HR Advisory and Payroll

Practical HR and payroll support to keep your business compliant and your team motivated.

Your people are usually your biggest cost and your biggest asset. As a business grows, the questions come thick and fast. Are our contracts right? Is payroll set up properly? How do I handle this difficult conversation? What does the law actually require of me? Most small businesses do not need a full-time HR manager, but they do need good answers to those questions, from someone who has seen them many times before.

What is included

• Practical, day-to-day HR support
• Employment contracts
• Payroll structuring and processing
• Day-to-day people management guidance

Led by Roopal Modasia-Patel

This service is led by Roopal Modasia-Patel, one of CrestWell's specialist associates. Roopal is a senior HR advisory consultant with over twenty years of specialist experience helping businesses build, manage and retain high-performing teams. She works with growing businesses, including accountancy firms and SMEs, providing practical HR and people management support without the overhead of a full-time hire.

She helps owners answer the questions that matter most as they grow. Do we have the right people in the right roles? Are our contracts and payroll set up efficiently and compliantly?

Employment contracts

Every employee and worker is entitled to a written statement of their main terms from their first day of work. A good contract does more than tick that box: it sets clear expectations on both sides, protects your business and saves a great deal of trouble if things go wrong later.

We review the contracts you already have, bring them up to date, and draw up new ones for new roles, including the policies that sit alongside them, such as holiday, sickness absence and disciplinary procedures, written so that your team can actually understand them.

Payroll structuring and processing

Payroll has to be right, every time, and on time. We set it up properly, or take it over from your current provider, and then run it for you:

• processing each pay run, weekly or monthly
• reporting to HMRC in real time, on or before each payday, as the law requires
• payslips for your team, and the year-end payroll paperwork
• statutory payments such as sick pay, maternity and paternity pay
• workplace pension auto-enrolment duties

We also look at how payroll is structured, so that it is efficient, compliant and ready to grow with you. For owner-directors, the way you pay yourself links closely to your company's tax position, and because CrestWell handles business tax as well, the two are planned together.

Day-to-day people management guidance

Most people problems start small. A lateness issue, a sickness absence that keeps coming back, a disagreement between colleagues, a request for flexible working, an underperformer nobody has spoken to. Handled early and fairly, most of them stay small.

You can pick up the phone and talk it through with someone experienced, get practical advice on what to do and say, and have the right letter or procedure ready when you need it. Employment law is changing, with significant reforms being phased in, and we keep you up to date with what they mean for your business.

Who this is for

This service suits businesses with a handful of employees up to a few dozen, that have outgrown doing HR and payroll informally but do not want the cost of a full-time HR hire. It is especially useful if you are taking on your first employees, growing quickly, or dealing with a difficult people issue right now.

Getting started

1. A free consultation, to understand your team, how payroll runs today and what is worrying you.
2. A review of your contracts, policies and payroll set-up, with an honest view of what needs attention first.
3. An agreed scope and fee, confirmed in writing before we start.
4. Ongoing support, with payroll run on time and advice at the end of the phone.

We are based in Crawley and work with businesses across Crawley, East Grinstead, Horsham, Haywards Heath and Horley, and with clients across the UK and abroad, travelling for the meetings that matter.