Name: jeff kuzmich - Migrate_CPA_Acquisition_Process_11182025_5123473
Uploaded: 2026-02-26T05:53:29.837Z
Duration: 21 min 57 s
Description: jeff kuzmich - Migrate_CPA_Acquisition_Process_11182025_5123473

Transcript for "jeff kuzmich - Migrate_CPA_Acquisition_Process_11182025_5123473": Hello, everyone. Welcome to the value of partnership, an introduction to the Paychex payroll acquisition program for accountants. My name is Rob Parsons, and I manage branded content here at Paychex. So before we dive in, I just wanted to cover a few housekeeping issues. Note that the primary audio is gonna be coming via your computer. There's no dial in options, so just make sure you got your speaker volume set right. Also, sometimes you may have to refresh your browser to make sure everything is working properly. You can see the key commands here to make that work. So let's look at some other important features now. You can download and print a copy of today's deck for future reference and to access additional resources. Just check the files and resources window. That's going to be on the top right of your console. It's available anytime during the event. If you have any questions during today's webinar, we have a specialized acquisition team who's receiving those. So you can send them via the ask us a question window. Just type in the question, click Submit, and that team will respond to you right away. And of course, please note this presentation does not constitute legal advice. This is for informational purposes only. And now, I'd like to introduce today's speaker. Leslie Winterbolton is the National Director of Accountant Channel Strategy at Paychex, where she spent the majority of her thirteen year career forming relationships with national brands and regional businesses. She's worked with partners across several industries including franchises, trade associations, integration technology companies, banking, and accounting. She's also traveled the country speaking to thousands of businesses and industry events around the importance of compliance, active employee development and engagement, and the value that Paychex can provide via its suite of services. So Leslie, welcome, and why don't you take us through what we're going to cover today? Thank you so much, Rob. Excited for our quick session today. I know we'll get a lot out of this session, and hopefully, we'll generate some additional follow-up for those listening in. But today, you'll learn a little bit more about why to to partner with Paychex. We'll talk specifically about our CPA payroll acquisition process and discuss some next steps and really how easy it is to get a no cost, no obligation valuation. Alright. So let's first start with why Paychex. We hear from our accounting partners today on the reasons they selected to partner with Paychex, and really it boils down to these five key areas: proven, we're experienced, we're innovative, we're trusted, and we're principled. And so on the screen is some proof of that. We have 17 times been an honoree for the world's most ethical companies. We are endorsed almost a quarter of a century now from the AICPA and the cpa.com organization, and we're a three year champion of America's most innovative companies. The other reasons our accounting partners choose and select Paychex for not only a partnership with them but also for their clients is the scalability of our offering. Whether you are an owner operator all the way up to thousands of employees, Paychex has you covered through our suite of solutions, through payroll, HR, talent management, benefits administration, and workforce management solutions to help your clients stay in business and stay profitable. When we think about powerful resources, we think about it in two different buckets, for you, your firm, as well as for your clients. So I'm going to highlight these three in a little bit more depth just to kind of frame up, again, some additional reasons why partners select Paychex. The first one is our Accountant Knowledge Center. The next one is our Paychex Partner Pro, which is a brand new platform we've launched, and the third one is our service and support. So let's dive in a little bit more. We've recently relaunched our Accountant Knowledge Center. This is backed by CCH, which is an industry expert and really brings about roughly $14,000 in value to you and your firm. This new relaunch incorporates an improved navigation and some AI search tools. You can also get access to master tax guides back to 1998 if you need to go back that far, And there's always special briefings as well as client letter toolkits available to keep you on the cutting edge of compliance concerns and be at the forefront of communicating that to your clients. Partner Pro. This was recently launched in June this calendar year, giving mutual client access and data to our CPA and accounting partners. And so this is very important to note. Because of an acquisition, going through an acquisition process with Paychex, you may have concerns that you would get a lack of understanding around the data around payroll because you're no longer processing it. Paychecks Partner Pro gives you access to all the relative and necessary information you need to help keep your clients on the right path and, of course, compliant, while Paychecks does all that heavy lifting for you. This dashboard gives you tactical and strategic guidance on your clients based on what has transpired in the past, but also helps queue up for you some areas that might help them remain compliant in the future. There are some live chat functions in here, and you can also submit information and questions on specific clients right through the platform. All of this on the back end is supported by customized service professionals that understand how important of a role you play to your clients. The next one I want to talk about is the service and support that you will get through this entire process as you're looking to explore why paychecks and why sell your payroll book of business to us. The first one is business development manager. So this is a concierge, quarterback individual that really helps coordinate both the firm and the client experience as you're engaging in this process with Paychex. You also have a designated sales team. This individual is, going to be the individual reaching out and communicating to your clients directly to onboard them to Paychex Solutions and making sure that we're communicating back with the firm where we're at in that process. And then lastly, we have some dedicated resources for both the onboarding and ongoing service of your clients. We have automated a lot of this behind the scenes, but we have not lost the personal touch that Paychex is known for. We have a data extraction team to really help in getting all the data from prior payrolls into our platform, as well as that dedicated ongoing and implementation service team to keep all of our ducks in a row as we're going through this process with your firm. Another reason firms are selecting to partner with Paychex is all the value added and scalable offerings we have for their clients. Firms are recognizing how complex it is to be a business operator and owner today. Some of the stats on your screen that you're seeing speak to that. 78 of companies are looking to outsource HR admin tasks. 87% of employees value retirement benefits. Also, significant interest in our PEO model. Merchant services is another offering from Paychex that can save on average $400 a month to a business owner. We offer a full suite of benefits and also include our workers' compensation pay as you go in most of our payroll bundles. So, you have heard a little bit about why paychecks, why CPA partners have selected to partner with us over our fifty plus years of existence. Now I want to get into more of the nitty gritty details of the payroll acquisition process. We'll cover some timeline, some milestones, and the client experience. So here's the five step process really from start to finish when collaborating with Paychex and selling your book of payroll business to us. The first step is really a no cost, no obligation valuation, and so this collects some basic details, monthly billing, number of employees, payroll frequency, and the services that you're providing. Now, this is more generic information initially, so we don't need client names or information. We just need client one is paying x, client two is paying X, etcetera. Once that information is submitted to Paychex, it only takes two to three business days for us to generate an evaluation of that book of business and present you an offer. From there, we move on to our due diligence step, which I'll get into in some future slides in a bit more detail. That also takes on average about two business days. From there, if the evaluation looks good and our process is very aligned with your process, we would move forward with the agreement phase. From there, once the agreements are submitted, that is when we will get your full client list with more detail. It takes on average about two business days for us to fully execute that agreement, and you receive your first payment, which is 20% of the total purchase price within seven days. From there, we plan our client engagement collectively with you, the firm, and we move forward in our conversion and retention periods, which are key milestones of how you get paid out. Right, so digging in just a little bit more into the due diligence portion of the acquisition process. Our goal is to have a process and cost neutral approach based on the solutions they're receiving from you at the firm level. So when we go in, we evaluate your book of business, it's creating that cost neutral as well as process neutral. So this due diligence step is getting into the nitty gritty details about how your clients communicate with you. How do they process payroll? At what frequency? How do they best communicate with you? Because we want to make sure that your clients are set up for success with paychecks. In that next step, the client engagement, we do some joint planning with you. We understand the mix of your client base. Who are your more tenured clients? Who are your newest clients? What are the expectations you set for your interaction and engagement with your clients? And how can paychecks pick up that baton and move that forward. So during this joint planning session, we oftentimes give you examples of communications that we've sent out for other successful firms that have been through this process. We give you client letters. We give you best practices so that this is a successful joint venture. We notify those clients. Obviously, most of that notification is going to come directly from you. And then we engage with them one on one as needed to help onboard those clients onto paychecks. Again, they will have a dedicated implementation specialist to help them get established for that first payroll run, and depending on how they best want to collaborate with us in the future, we'll set them up for success, whether they want to log in and process payroll directly themselves or whether they want to talk to someone through every single pay period. The conversion and retention period both last ninety days. Those are some additional milestones of how you get compensated. So once we start converting your clients and they process that first payroll, they have concluded that conversion period. So we allot ninety days to convert all of those clients over to Paychex to run their first payroll. Once that has happened, we close the conversion period, and now we're in the retention period. The retention period also lasts around ninety days. So what to expect and why it works? Why this has been so successful and a great relationship and partnership with our accounting firms is because they recognize how much revenue this can generate for their firm to allow them to reinvest, to reinvest in technology, to reinvest in people and processes within their firm to be positioned for growth. We've been successful. We have a 97% retention rate on converted clients, and we help firms escalate the margins that they would have received in several years into about one hundred and eighty day period. We have U. S.-based dedicated support, and we have consistent outcomes with almost 8,000 clients, in the last twelve months that we've converted through this process. So don't just take it from me, Take it from some of your peers and colleagues. So there is on the left hand side, we have someone from JBS Corp, HR and operations manager, and I just want to read a little snippet of this testimonial. Their communication with our transitioning clients was excellent, including Spanish speaking representatives for our Latino clients, which added tremendous value. And on the right hand side, you'll see Ed from Pennsylvania stepping away from the payroll, freeing me up to focus on delivering higher value services to my client. And lastly, we'll hear from Ron from Bel Air MD. Paychecks exhibit a level of professionalism, knowledge, and dedication that truly impressed me, and they took the time to understand my business and its unique needs. So in closing, we treat this as a partnership. This is not a transaction. We are here for the long haul. Hopefully, the resources, track record, and accolades that you've seen from paychecks really speak to that. But it is quite easy to find out more about an evaluation of your firm and the payroll book of business that you currently have. So step one would be to schedule a meeting. We'd love to hear about what your exit strategy is, what your growth goals are. Step two would be to learn more about your payroll process, and we can give you an offer within forty eight business hours. And step three is we coordinate with you. Once agreements are signed, we work in tandem with you to have the best onboarding and ongoing experience for your clients. So hopefully, through today's short session, you see all the reasons to reach out and gain more information, arming you with what you need to be successful now and in the future. So, thank you so much for your time. I appreciate it. Thank you, Leslie. And I have just a few questions. I suspect CPAs and accountants have these as well. First of all, if I start with the valuation, what's my commitment? Do I have to move forward? How does that process work? There is no commitment. We truly mean no obligation because it's really decision, the firm's decision, on how they move forward. We have some firms that annually reach out to get an updated evaluation, and I think that's healthy for you to know and understand what you're doing in your firm and how valuable it is. That's great. And how quickly can I get that valuation? It's no cost, right? It's no cost. It's about a forty eight hour turn time once we get the basic information from the firm. And we have seen this process from start to agreements and start converting clients in just under two weeks. If we have a highly motivated seller who's really looking to move that payroll book of business, we can accommodate that level of urgency and match that level of urgency. Unfortunately, we're speaking with a lot of CPAs right now who have lost some key talent. And so if you have a payroll individual that's been processing the payroll for twenty, twenty five years, and that person's retired, or there's been a family emergency and they aren't coming back to work, it's leaving a void. And so we can fill that void very easily, making sure that your customer experience does not suffer for that payroll book of business. That's great to hear, and that makes a lot of sense. Is there a minimum number of clients that I have to have to be eligible, for this acquisition, for this program? Great question. So we, have a minimum level at 10. However, we do have some additional options in way of maybe a revenue share agreement if you have under 10 clients. Excellent. And I know you touched on it briefly, but how many details do you really need? Do you have to get all the nitty gritty details about my clients? I'm not sure I want to share that right out of the gate. No, We are Okay with you just saying clients one through 50. We don't need the clients' names, because at that point, it really is again, there's no obligation. It is a free evaluation. And we don't want to make anyone feel uncomfortable by being inquisitive. Generally, people are surprised by how much we will provide back from an offer perspective, and they're so elated that they move even quicker when we move forward from there. But there's no obligation initially at all, so, we're happy with just getting some basic details to allow you to really see what that book of business is worth. That's great. And I understand a lot of these are clients. These relationships are valuable. Will accountants continue to have oversight to that payroll data after they make the sale to Paychex? Of course. Yes, that's why I wanted to highlight PartnerPro because that is our platform giving access to all mutual clients. So you can pull quarterly reports, payroll reports. You can also see what their labor trends are and turnover is. So there's not just payroll information in Paychex Partner Pro. There's also additional analytics to really help fuel your CAS practice, which is great. It is great. I have just one last question. CPAs probably have choices on who they can sell to. Why should they choose paychecks over other competitors? I love that you asked this question. When we hear from our CPA partners and accounting partners post acquisition, it's truly the people component that has been the biggest factor of this success. The responsiveness, the partnership pre, during, and post acquisition that has become more of our secret sauce and the game changer for us collaborating so well in this space. That's great. Well, thank you so much, Leslie. I really appreciate you taking the time today to share with us this information. And thank you for joining us today to learn the specifics on our payroll acquisition program for accounting professionals. Now, if you're ready to take that next step and request your no cost evaluation, we invite you to follow the prompt on your webinar console. When you click it, you'll reach the form where you can request that no cost evaluation. And we also have a link here, in this slide, and you will get these, copy of this deck in the files and resources window on your console. So you can just go right there and learn more about the partnership process. Finally, if you can spare a few moments as we close, we welcome your feedback on a brief survey that will pop up and your response helps us improve future resources like this to support your business. Thank you once again for joining and we wish you all the best.