WageTime is payroll for financial advisors and RIAs: the lead advisor’s base, the revenue bonus on the book they manage, and an associate’s new-asset incentive settle in one run, with every IAR’s CE clock tracked before it stops a registration.
Financial planning and investment advisory firms run about 89,445 US establishments (BLS QCEW, NAICS 523940, Q4 2024), and most are small: a couple of lead advisors, an associate or two, a client-service associate, a paraplanner, and an owner who is also the chief compliance officer. The revenue is a recurring advisory fee, not a stack of commissions that claw back, so the pay is mostly salary plus a bonus tied to that revenue. What breaks off-the-shelf payroll is everything around it: the mix of W-2 and 1099 advisors, the continuing-education clock that can stop an IAR from renewing, and the records an examiner can ask to see.
An advisory firm’s revenue is a recurring fee on assets under management, so advisors are paid a base salary plus a bonus tied to the revenue they manage and a new-asset incentive for the assets they bring in, not a commission that trails for years and reverses on a lapse. A dual-registered advisor, the one who also holds a Series 7, may still sit on a payout grid through an affiliated broker-dealer. One firm can run all of it, and generic payroll only knows how to cut a flat salary.
Every IAR owes 12 continuing-education credits a year under the NASAA framework, split exactly 6 Products and Practice plus 6 Ethics and Professional Responsibility, and the two buckets do not substitute for each other. Miss a year and the status turns “CE Inactive.” Miss a second year in a row and the person is no longer eligible to renew as an IAR. Nobody owns that calendar until a renewal is already blocked.
At one firm a lead advisor is a W-2 employee, an independent advisor settles as a 1099, and a hybrid advisor can be both across two entities. The current is running toward W-2: aggregators are moving formerly 1099-affiliated advisors onto W-2 payroll. A payroll tool that assumes one kind of “rep” makes you run the firm on two systems that never reconcile at year-end.
An RIA keeps books and records under the Investment Advisers Act (SEC Rule 204-2, or the NASAA state analog), and comp history, bonus approvals, and timesheets are the payroll-side records that live near that obligation. When the pay register and the bonus math sit in a spreadsheet on one laptop, “who approved this and when” is a story you reconstruct, not a log you open.
The people who make the advice possible are on payroll too: client-service associates and paraplanners who are usually non-exempt and owed overtime in a busy stretch, an operations or compliance lead, and an owner who runs an S-corp and has to take a reasonable W-2 salary before distributions. Four pay treatments, one small run, and no HR department to sort them.
How do you pay an advisor whose comp is a salary plus a bonus on the revenue they manage? WageTime settles the whole stack in one run: base as salaried pay, the revenue bonus and new-asset incentive as pay codes beside it.
Replaces the comp spreadsheet where a salary, a revenue bonus, and one contractor payout never tie back to the same check.
How do you keep an IAR’s continuing education from quietly lapsing into an inactive registration? Each advisor’s Series 65 or 66 registration, IARD states, and the 12 yearly NASAA credits you record in WageTime live on the employee record, alerted before the renewal deadline.
| Advisor | Registration / states | IAR CE recorded | Next deadline |
|---|---|---|---|
| Nolan Ferris | Series 65, IAR TX + 3 states | 8 of 12 recorded | 90 days |
| Aisha Raymont | Series 66 + 7, IAR TX | 12 of 12 recorded | Complete this cycle |
| Gordon Ashby | Series 65, IAR TX + CA | 3 of 12 recorded | 30 days |
| Corinne Vale | Series 65, IAR CO | 6 of 12 recorded | 60 days |
Replaces the CE-and-registration spreadsheet nobody reopens until an advisor’s renewal is already blocked.
What payroll records should an RIA be able to produce on request? WageTime keeps registers, comp and bonus history, and attested timesheets behind role-based access with full audit logging, while the Rule 204-2 duty itself stays the firm’s obligation.
| Record | Who can see it | Change history | Status |
|---|---|---|---|
| Payroll register, June | Principal + ops lead | Effective-dated Jul 1 | Locked |
| Advisor comp & bonus history | Principal only | Full change log | Access-controlled |
| Client-service timesheets, Jun 16-30 | Ops lead + employee | Attested by employee | Locked |
| Role & approval changes | All admins | Who, when, what logged | Audit log |
Replaces the reconstruction exercise when someone asks who approved a bonus and when, and the answer is a spreadsheet’s last-modified date.
Who else is on an advisory firm’s payroll? The client-service associates and paraplanners who are usually non-exempt, the S-corp owner’s own W-2, and the remote ops hire whose new state comes online from the first check, all in one WageTime run.
Replaces the call to the CPA that starts with “our new ops hire lives in Colorado now” and ends with a registration you did not know you needed.
Full-service payroll is $10 a month per person paid that month, plus $50 a month per company, with unlimited runs. No long-term contracts, no per-run charges.
Off-cycle runs and bonuses cost nothing extra. No long-term contracts; cancel anytime.
Example: 50 people paid × $10 + $50 company = $550 for the month
HR & hiring, onboarding, PTO, time tracking, benefits, and workers’ comp are optional add-ons, priced separately when you’re ready.
See a demoMost fee-only RIAs pay advisors a base salary plus a bonus tied to the revenue they manage and a new-asset incentive, rather than a pure production grid; a dual-registered advisor may still sit on a payout grid through an affiliated broker-dealer. WageTime settles salary, bonus, and grid-style payouts through pay codes in one run, and does not recompute your payout schedule.
Under the NASAA framework, an Investment Adviser Representative completes 12 CE credits a year, split 6 Products and Practice and 6 Ethics and Professional Responsibility, and the buckets do not substitute. A missed year turns the status inactive; a second consecutive miss ends eligibility to renew. WageTime tracks the counts and dates you enter with 30/60/90-day alerts; it does not report to any regulator.
Classification depends on the arrangement, and one firm often runs both: employee advisors are usually W-2, while independent or hybrid advisors settle as 1099. Many firms are moving formerly 1099 advisors onto W-2. Classification is your and your advisors’ decision. WageTime pays whichever way you set it, W-2 and 1099 in one run, both year-end forms included.
Rule 204-2 under the Investment Advisers Act (and the NASAA state analog) sets the adviser’s books-and-records duty; meeting it is the firm’s responsibility, not a payroll product’s. What WageTime does is keep the payroll-side records, comp history, bonus approvals, and attested timesheets, behind role-based access with full audit logging and effective dating, instead of loose on a spreadsheet.
Often not. Exemption depends on a duties test and a salary floor, not the job title, so many client-service and paraplanner roles are non-exempt and owed overtime in a busy stretch. WageTime tracks their hours with attestation and locking and computes overtime automatically, including weighted-average overtime when someone works two rates in one week.
$50 a month for the company plus $10 for each person actually paid that month: a 10-person firm is $150 in a normal month. Runs are unlimited, so a quarter-end bonus run, the biweekly staff run, and a spot new-asset incentive all cost exactly what the formula says. No long-term contracts; cancel anytime.
The advisor on salary plus a revenue bonus, the associate’s new-asset incentive, the one independent advisor on a 1099, and the two IARs whose CE clocks you are trying not to lose track of. Twenty minutes with a payroll specialist on a live demo firm, and you’ll watch a mixed W-2 and 1099 run settle salary, bonus, and incentive together, registrations and CE tracked with alerts, and pay records behind role-based access with a full audit log.
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