Payroll Help

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How to Integrate Payroll with Patriot Accounting

In this article:

How to Set Up Payroll Integration Settings
Select Your Journal Entry Format
Select Asset Accounts
Select Pay and Tax Expense and Liability Accounts
How to Handle Imported Payroll and Contractor Bank Transactions

Background

Patriot Software offers seamless payroll to accounting integration. If you use both Patriot Payroll and Accounting Software, a journal entry will be automatically created in your accounting software each time you run a payroll. 

You can view these payroll transactions on your General Ledger report.

How to Set Up Payroll Integration Settings

  • To set up or edit your payroll integration go to Settings > Payroll Settings > Payroll Integration Settings
  • Select “Patriot Accounting” under the Accounting Software to integrate Patriot Payroll with Patriot Accounting.
    • You can also choose “No integration” if you prefer to manually record payroll with journal entries or when importing bank transactions.

This new integration is being rolled out. If you do not see these choices, please contact support to have us add you to the enhanced payroll to accounting integration.

Select Your Journal Entry Format

Choose to either record your journal entries either as a summary or by employee when setting up your Accounting software integration for the first time.

  • Summary – you will see the total net payroll amount appear in your General Ledger report for each pay date.
    • Remitted taxes will be a separate entry.
    • You will have the option to record the net pay of each employee who is not paid via direct deposit separately.
  • By Employee – you will see each employee’s name as an individual row in your General Ledger report.
    • Net Pay, Employee, and Employer Taxes will be listed separately.

💡Note: Contractor payments will be recorded in your GL as you pay each contractor.

Select Asset Accounts

The fields that show in this section is determined by your company’s payroll setup: whether you use direct deposit, and if you have Basic Payroll (you handle tax remittance) or Full Service Payroll (Patriot manages tax remittance).

  • Direct Deposit Net Pay, Remitted Employee and Employer Taxes Asset Account – Choose the bank account that is used when Patriot collects the direct deposit money for employees and/or payroll taxes.
  • Non-Direct Deposit Asset Account – Select the bank account used for paper checks or PayPal, Venmo, etc.
    • Check the box “Record non-direct deposit net pay by each employees” if you want to track employee checks individually.
    • You can select this even if you choose to record your journal entries in the summary format.

Select Pay and Tax Expense and Liability Accounts

  • Gross Pay Expense Account – Gross pay is the total compensation you pay to your employees before taxes or deductions.  Choose the expense account to record.
  • Employer Tax Expense Account – This includes all employer taxes such as Social Security, Medicare, unemployment, and any other employer-paid taxes you may have in your state.
    • Both Basic and Full-Service Payroll customers should select the expense account to apply these entries.
  • Non-Remitted Employee and Employer Taxes Liability Account
    • Full-Service payroll –  In rare cases there may be liabilities that Patriot does not collect or pay on your behalf such as disability insurances (NYSDI, HI SDI, NY PFL), and the opt-in employer NY ECET tax. All taxes that are calculated but not remitted are clearly noted on the tax deposit frequency settings page in your software. In the event any of these taxes or should future non-remitted taxes apply, please select a liability account.
    • Basic payroll –  select a liability account to apply these entries.
  • Employee Deduction Accounts – Select a liability account for each employee deduction.
    • This includes all employee deductions, such as 401(k) or health insurance. 
    • You will only see this if you have at least one company-level deduction set up in your payroll account. 
  • Company-Paid Contribution Accounts – Enter both an expense and liability account for each company-level contribution you’ve set up in your payroll account.
    • This includes all employer-paid contributions such as employer 401(k) contributions or the company portion of health insurance premiums. 
    • You will only see this if you have at least one company-level contribution set up in your payroll account. 

How to Handle Imported Payroll and Contractor Bank Transactions

After you set up integration, all payroll transactions will be recorded in your accounting software.

  • When you import bank transactions, you’ll see these transactions again. If you are not using a payroll clearing account, we recommend you dismiss or delete the bank imports related to payroll to avoid duplicate transactions in your general ledger.
  • Similarly, be cautious with contractor payments. These are already recorded when you create the payment to the contractor and accepting the same payment from your bank import will also result in duplicate entries.

Read our help article on Manage Pending Bank Transactions for more info.

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