SeroPayroll vs Wagepoint

Two kinds of small-business payroll

Wagepoint, as of 2026 per its public site, is a Canadian cloud payroll service for small businesses that takes care of direct deposit and remittances, so money moves to employees and to CRA without you uploading files. That convenience is the core of its offer, and it’s well suited to owners who want payroll handled with as few steps as possible.

SeroPayroll is software you run yourself. It calculates every deduction to the cent, produces the bank, CRA and Service Canada files, and leaves the upload and payment steps with you. Owners and bookkeepers who already manage business banking online usually find those steps take a few minutes each pay day.

Calculations and statutes

SeroPayroll covers CPP and CPP2, EI, QPP and QPIP, T4127 tax and taxable benefits, reconciled to the CRA calculator across 14 jurisdictions. Vacation pay is tracked in dollars owed rather than hours alone, and thirteen statutory holiday calendars each use their own province’s formula for holiday pay. Rates are stored as data so updates arrive without code changes.

Overtime and banked time follow each statute, so Ontario, Alberta and British Columbia employees are each paid under their own rules. Employer levies such as WCB, WSIB, CNESST, Ontario EHT and Québec HSF are calculated with the run. Benefits, deductions and garnishments follow a priority order, with a shortfall register.

• Thirteen stat holiday calendars
• Overtime and banked time by statute
• Benefits, deductions and garnishments
• Employer levies by province

Pay runs that hold up

Every pay run goes through calculate, approve, post and settle. Runs are reversed rather than edited, so history stays intact and auditable, and a run reaches the general ledger once, never twice. Bonus and off-cycle runs are supported, and you can hold one employee’s pay without holding up everyone else.

Remittances follow the CRA calendar for quarterly, regular and accelerated threshold 1 and 2 filers, and Revenu Québec’s TPZ-1015 for Québec employers. PIER review flags CPP and EI shortfalls before CRA’s Pensionable and Insurable Earnings Review does, which can save an unpleasant letter months after year-end. Readiness checks run before year-end too.

When Wagepoint may be the better fit

If you want payroll where the provider moves the money and handles remittances, so you never upload a bank file or make a CRA payment yourself, Wagepoint’s model is built for that. It’s focused on small Canadian businesses and is known for approachable support aimed at owners rather than payroll specialists.

Owners who want the fewest possible steps each pay day, or who don’t have online banking set up for file uploads, may prefer that convenience even at a different price. Choosing between the two is mostly about which service model you want, not which calculates better. Both approaches have merit.

SeroPayroll and SeroBooks together

The same login works across SeroPayroll and SeroBooks. SeroBooks Pro includes payroll on the same ledger, with US payroll too, while SeroPayroll exports GL journals in CSV and IIF-style formats for other ledgers such as QuickBooks Desktop. Either way, a pay run reaches the books once, with no double posting.

Plans are published in USD: Starter $25/mo up to 10 employees, Team $50/mo, Business $100/mo and Scale $249/mo, with annual billing at 10 months’ cost. Employees who are only paid need no login. Company files are encrypted locally with a recovery key. A cloud sync add-on is available for teams on more than one machine.