Homebase Redefines Payday for Small Business Teams

The company’s powerful suite of products reimagines Main Street’s broken pay system, as new payday study predicts the death of the traditional paycheck by the end of 2024.

• Homebase ushers in an era of fully automated payroll powered by AI that’s zero-click, instantaneous, and error-free, replacing dated payroll systems that fail today’s small businesses.
• Payday becomes any day for hourly workers, as more and more reject the two-week pay cycle and opt for on-demand earned wages to keep up with regular expenses.
• Unprecedented transparency will be the norm for small business owners anticipating labor costs and for workers tracking bills, earnings over time, and taking control of their financial well-being.

San Francisco, October 19, 2023 – Homebase, the all-in-one team management app that helps more than 100,000 local, small businesses manage their hourly teams, is opening the door to the future of pay for Main Street with an updated suite of powerful payday tools that radically reimagine dated payroll systems. This comes on the heels of a new, small business payday study by the company signaling the death of the paycheck as we know it by the end of 2024. These innovations mark a new era of pay. Homebase wants small businesses to stop running payroll. Homebase Payroll brings innovation and automation to outdated payroll processes at a time when small businesses need it most. The company’s payday study revealed that traditional payroll systems continue to fail small businesses, costing them time and money.

• Today, 76% of employers have made miscalculations running payroll.
• 63 hours is the average amount of time a small business owner spends each year running payroll; 31% say time spent on payroll could be better spent growing their business.

Homebase is completely reimagining payroll for small businesses—especially those facing the complexity of managing hourly employees—by integrating time-tracking and payroll in one place. This saves small businesses from wasted time and errors because they don’t have to transfer critical data between systems or do manual calculations with every payroll run. And with fully automated payroll and tip-pooling coming soon, small businesses will never have to “run” payroll again. “Homebase Payroll is the complete package, including the extremely helpful support staff. It's very user-friendly and it makes payday a breeze for me and for my workers,” said Joseph Marino, Owner of Max Protection Moving LLC. Homebase empowers workers to do payday their way. The traditional, two-week pay cycle doesn’t line up with the needs of today’s hourly worker. Bills, rent, daily essentials, and emergency expenses can’t wait for their next payday, leading workers to take out risky payday loans or to go into overdraft on their bank accounts just to make ends meet.

• Right now, 75% of hourly workers are paid biweekly, but 55% would opt for more frequent payments if given the choice.
• More than 1 in 10 have paid more than $500 in the past year to cover payday loan repayments, interest charges, or cash advance and overdraft fees.
• Nearly half (45%) of hourly workers say a no-interest, on-demand pay option from their employer would help them to manage their finances better.

To help small businesses take care of their people, Homebase offers hourly workers on-demand access to their earned wages, with tools like Cash Out or the recently released Homebase Pay Any Day Visa Debit Card¹. Immediately after an employee clocks out from their shift, they can access the wages they’ve just earned for free (i.e. no fees or interest for the employee, and no cost or liability to the employer). This puts financial control back in the hands of hourly workers. Homebase brings total transparency to small business owners and workers alike. The complexities of hourly teams make it difficult for small businesses to accurately forecast labor costs and plan staffing. For hourly workers whose schedules can change weekly or who rely on tips, every paycheck can be a different amount, making it difficult to plan for expenses.

• 66% of small business owners have reviewed employee timesheets and found errors that had to be corrected, costing them precious time and resources.
• 28% of employees say their financial stress is a distraction for them at work.

By connecting all parts of team management, from scheduling to timesheets to payroll, Homebase’s predictive modeling enables owners to more accurately plan for labor costs. For hourly workers, Homebase offers a complete financial picture, with the earnings tab and the newly launched bill tracking, all in one app. They are able to plan ahead, predict earnings and expenses, and adjust for shortfalls—removing a key source of financial stress. “This is about more than just new technology. We’re reimagining payday for Main Street from the ground up,” said Homebase Founder & CEO, John Waldmann. “We’re proud to usher in a new era of pay for Main Street that delivers the best possible pay experience to small business teams,” said Waldmann. ¹Issued by Piermont Bank. Study Methodology: From August 31 to September 8, 2023, Homebase conducted a comprehensive study made up of two surveys, which gathered first-hand insights from over 850 hourly workers and 500 small business owners based in the U.S. Key findings are available here.