Payroll Specialist

We are looking for a Payroll Specialist to join a collaborative payroll team in Sarasota, Florida. This contract opportunity has the potential to become permanent, is fully onsite, and supports large-scale, multi-state payroll operations for a workforce of more than 1,300 employees. The ideal candidate brings strong payroll processing experience, sharp attention to detail, and the ability to manage recurring deadlines in a fast-moving environment while providing dependable support to employees and internal partners.

Responsibilities:

• Process payroll information for assigned employee groups and maintain accurate payroll records across multiple locations.
• Review payroll transactions to verify correct wages, deductions, garnishments, and tax withholdings before final processing.
• Support weekly payroll cycles by meeting established deadlines in a high-volume environment with consistent accuracy.
• Work with human resources, supervisors, and site leadership to research and resolve payroll questions, discrepancies, and employee concerns.
• Update and reconcile employee deductions such as benefits, garnishments, meal-related charges, merchandise purchases, and other payroll adjustments.
• Monitor outstanding deduction balances, investigate arrears, and complete reconciliations to keep employee records current.
• Generate payroll reports from internal systems and use Excel to sort, analyze, and validate data for review and reconciliation.
• Examine daily payroll activity and compare updates to identify errors, inconsistencies, or eligibility-related issues.
• Respond to employee payroll inquiries, explain applicable payroll policies, and conduct research to support issue resolution.
• Contribute to payroll-related initiatives, process enhancements, and system update efforts as needed.