How Do I Know Which PEOs Are Reliable?

With all the choices for PEOs out there, both big and small, how do you know which ones will be around in a year or two? How can you research which PEOs are reliable? For small business owners making the big leap to HR outsourcing, this is a very good question. How can you know which ones to trust, outside of the top tier PEOs in the United States? Smaller regional, and even national PEOs, with a less known brand name can offer very attractive fees and may promise wonderful service, but it does no good if they close their doors in 6 months. How could you ever see anything like that coming? What if you get involved with a smaller PEO only to find out they are performing unethical business practices? Where do you go to find out?  

How To Know Which PEOs Are Reliable

You might have heard that the IRS is going to start verifying the solvency of PEOs. That is good news for the small business owner looking to work with a PEO, but unfortunately that verification process is not ready to take advantage of yet.   The Federal government is thankfully coming onboard to keep tabs on PEOs and guard small business owners and their employees from unfair business practices performed by unreliable PEOs. Never has the government stepped in to protect businesses from predatory PEOs so this is great for the small business owner and other PEOs in the industry who are affected indirectly by rumors that PEOs are not working in the best interest of their customers.   One bad apple can certainly feel like it spoils the whole bunch. Most PEOs are grateful that a verification process is in place as a means to protect their good name and prove their worth.   Although this piece of new legislation, approved by the Obama administration, is coming to fruition soon, the verification process has already been delayed once, moving from January of 2015 until July of 2016. There are already whispers that this date could change again. So what do you do now?  

HR-Related Forums Can Offer Peer Feedback

There are lots of sites that offer forums and support for people who are looking for HR-related services. If you want to find some customer feedback on a certain PEO or PEOs in general, you can take some time and sift through the conversations on the boards. There is a lot to get through on them, but there is generally some good customer experience information to be had if you want to read it.   The issue with using forums and boards is that you tend to only get negative feedback on nearly everything and also you are not usually getting the full story. Information like this can be very biased, and just because someone had one bad experience, doesn’t mean you’ll experience the same. Unfortunately, you’ll never really get the full story to decide if what you read is really accurate, unless a number of customers also reverberate the same message on the boards. These boards do have good information, you just have to wade through it and weigh the feedback against what you don’t know about the situations being discussed.

Industry Governance Associations Can Help

Like most industries, there are associations that do provide some information and support around helping consumers work with ethical businesses. It behooves almost any industry, particularly those that serve a consumer or a small business owner, to provide a means to see who is collectively keeping an eye on the businesses that work alongside them.   Where common review sites and HR-related forums fail, there are entities who have their own verification or certification process such as the ESAC. This organization, comprised of PEOs who join and become members, has a certification process based on best practices and customer feedback to understand which PEOs are reliable.   This type of industry-driven certification is not bad, PEOs are more or less judged by their peers against their peers in this scenario. The problem is, unlike an IRS vetting process, it is not something outside the industry. With the IRS, there are more teeth in the compliance and verification process because it will be required. No one is requiring a PEO to be accredited by the ESAC.   Still, the ESAC does offer bonding services to accredited PEOs so customers are backed by an assurance that the PEO who is accredited by them will not financially default.  

Look To PEO Brokers For Reliability You Can Count On

Who would better have their ear to the ground regarding PEOs than a PEO broker? PEO brokers work directly with PEOs, guiding customers who entrust their PEO selection process to them to which PEOs are reliable. Since PEO brokers, like PEO Spectrum, work so intimately with the PEOs that are out there, they know which ones you can count on.   In short, PEO brokers are only as good as their recommendations. It is in their best interest to only work with PEOs that have a high customer satisfaction rating and have provided good consistent services to their customers. Would you expect anything less?   A PEO broker cuts through all the information and red tape to just provide you with a narrowed choice of options, based on your experiences and service needs so you know which PEOs are reliable. They are the trusted advisors to small businesses where so much choice and risk exists.