IRIS pledges to fix SMEs’ cash flow woes with instant payroll payments, powered by Modulr

IRIS Software Group (IRIS), one of the UK’s leading payroll software providers, has teamed up with Payments-as-a-Service platform Modulr to help solve SMEs’ cash flow problems by embedding fast, automatic and secure payments directly into its payroll solutions.

Managing cash flow has always been a struggle for SMEs, but the last 18 months have proved just how critical it is to have a strong grasp over monies going in and out of a business. According to research, more than a third of small business owners have cashflow issues, with 17% forced to pay employees late and 33% of owners paying themselves late or not at all. Clearly, this can’t be allowed to continue if the economy is to recover quickly.

Harnessing Modulr’s leading payments infrastructure, IRIS now enables SME owners and their accountants to pay salaries immediately when they run payroll each month. This crucially removes the requirement to have much-needed cash tied up for three days before every payday, as is currently the case when using BACs payments to pay salaries. With Modulr’s direct access to Faster Payments rails, salaries can be paid in seconds, which gives SMEs three extra days to manage their cash flow, and ensures funds are available for use across the business when required. Further enhanced by automatic file uploads which saves further time with regards to reconciliation.

Relieving this cash flow pressure means SME owners and accountants can focus on growing businesses; with precious time saved, manual processes removed and costly human errors reduced. Seamlessly embedding payments within the payroll process also ensures employees are paid the right amount on time, every time, instantly.

The partnership with Modulr is part of IRIS’ long-term ‘build, buy, partner’ strategy and aligns with their mission to take the pain out of processes and enable companies to focus on growing their business. The first IRIS payroll system to make use of the Modulr integration is IRIS Earnie, with further integrations to more IRIS offerings will follow in the coming months.

The IRIS-Modulr API integration between Modulr’s payments and accounts infrastructure synchronises payroll calculations to payment entries from IRIS’ payroll software, enabling finance teams to view pending and paid payments, and approve outstanding payments from one single, secure online portal.

Andrew Burton, Head of Partner Channel, IRIS Software comments, “SME owners and accountants need to be able to plan their next critical steps to move forward with confidence. This requires a strong grasp of their cash flow, yet too often much-needed cash is tied up in payroll. Partnering with Modulr, we can empower SMEs to take charge of their financials, ensure employees are paid on time, every time, and focus on growing their business.”

Myles Stephenson, CEO of Modulr comments, “SMEs are the backbone of the UK economy, but they’ve been seriously hamstrung by poor cash flow issues, especially in the last 18 months. And relying on inefficient, legacy payment processes is only compounding problems caused by external factors. We’re proud to be working with IRIS to support SME owners and their accountants as they grow and build by removing hidden payroll payment inefficiencies.”