Kakosimidi, and a 40+ member team across Zoho, AWS and AI.
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