A McDonald’s operator pays a service fee, an ad contribution, and rent to the same corporation, then watches labor across about eight restaurants at once. WageTime is payroll for that portfolio: labor readable by restaurant, every EIN under one login.
For independently owned and operated McDonald’s restaurants. WageTime is not affiliated with, endorsed by, or sponsored by McDonald’s Corporation. “McDonald’s” is a trademark of its owner, named here only to describe the businesses this page serves.
None of these is the tip-credit problem a sit-down restaurant has. They are the standing conditions of running McDonald’s restaurants at high volume across several EINs, where the franchisor is also the landlord and the crew is unmistakably yours.
McDonald’s built its business on real estate: the corporation controls the site and leases it to you. Add the service fee and the advertising contribution and roughly 16 to 23 cents of every gross dollar is gone before payroll. Rent moves with sales, so the one big number you can steer is labor, and you need it by restaurant, this week.
This is not a single storefront. About ninety-five percent of US McDonald’s are franchisee-run, and the typical operator holds roughly eight of them, each a separate EIN with its own filings. That is dozens of returns and hundreds of W-2s, and generic payroll answers it with a login per location and a spreadsheet to see the group.
McDonald’s spent years at the NLRB over whether it is the joint employer of its franchisees’ workers, and in 2019 the board approved a settlement and declined to call it one. The practical result lands on you: the crew is yours, so the wage record, the back pay, and any audit are yours too. Your payroll is the document that answers for it.
California’s $20 fast-food minimum applies to national chains with 60 or more US locations and names the franchisee as the covered employer. It arrived by ballot-and-bill, and a standing Fast Food Council can raise it again on its own schedule. Across states and cities, every location needs the floor that applies to it, with the next step-up already loaded.
A single restaurant runs fifty-plus crew on a straight hourly wage, skews heavily toward 14- to 17-year-olds, and turns over about two of every three roles a year. At portfolio scale that is a constant onboarding wave, a minor-hour rules layer on every schedule, and a final check owed the week someone walks.
Crew punches and schedules live in the point-of-sale and back-office systems, and every cycle someone exports, reformats, and re-keys them into payroll. Multiply that by eight restaurants and the re-keying is a job of its own, and every handoff is a chance to short a paycheck.
Job costing lands hours to each restaurant as the run happens, so a location trending hot surfaces this week instead of at month-end. WageTime turns that into one labor number you read across the whole portfolio, not a spreadsheet a bookkeeper rebuilds per restaurant.
| Restaurant | Labor % | Trend |
|---|---|---|
| Elm St #4412$78,000 net · $19,500 labor | 25.0% | On plan |
| Route 9 #7731$71,000 net · $19,170 labor | 27.0% | Watch |
| Midtown #2210$83,000 net · $26,560 labor | 32.0% | Running hot |
| Lakeside #5590$69,000 net · $17,940 labor | 26.0% | On plan |
Replaces the labor-percentage spreadsheet the bookkeeper rebuilds per restaurant every week, and the hot location nobody catches until the P&L lands.
McDonald’s restaurants each file under their own EIN, and WageTime runs the whole group from one sign-in, per restaurant or rolled up, the multi-EIN shape this organization actually has.
| Restaurant | Filings | Status |
|---|---|---|
| Elm St #4412 LLCEIN ••-•••4412 · 58 paid | Federal & state filed | Complete |
| Route 9 #7731 LLCEIN ••-•••7731 · 61 paid | Federal & state filed | Complete |
| Midtown #2210 LLCEIN ••-•••2210 · 52 paid | Federal & state filed | Complete |
| Lakeside #5590 LLCEIN ••-•••5590 · 49 paid | Federal & state filed | Complete |
Replaces a payroll account per restaurant, four sets of year-end filings, and the consolidation spreadsheet nobody trusts.
Your defense document. Because McDonald’s established at the labor board that the franchisee is the employer, the wage record, the back pay, and any audit sit on your side, and WageTime keeps that record audit-ready by default.
| Crew member | Change | Status |
|---|---|---|
| Marcus T.Elm St #4412 | OT recomputed · system | Locked |
| Dana R.Route 9 #7731 | +0.4 hr edit · J. Ruiz, Mgr | Attested |
| Priya S.Midtown #2210 | Rate chg, eff. Apr 1 · Payroll | Eff-dated |
| Kevin O.Lakeside #5590 | Missing punch added · S. Cole, GM | Review |
Replaces the overtime rate someone guessed, the edit with no name on it, and the paper timesheets an auditor asks for and you cannot find.
Every restaurant needs the wage floor that applies to it, effective-dated, whether that’s California’s $20 fast-food minimum, a Chicago city rate, or a rural state number. WageTime tests all of them in the same run.
| Restaurant | Floor · next change | Status |
|---|---|---|
| Route 9 #7731California, fast food | $20.00 · council review | On floor |
| Midtown #2210Chicago, IL | $16.60 · Jul 1 CPI adj | On floor |
| Elm St #4412Illinois | $15.00 · Jan 1 step-up | On floor |
| Lakeside #5590Federal | $7.25 · none scheduled | On floor |
Replaces the rate someone forgot to update the day a city floor moved, and the back-pay letter that follows.
WageTime onboards a McDonald’s crew as a wave, not a packet at a time: new hires enter their details and sign tax forms from a phone, and a summer wave loads in bulk.
| Crew member | Move | Status |
|---|---|---|
| Nadia F.Elm St #4412 | New hire, first shift Thu | Self-onboarded |
| Theo B.Route 9 #7731 | New hire, first shift Sat | Self-onboarded |
| Bulk waveMidtown #2210 | 6 summer hires | In bulk |
| Marisol A.Lakeside #5590 | New hire, first shift Mon | Waiting on I-9 |
| Elena V.Elm St #4412 | Left Fri close · final Mon | Off-cycle |
| Jordan P.Route 9 #7731 | Back for summer, records kept | Rehire |
Replaces the stack of new-hire packets, the manager’s onboarding hour between rushes, and the “it’ll be on the next run” final check.
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 demoWageTime carries hours and pay to each restaurant and cost code as the run happens, so labor lands by location and a hot restaurant shows up this week. Finished payroll posts to QuickBooks by department, so labor percentage is a report you pull. It matters because a service fee, ad contribution, and rent to the same corporation take about 16 to 23 cents of every gross dollar.
No. Each restaurant keeps its own EIN and files its own federal, state, and local returns, but you run all of them from one sign-in and pull results per restaurant or combined. About ninety-five percent of US McDonald’s are franchisee-run and the typical operator holds roughly eight, so that is hundreds of W-2s under one roof. Adding a restaurant means adding a company, not a vendor.
You are. After years of litigation the National Labor Relations Board approved a 2019 settlement and declined to hold McDonald’s Corporation a joint employer of its franchisees’ workers. The practical result is that the wage record, the back pay, and any audit sit with you, which is why WageTime keeps an audit-ready record with attestation, change logs, and effective-dated history by default. WageTime does not provide legal advice.
If a restaurant is in California, yes, and it can rise. The $20 floor applies to national chains with 60 or more US locations and names the franchisee as the covered employer, and a standing Fast Food Council can set further increases. WageTime runs the floor per location with effective-dated setup, so the next council step-up is loaded before it takes effect.
Yes, at volume. New crew self-onboard from a phone with the electronic I-9 captured both sides before a first shift, and a hiring wave onboards in bulk. Scheduling conflict safeguards flag rest-period gaps and overnight shifts before a schedule publishes, and break and meal rules live in the timesheets. The federal hour caps for minors and the hazardous-equipment limits stay yours to apply; WageTime does not provide legal advice.
$50 per month per company plus $10 per month per person paid that month, no long-term contract. The four-restaurant group in the screens, 220 people paid, comes to $2,400 for the month: $200 in company bases plus $2,200 in per-person fees. Runs are unlimited, so off-cycle final checks and weekly pay cost nothing extra. Switching is full-service and paid, scoped on the demo.
Last month’s hiring wave, the restaurant whose labor runs hot, and the location that just landed under a new city floor. Twenty minutes with a payroll specialist on a live demo organization: you’ll watch labor post by restaurant, a wage floor load ahead of its date, and a final check run off-cycle.
Book a 20-minute demo