Today on our blog, we are delighted to hear from OuiPay, an Immedis partner since our inception. Their expertise with Canadian payroll across all provinces is second to none. Marc Kimmel, co-founder of OuiPay, along with his colleague James April and the rest of the OuiPay team, consistently show that working together as true partners brings great benefits and results for all.
Can you start by telling us a little about your company? I imagine the way people pronounce your name results in a few interesting conversations.
OuiPay was started in 2009 and focuses primarily on Canadian payrolls for mid to larger-sized companies. Our niche is complex payrolls as we automate almost 100% of manual processes. We process over 1 billion dollars of payroll annually and pay about 25,000 employees a month.
Yes, our name does spark conversation. Oui in French is yes, so when put together with Pay, it means YesPay. As we are in the Province of Quebec, we thought that it was a cute play on words. Clients have responded very well to it right across Canada.
What is the payroll landscape like in Canada?
As in other countries, there are many different payroll providers, with larger regional ones, especially in Quebec, where the language and culture are different. OuiPay is probably one of the larger regional players and the largest in terms of our partnerships with multiple companies like Immedis.
As we enter a new year, what are the top challenges in global payroll?
It looks like more and more companies are expanding globally this year. We see many European and Latin American companies outsourcing tasks to Canada. Often, they don’t know how to handle the local requirements, so it is imperative that they work with companies with this knowledge and expertise.
How has COVID-19 changed the way organizations operate a global payroll?
More companies are looking at ways to get the most out of people working from home. So long as workers can connect to colleagues around the world, they really can work from anywhere. More and more clients are taking advantage of this and hiring the best people regardless of where they live.
What is the biggest benefit of touchless global payroll for customers?
One of the most significant advantages is that the time historically allocated to performing repetitive HR and payroll tasks is now free to concentrate on strategy and the goal of generating actionable insights from workforce analytics.
What should a customer know before integrating their payroll with their HCM and Finance systems?
That the word integration means something different to each person involved in the process. While many companies promote a fully integrated product, usually it means that there are available exports for import, and the process is not automatic and seamless. It is essential to establish exactly what the provider understands as a truly integrated model and work from there.
Editor’s note– Read our blog, Evaluating a Payroll Solution? Here are the Best Questions to Ask about Integration Capabilities to help you prepare for this conversation.
What lessons have you learned over the years as you work with companies trying to improve their global payroll processes?
The biggest one is that the “head office” doesn’t realize that payrolls differ between countries and regions. They assume that the way they do things in the home country is the same everywhere. Also, if they don’t pick the right global partner, the process can be very difficult, and they run the risk of not being compliant.
What are the elements of a great business partnership?
Pick a GREAT partner and listen to each other. It’s like a marriage, and unless the lines of communication are open, it will fail.
What is your experience of partnering with Immedis – can you tell us a little about the integration process?
We started with a company that Immedis purchased called Expaticore. They had a bunch of small, mainly US-based clients that needed Canadian payroll help. Once Immedis took over, the Canadian client base grew, and the headcounts of the new clients grew. This prompted the need to automate the implementation and the payroll process between the two companies. We are currently adding more layers to this, and so far, it is going very well.
How do you ensure the security of your customer’s data?
All of our client data is located on secured servers in a secure data center in Canada. Only OuiPay personnel have access to the core data, and our web-based solution keeps a minimal amount of personal data.
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