When you’re hiring a maid, you’ll first have to ask yourself what sort of housekeeping service you’re looking for. Commercial housekeeping services that use their own cleaning supplies and methods are classified as independent businesses that charge flat-fee rates for their service. Nevertheless, many households are looking for the extra attention and control that comes with hiring a maid as a private housekeeper.
Expect the maid to use a special kind of floor cleaner for your aging hardwood floors? Looking for someone who will make themselves available at various times that coincide with your dining schedule? Expect the maid to know the exact positions and angles of all your knick-knacks after moving them for dusting? Well, then, you’re looking for a household employee, and the housekeeping wages will be paid as a traditional employer-employee relationship.
Take Care of Payroll and Filing Forms when You First Hire a Maid
Hiring a maid isn’t necessarily going to mean things like health benefits and retirement plans as part of the housekeeping wages, but you will have to calculate and withhold payroll and income taxes. Don’t let this prospect intimidate you. It may be a hassle, but it doesn’t need to be a logistical nightmare. It shouldn’t keeping your from hiring the maid that’s best for your household. Nor should you lose sleep wondering whether you accurately prepared and filed all the relevant forms.
Get the user-friendly platform and modular products from Advanced Micro Solutions (AMS). Our software ensures you can prepare, print, and file household employment forms. Quickly and reliably. Better yet, you can choose the level of support that matches your payroll and accounting plan.
By setting up your housekeeping wages as a regularly scheduled paycheck, many people can do their own manual paycheck calculations. More than likely, you’ll still want support with your Sch H Form 1040 and state unemployment forms. You can get this kind of simple support with our Forms Filer Plus module. You can also buy our E-File and Software Generated Forms products to take care of all your form filing requirements out of your home office.
AMS Payroll Support for Housekeeping Wages
That said, the most popular solution for processing paychecks is AMS Payroll. This advanced payroll system is just what you need to calculate weekly, bi-monthly, or monthly paychecks, transfer information to quarterly and end-of-year filing forms, and report the data as needed. It doesn’t matter where you live, or what sort of compensation you’re offering prospective housekeepers. AMS Payroll can handle it and pretty much everything that comes with household employee payroll accounting:
- Processes “Live” or After-The-Fact Payroll.
- Automatically calculate federal, state and local payroll taxes.
- State and Federal Tax deposit information, as well as disbursements, can be recorded.
- Imports data from QuickBooks, Excel, PeachTree, and Tab-Delimited Text Files.
- Exports data to a Tab-Delimited Text File and/or QuickBooks General Journal.
- Electronically file employer forms. Create an SSN Verification file.
- Direct deposit payroll processing or print paychecks.
- Automatic saving feature ensures data is never lost. Generate a wide variety of payroll reports, such as a tax summary of worker’s compensation.
- Supports Federal payroll forms such as the 941, 940, 943, 944 and 1040 Sch H. See complete forms list.
- Includes SUI forms for all 50 states, the District of Columbia See complete forms list.
Hiring a maid can be stressful enough on its own. Don’t let federal and state employment laws add to this stress. Get accounting software from AMS. You can download our free demo and buy our products at any time. Still have questions? Call AMS Sales and Information at (800) 536-1099.