Weekly pay, multi-worksite W-2 temps, and rates that change by assignment: staffing payroll is production work, not back-office overhead. WageTime is payroll built for exactly that.
Staffing companies hired 11.2 million temporary and contract employees in 2024, and the average temp assignment runs about ten weeks (ASA). That means payroll here is not a monthly chore. It is the factory floor: weekly, high-volume, multi-jurisdiction, and running on a gross margin near 25% (SIA), where every error is margin you don’t get back.
A temp picks orders 30 hours at one client and packs 14 at another, at different rates. Federal rules say that week’s overtime computes on the weighted average of all rates (29 CFR 778.115), not whichever rate was live at hour 41. Payroll that keys overtime to one employee rate gets it wrong, and joint-employment doctrine can pull your client into the shortfall with you.
Your EIN lives in one city. Your temps work in forty. Ohio keys municipal withholding to where the employee works, per portion of a day. Pennsylvania wants employer registration at each worksite and the higher of resident versus work-location tax. Win one new client across a county line and payroll inherits a jurisdiction your system has never heard of.
ASA measured temp turnover at 416% in 2024. At ten-week average tenure, every seat is a fresh I-9, an E-Verify case, and eventually a final check, several times a year. That is a production process. Generic payroll treats it like an occasional life event.
Your hours are approved by client supervisors, on portals and VMS timesheets you don’t control, then somebody re-keys them into payroll. Back-office coordinators burn 15-20 minutes per start moving data that already exists in the ATS. At staffing volume, the re-key is a full-time job that produces nothing but risk.
Temps expect Friday like clockwork; clients pay in 30, 45, 60 days. You carry multiple payroll cycles in receivables on a gross margin near 25% (SIA), so a payroll platform that meters every run, or fumbles a week, is spending your thinnest dollar. Weekly cadence should be the default, not a premium tier.
Illinois ties equal pay to 720 hours worked at the same client. New Jersey requires wage statements itemized by client, hours, and rate, and the Third Circuit upheld it. Massachusetts wants a written job order per assignment. Generic payroll has no idea who the client even is; here, the client relationship is the compliance object.
How does overtime work when a temp covers two assignments in one week? WageTime computes it on the weighted-average regular rate, the federal default (29 CFR 778.115): straight-time pay across every assignment divided by total hours, premium on top.
| Assignment | Hours | Amount |
|---|---|---|
| Brookfield Distributionorder picking · $17.60/hr | 30.0 | $528.00 |
| Veltri Foodspackaging line · $19.80/hr | 14.0 | $277.20 |
Replaces the Saturday spreadsheet where someone reconstructs which four hours were overtime, and at whose rate.
Which taxes apply to a temp depends on where the assignment is, so WageTime resolves them from the worksite address itself, and a client won in a new municipality calculates its locals correctly from the first check.
| Temp | Local rule applied | SUI state |
|---|---|---|
| Keisha R.Brookfield Dist · Columbus OH | Columbus municipal | OH |
| Dan W.Veltri Foods · Sharon Hill PA | PA local EIT | PA |
| Marisol T.Quill Medical · Louisville KY | Jefferson County | KY |
| Trey B.Harbor Freight · Nashville TN | No local income tax | TN |
Replaces the tax-notice folder that grows a new envelope every time sales wins a client across a county line.
What does onboarding look like at 400% turnover? Batches, not events: WageTime treats Monday start lists as a production queue, so starts become a checklist someone clears before coffee, not a folder that eats the morning.
| New hire | I-9 · E-Verify | Status |
|---|---|---|
| Alvarez, NinaBrookfield Distribution | Docs captured | Complete |
| Okafor, SamVeltri Foods | Docs captured | Complete |
| Reyes, Marco rehireQuill Medical Group | Docs retained | Rehire |
| Pruitt, CaseyHarbor Freight Yard | I-9 List B pending | Pending |
Replaces the Monday folder of half-signed PDFs, and the start that slipped a week because one document never came back.
Client supervisors approve your hours on portals you don’t control, so WageTime imports them cleanly: clock hours flow straight into the run with no double entry, coded to the clients and assignments they came from.
| Client | Approved hrs | Labor cost |
|---|---|---|
| Brookfield DistributionBRKFLD-WHSE · 14 temps | 512.5 | $9,215.75 |
| Veltri FoodsVELTRI-PKG · 9 temps | 322.0 | $6,270.90 |
| Quill Medical GroupQUILL-ADMIN · 6 temps | 228.0 | $4,868.40 |
| Harbor Freight YardHARBOR-YARD · 5 temps | 187.5 | $3,384.38 |
Replaces the CSV shuffle between the ATS export and the payroll import, and the 15 minutes per start it quietly bills you.
Who has to offer a temp health coverage? Usually the agency, as the employer, and staffing is the textbook variable-hour case: WageTime runs ACA look-back measurement continuously, updating as timesheets land instead of in a January panic.
| Employee | Avg hrs/wk | Status |
|---|---|---|
| Keisha R.Month 8 of 12 · nearing FT | 33.4 | Review |
| Dan W.Month 5 of 12 | 21.2 | Below threshold |
| Marisol T.Measured · stability period | 30.8 | Offered |
| Trey B.Month 2 of 12 | 12.6 | Below threshold |
Replaces the January spreadsheet that tries to reconstruct a year of variable hours the week 1095-Cs are due.
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 demoThe agency is the employer of record for its temps: it pays wages, withholds and files payroll taxes, and issues the W-2s, while the client directs the day-to-day work. WageTime runs that model natively, weekly runs at no extra cost, taxes filed automatically for every worksite jurisdiction, and your internal recruiters in the same payroll.
Hours from all assignments in a workweek add together, and under the federal default the overtime rate is the weighted average of all rates worked that week (29 CFR 778.115). WageTime computes weighted-average overtime automatically whenever someone works two or more rates in a week, so multi-assignment weeks come out right without spreadsheet forensics.
The staffing agency does, as the employer. WageTime files every federal, state, and local tax automatically, including deposits, and resolves local taxes from each temp’s geolocated work and home addresses across 11,000+ jurisdictions, so a new client worksite starts calculating correctly from its first check.
Temps on your assignments are almost always W-2 employees of the agency; misclassifying them as 1099 is an expensive mistake. Classification is a decision for you and your attorney. In WageTime, W-2 temps, W-2 internal staff, and legitimate 1099 contractors run in the same payroll, with W-2s and 1099s both included at year-end.
You can until a temp works two rates in one week, a client opens in a new municipality, or Monday brings 20 starts. Those are the breaking points: multi-rate overtime, worksite-based local taxes, and onboarding volume. WageTime is built around exactly those three. For front-office recruiting and client invoicing you’ll still use your ATS; bring it to the demo and we’ll confirm the exact flow for your setup.
$50 a month for the company plus $10 for each person actually paid that month, with unlimited runs. Weekly pay costs the same as biweekly, off-cycle final checks cost nothing extra, and a quiet month costs less because you only pay for people actually paid. An agency paying 40 temps and 4 recruiters in a month is $490, whether that month had four Fridays or five.
Last week’s approved-hours export, your worksite list, and one temp who worked two assignments. Twenty minutes with a payroll specialist on a live demo company: you’ll see the weighted-average overtime math on a real multi-rate week, worksite tax setup, the Monday start queue, and the ACA look-back dashboard.
Book a 20-minute demo