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Short definitions of the terms you’ll see across Bolto. Each links to the guide that covers it.

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Payroll

Pay schedule. How often employees are paid (weekly, biweekly, semimonthly, monthly) and on which dates. It defines pay periods, paydays, and approval deadlines. Pay schedules & payroll groups Pay period. The days a paycheck covers, for example the 1st to the 15th. Payday. The date money arrives in employees’ accounts. Approval deadline. The last moment you can approve a payroll for it to pay on the scheduled payday. It’s the payday minus your processing period, in business days, shown in US Eastern Time. Running Payroll Processing period. The number of business days between approval and payday. From four days down to one, depending on your history with Bolto. It gets longer after a failed payment. Payroll group. A set of employees paid on the same schedule from the same bank account. Bolto drafts one payroll per group per period. Payroll groups Draft. A payroll Bolto has prepared that you haven’t approved. Expired means the deadline passed. Payroll statuses Auto-Pay. A group setting that submits unchanged payrolls automatically. Only for salaried, exempt employees. The first run after turning it on is manual. Auto-Pay Off-cycle payroll. A payroll outside the regular schedule for bonuses, corrections, or missed pay. Off-cycle payroll Needs attention / blocking. An employee is missing something (forms, pay rate, bank account, tax details) and the payroll can’t be approved until it’s fixed. An employee is blocking payroll Exempt / non-exempt. Whether an employee is exempt from overtime under federal law. Salaried professionals are usually exempt. Hourly workers and interns are usually non-exempt. Non-exempt employees log timesheets and can’t be in Auto-Pay groups. Supplemental earnings. Bonuses, commissions, and severance, which can be withheld at a flat federal rate instead of the W-4 rate.

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Contractors

Invoice schedule. The recurring pay periods for fixed-rate and hourly contractors. Each period Bolto generates an invoice for you to fund, then pays the contractors. Separate from employee pay schedules. Invoice schedules On-demand payment. A one-off contractor payment you create and fund yourself, outside any schedule. On-demand payments Funding invoice. For international contractors, the invoice Bolto sends you to fund a payment run. Contractors are paid once it’s paid. Due. A contractor payment waiting on you. Approve the US run or pay the funding invoice. Contractor of Record (CoR). Bolto engages the contractor on your behalf and takes on the classification risk. Contractor of Record

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Taxes and compliance

FEIN / EIN. Your federal employer ID number from the IRS. State employer IDs. Withholding and unemployment account numbers each state issues after you register. State registrations SUI. State unemployment insurance, an employer tax with a rate the state assigns you. Form 8655. Federal authorization letting Bolto file and pay federal payroll taxes for you. A POA (power of attorney) is the state version. Filing authorizations Form I-9. Employment eligibility verification every US employee completes. I-9 verification W-4. The federal withholding form employees complete during onboarding. States have their own versions. W-2 / 1099-NEC. Year-end forms for employees and US contractors. Bolto files both. W-9. The form a US contractor gives you with their taxpayer ID. Bolto collects the same information during contractor onboarding.

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Products

Payroll. You employ US workers through your own entity. Bolto runs payroll and taxes. Contractors. You pay independent contractors, in the US or abroad, through Bolto. EOR (Employer of Record). Bolto legally employs workers for you in countries where you don’t have an entity. EOR