---
title: Top 10 Payroll Mistakes Organizations Make
description: Mistakes happen. OnePoint HCM shares with you the top 10 payroll mistakes we see organizations make to help prevent them from happening to your organization.
---

[OnePoint Human Capital Management Blog ](https://blog.onehcm.com)

# [Top 10 Payroll Mistakes Organizations Make](https://blog.onehcm.com/top-10-payroll-mistakes)

 Written by [bop-admin](https://blog.onehcm.com/author/bop-admin) | Feb 20, 2017 6:04:28 AM

<https://go.onehcm.com/Paystub-Audit-Checklist-LP>Organizations spend hours each payroll period collecting time sheets, auditing time worked approving employee time, and applying pay rules accurately.

However mistakes do happen. Honest time reporting errors, incorrect pay rates, overtime errors, missing forms, are just some examples of payroll mistakes that costs businesses money and increases compliance risk.

Don’t wait for one of these to creep up, be proactive and keep compliant.

### Here are our top 10 payroll mistakes:

*(How many of these can you say with 100% uncertainty you haven’t made or will never make?)*

1. Making improper overtime payments

2. Misclassifying employees as independent contractors  
*Learn the IRS and DOL tests in our January Blog Article, “[Classifying workers as employees vs independent contractor](https://onehcm.com/classifying-workers-as-employees-or-independent-contractor)”*

3. Making mistakes on an Independent Contractor W-9

4. Missing tax deposit or filing deadlines

5. Incorrectly determining exempt vs. non-exempt  
*Download our [FLSA Exempt Employee Flow Chart](https://go.onehcm.com/Exempt-Employee-Guide-and-Flowchart-Download) as a guide to proper employee classification.*

6. Mistakes on 1099-MISC forms for independent contractors

7. Messing up or mishandling garnishments, child support payments or levies

8. Ignoring other taxable items, such as gifts, prizes, bonuses and awards

9. Incorrect or out-of-date I-9 forms  
*The USCIS released the New Smart I-9 form on November 22, 2016. Read about the new form in our blog post, “[USCIS Releases New I-9 Form](https://onehcm.com/uscis-releases-new-i-9-form),” November 2016*

10. Payroll deduction errors  
*Get more specifics on common payroll deduction errors from our Blog post, “[Payroll Deductions Laws and Employer Best Practices](https://onehcm.com/payroll-deduction-laws-and-employer-best-practices),” April 2016*

[View full post](https://blog.onehcm.com/top-10-payroll-mistakes)

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