If you’re still manually uploading spreadsheets to your 401(k) provider every pay period, we don’t need to tell you how much this already sucks.

Manual reconciliation (matching payroll data to retirement contributions) is one of those thankless HR tasks that eats up your day while simultaneously introducing risk. For teams without a native integration between payroll and their 401(k) providers, the process typically involves:

• Downloading payroll data
  
  

• Calculating employee contributions
  
  

• Formatting spreadsheets exactly the way the recordkeeper requires
  
  

• Emailing or uploading those files to the right portal
  
  

• Hoping you entered all the numbers correctly

No question it’s a tedious chore that, eventually, you can get down pat in a routine. But there’s nothing safeguarding you from making mistakes. The whole ordeal actually turns into more and more of a liability.

The following are three common options companies use (often with difficulty) to stay compliant.

Manually Track Everything 

Some teams stay organized with standardized templates and training more than one team member on the process. The precautionary measures usually come in the form of checklists and weekly calendar reminders.

Those are pretty smart tactics, but we are human. Things happen. We make mistakes. One skipped step or last-minute payroll edit, and suddenly the whole thing unravels. Or one person is out sick, and the entire system can falter. There’s a lot of pressure on a single individual and that creates continuity risk over time.

That’s even before factoring in the inevitable burnout.

Throw Money at the Problem  

Others try to solve the problem by outsourcing the work. Oftentimes a department will bring in a third-party administrator or rely on their accountant or payroll provider to coordinate the reconciliation manually.

This can often add cost and delays, which can be worth the expense if the process reduces operational risk. 

But it will never eliminate it. Somebody still has to hit “Send.” Only now you’re just paying someone else to do it.

Hope for the Best

It sounds crazy, but some employers are simply winging it. They do the best they can, knowing that mistakes can trigger penalties from the Department of Labor or IRS. Maybe it’s a budgetary issue or simply not a high-enough priority to address, but without a better tool, they’re leaving themselves exposed to compliance and reporting risks.

The strategy may choose the strategy deliberately, but it’s quite a gamble.  

There Is a Better Option 

Choose a provider that integrates directly with your payroll.

Providers like Basic Capital integrate directly with most major payroll platforms, which means contributions are synced automatically every pay period. The days of spreadsheet uploads and manual verification can be eliminated quickly and easily. The risk of input error gets reduced to zero; instead, you can enjoy a clean, automatic reconciliation every time you run payroll.

We support integrations with more than 150 payroll providers, and our onboarding process includes real human support to ensure your team is set up the right way on day one.

If you’ve been stuck with a clunky manual process, it doesn’t have to stay that way. Let your 401(k) provider do the heavy lifting, so your HR team can get back to what actually matters.

If your 401(k) process still depends on spreadsheets, it might be time for an upgrade.