It’s vital to choose the best professional employer organization (PEO) to help your company grow.
The right PEO will handle human resources and other management tasks, which will free up valuable mental energy and give you enough time to focus on other tasks you need to complete to make sure your business succeeds.
The wrong PEO will drain time and money from your already limited reserves, so that you never have quite enough resources or mental energy to keep your company moving forward.
I found the best New York PEO service after analyzing more than 900 PEOs, researching the top 15, then rating the top 9.
But there’s something you should know before I give my recommendation.
The Best PEO Isn't Always the Right PEO
I’ve spent more hours than I want to confess reviewing the 900+ New York PEOs, and have chosen the PEO company with the greatest average score across a range of metrics. However, just because it received the highest average score doesn’t guarantee it’s the best PEO for your business.
- Some New York PEOs have extensive industry knowledge and may offer special benefits and perks.
- Some New York PEOs have created strong ties with insurance providers and can offer a more comprehensive selection of health insurance plans, better benefits, and better rates.
- Some New York PEOs have tremendous compliance experience and can guarantee that you adhere to all state and federal regulations.
The only way to choose the best PEO for your business is to weigh the unique requirements of your business and employees against the benefits of each PEO. That way, you’ll choose the best-scoring PEO based on parameters that matter to you, not just the best-scoring PEO overall.
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If you just want to know which PEO received the highest score, here are my top picks for the best PEO in New York.
1. PEO Companies — 9.45/10 (Best Overall PEO)
PEO Companies is my choice for the best PEO overall because, although they don’t stand out for anything unique, they handle everything you need effortlessly. Their key distinction is that you’ll never have any major problems with them.
Pros
They provide all the PEO services that a good New York PEO company should:
- Human resources paperwork
- Employee benefits administration
- Tax administration
- Compliance assistance
- Strategic services
- Payroll services
- Benefits packages and 401k
- Employee contracts
- Dental insurance
- Risk management
- HR technology
- Health insurance
- Assistance with unemployment claims
- Workers’ compensation insurance
- Administrative services
- Employee benefits administration
- HR outsourcing and solutions
They back all their PEO services up with a reliable customer support team as well. If you email them, you can expect a response within 24 hours for general questions. But if you have a more pressing issue you can call them and get a more prompt response.
One of the best aspects of their services is that even though they have the technological might to support even the largest of corporations, they focus on small- and medium-sized businesses.
This means they can support your company at any stage of growth.
Cons
There’s only one real downside to PEO Companies New York PEO services. They don’t provide any truly exceptional services.
- While they offer all the PEO services and HR solutions that small- and medium-sized businesses need, you won’t find any luxurious or high-end services among their offerings.
- Their customer support team is competent enough to answer your questions, and they’ll respond to you reasonably quickly, but they don’t add any personal touches to their support (such as sending out a birthday card).
- Their prices are competitive, but they aren’t as low as some of the other PEOs on my list. They don’t go out of their way to provide you with excellent rates, and they’re definitely making sure they’ll make a nice profit from their fees.
So, while the company scores well across the board, you won’t find any unique services that will really blow you away.
Overall
PEO Companies is my first pick since they provide services to meet all your business needs, and they do them efficiently.
Costs vary depending on the size and needs of your business and employees, so reach out to them with the specific details of your business and see what they can do for you.
2. Flexible PEO — 7.90/10 (Best Customer Service PEO)
Flexible PEO is my second choice, but that doesn’t rule them out as a viable alternative to PEO Companies. They only narrowly missed first place, and they did outperform PEO Companies in one area.
Pros
Flexible, like PEO Companies, offers a comprehensive range of New York PEO products and services.
They provide health insurance, HR outsourcing and solutions, payroll services, benefits administration, workers’ compensation insurance, HR technology, tax administration, assistance with unemployment claims, and compliance support. They have a user-friendly interface for getting set up in their system, and they provide cheap rates.
But the one area where they really stand out is their customer service.
The average response time to customer service emails was 46 minutes, and the average wait time to talk with a customer service representative by phone was less than 2 minutes in the three customer service tests I conducted.
Their assistance was not only timely, but also really, really efficient. They were able to address my problems without transferring me to another agent (requiring me to repeat my problem to several people) or involving management.
The only way they could really improve their customer service, in my opinion, would be to send out birthday cards or add some other personal touch.
Cons
Flexible lost out on my #1 spot because, although their system is simple to use and their pricing is reasonable, it fell short of PEO Companies' offering.
There were a few times when their system was a little confusing, and I had to phone their excellent customer service to figure out how to navigate it. Although Flexible offers some fairly competitive rates, all three quotes I got from them were around 10% higher than the quotes PEO Companies gave me.
Most people wouldn’t consider these to be deal breakers (especially if great customer support is a priority for you), but these drawbacks were just enough to scoot Flexible down to the second spot on my list.
Overall
Flexible PEO is a great New York PEO company that checks a lot of boxes. They provide a full range of service options, as well as competitive pricing, and they back it all with truly stellar customer service. It’s not always easy to navigate their system, and they’re a bit more expensive than PEO Companies, but they’re still a good professional employer organization option, and they’re an excellent option if you’re looking for a PEO that delivers outstanding customer support.
Of course, all professional employer organizations in New York base their pricing on the size of your business, how many employees you have, and which services and benefits you want to provide for your employees.
3. CoAdvantage PEO — 7.41/10 (Best Value PEO)
The third-best New York PEO on my list is CoAdvantage PEO. They provide all the PEO service offerings to meet the needs of most small or medium businesses, but they disappointed me in a couple of areas.
Pros
As with the other professional employer organizations on my list, CoAdvantage PEO offers a full range of services. They provide HR outsourcing and solutions, health insurance, payroll services, benefits administration, workers’ compensation insurance, HR technology, benefits packages, tax administration, and assistance with unemployment claims and compliance, as well as other strategic services.
It’s pretty easy to get set up with their system, and their support team was able to competently answer my questions in a reasonable amount of time.
Their standout feature is their pricing. I got three different quotes for three different fictional businesses, and the quotes they gave me were the top three quotes I received from all the professional employer organizations on my list. (As a matter of fact, the quote they gave me for my small business was the best professional employer organization price quote I got.) I included all the additional services, benefits packages, and HR solutions, so this really made their low prices stand out and illustrated the great value they provide.
Cons
As I’ve stated, CoAdvantage PEO is a great choice for any business owner in New York looking for a solid professional employer organization to meet their human resources needs. However, their services do have a few limitations.
It was easy to get set up with their system. However, I found it difficult to navigate once I was in it, and I was having trouble performing even routine tasks in their PEO system. So, this definitely isn’t a system for those who lack technological experience.
I contacted their customer support team to help me navigate these issues, and even though they answered my call reasonably fast, their customer support team isn’t anywhere close to matching the superior support offered by CoAdvantage.
Overall
CoAdvantage PEO is a solid New York PEO option that provides decent customer support and great pricing. Their system can be confusing sometimes—those who are technologically inexperienced will definitely struggle with it—and their support team doesn’t offer the same level of patience and efficiency as CoAdvantage’s support team. However, CoAdvantage PEO is the best-priced professional employer organization in New York.
All professional employer organizations require certain information before they can provide you with a quote, such as the size of your business, how many employees you have, and the benefits you’d like to offer your employees.
4. Justworks
Justworks is new to the New York PEO scene. They were established in 2012, and since then they’ve grown to provide PEO services to small businesses all over the country.
They’re another full-range service PEO option, like the other New York PEOs on my list. They offer HR outsourcing and solutions, health insurance, payroll services, benefits administration, workers’ compensation, benefits packages, assistance with compliance, and other business solutions.
Justworks offers one thing that the other New York professional employer organizations don’t: transparency.
Their pricing structure is publicly listed on their website for anyone to access. This is quite refreshing because the New York PEO industry relies on obscure pricing and forcing potential clients to sit through a sales call to get a quote.
I ranked Justworks at #4, even though they do provide pricing transparency, because of their relatively young age. This is important in the New York PEO industry.
It’s quite a time-consuming process to join a New York PEO and get established within their system. Most business owners can’t afford to repeat the process if they choose a start-up PEO in New York that has to suddenly cease operation.
I suggest you wait a few years for Justworks to better establish itself and develop a proven track record before you trust them with your business.
5. Infiniti HR
Infiniti HR is a New York PEO that has found a way to stand out among the rest of the New York state professional employer organizations.
They offer HR outsourcing, payroll services, workers’ compensation, benefits and insurance, assistance with compliance, and other business solutions to their clients.
But their unique feature is employee recruitment. If you’ve ever worked with good employees, then you know what a boon they can be for small businesses. So the fact that Infiniti offers a service to help you find the right employees is massively beneficial.
Infiniti’s one drawback is the same as Justwork’s: their inexperience. Infiniti HR has only been in the New York PEO industry for a decade, which means that it doesn’t have the proven track record that other New York PEO providers bring to the table. I’d advise you give Infiniti HR a few years to get established before signing your company up for their services.
6. TriNet
TriNet is the best-established and oldest professional employer organization in the industry—not just in New York. This PEO company blows other New York PEO companies on my list away in terms of their long-established track record. They got their start in 1988, and since then they’ve grown to more than 16,000 companies and have more than 330,000 employees under their umbrella company.
They provide all the services you need for your New York State company, such as HR outsourcing, workers’ compensation, payroll processing, employee benefits, and assistance with compliance. However, it seems like they use their big name and reputation to lure new clients, rather than actually offering quality PEO services.
Their customer service doesn’t offer any personalized service, they don’t work to provide new solutions to existing problems both with their services and in the PEO industry at large, and they won’t try to impress you or work to gain you as a customer.
As a result, even though TriNet is a reliable New York professional employer organization, you’ll never notice them go out of their way to exceed your expectations, let alone PEO industry standards.
7. Oasis Outsourcing
Oasis is another one of the New York PEO companies on my list that have been around for a long time. They’ve been helping small businesses with their HR solutions and PEO services for over 20 years. They’ve been bought by PayChex recently, but they still operate under their original Oasis name.
They offer HR outsourcing, workers’ compensation, payroll processing, compliance assistance, employee benefits, and more for their clients. They’re also one of the PEO companies I mentioned that offers industry-specific services, and work to provide unique services to businesses in the hospitality, education, retail, and banking, as well as other industries.
The reason they wound up so far down my list of best PEOs in New York is because they require their clients to sign 12-month contracts. The entire New York PEO industry seems to revolve around month-to-month contracts, so it’s pretty weird and unnecessary for Oasis to make this stipulation, and they lost a lot of points solely on that account.
8. ADP Totalsource
ADP Totalsource is another big name in the world of professional employer organization companies. They offer service to businesses in more than 140 different countries.
They offer all the services that your business needs, like HR outsourcing, payroll processing, employee benefits, compliance assistance and workers’ compensation. They also offer a number of industry-specific HR solutions.
One of the best aspects of ADP’s services is that their customer support isn’t limited to you, the business owner. If your employees have HR questions or queries about their benefits, they can access the PEO’s customer support line as well. By allowing your employees to access the PEO customer support line, it can cut out the middleman—you—and save time, while also preventing a lot of headaches.
ADP’s drawback is the same as TriNet’s. Because they’re such a large company with loads of clients, your business will never get the attention it needs to really thrive and grow.
9. Insperity
Insperity is a New York PEO company that had a lot of potential when I first started looking into their company, but they were ultimately disappointing.
As a New York professional employer organization customer, you can expect insurance and benefits, payroll services, workers’ compensation, compliance assistance, and HR services.
The promise I saw in Insperity began when I found out they’ve been in business for more than 30 years and have a proven track record. They’ve won numerous awards both for their professional employer organization services and their customer support. I then read that they allow their clients to cancel their services at any time (as long as they provide 20 days notice), so I was convinced that I’d found a New York PEO company that offered superior services.
But then I found one service that convinced me I was wrong: their health care.
Health care is a major issue for any business owner. To get it right you need to have a lot of flexibility so that you can meet the individual needs of your employees. Of course, your employees are all unique individuals, and they each have unique health care needs, so you need a lot of benefits options to ensure that the needs of your employees are adequately met.
This is why it disappointed me so much that Insperity only offers benefits plans from one provider. I’ve got no idea why they don’t offer benefits plans from other providers, and they never adequately answered this, so I can’t tell you. That’s just what they do.
Obviously, if you choose Insperity, your employees may not get the insurance coverage that they need because Insperity doesn’t offer you many options or providers.
The Best PEO for Your Business
There are more than 900 different New York PEO companies, so it can be quite tricky (and a little intimidating) to find a good PEO company for your business.
I’ve spent more than 230 hours over the past six years investigating the PEO industry, and I’ve identified the best PEO companies: PEO Companies, Flexible, and CoAdvantage.
Even though these PEO providers will prove to be reliable PEO solutions for any business, finding the right PEO for your New York business requires a customized recommendation that’s based on many factors:
- The number of employees on your payroll
- What you want the PEO to help with (payroll, HR compliance, workers’ compensation insurance, etc.)
- Employee benefits you want to offer to your team (such as health insurance and workers’ compensation insurance)
- How much you can afford to spend on employee benefits
- The location of your small business
- The location where you conduct your business (if outside the office)
- How much customer support you will need
- Your technological capabilities
- How large you plan to scale
- Your industry
If you would like to find the right PEO for your company, simply enter your details below and I will provide a free assessment of your company needs.
The Best PEO Selection Process
I used an extensive selection process to choose the best PEO. But before I tell you about my process, there are a few things you should know about me.
Why You Should Trust Me
I know PEO providers better than nearly anyone else in the world because of my years of experience dealing with different companies for my small businesses and also through helping others find the right PEO to suit their business needs. So, you can trust any PEO recommendation I make because of my expertise.
I began my PEO experience when I started my online health company. I was thoroughly overwhelmed by learning all the basics involved in building a small online business, like creating websites, writing articles, and managing my employees. I didn’t have time to deal with all the human resources tasks that took up my day.
At first, I tried hiring a staffing company to help manage my employees. But that wasn’t enough because I still had a lot of human resources problems to deal with. So, I partnered with a good PEO.
After dealing with all of that, I took a break before I started my next business venture—a cafe! To say that running a cafe is a lot different from running an online health company is a vast understatement.
But even though the two businesses were so different, I encountered a common problem: human resources pain. Again, I started researching the New York PEO industry to find a PEO to meet my HR needs. I read websites and online reviews, and listened to sales people make pitches when all I really wanted was a simple answer from them regarding a question I had. It was a LOT of information to process. Eventually, I found the right New York professional employer organization for my business, and they helped it grow and succeed.
It didn’t take long for me to realize I don’t have the personality necessary for the hospitality industry in New York. So, I sold my cafe and spent some more time contemplating my next move. It came to me unexpectedly because many of my old friends from both my health business and my cafe began asking me for information about how to deal with back-end business operations, and things like HR services, payroll, benefits, workers’ compensation, and compliance.
I made more and more PEO recommendations, which caused even more people to come to me asking for recommendations and help with their HR problems. I started writing down my recommendations. From these humble beginnings, I’ve grown my business and helped more than 1,200 people find the right HR support for their businesses, and it’s given me so much experience in the PEO industry that I probably know more about the industry than some of the people that work for the companies on my list.
How I Selected the Best PEO
I used a four-stage process to gradually thin out the list of over 900 different PEO companies down to a few. Here’s how I found the best PEO.
Stage 1: Reviews
The first stage of my process was reading online reviews for each of the New York PEO companies on my list.
Any New York PEO company that has been in business for over a year should have racked up some significant online feedback, and customers should be talking about their HR services. I used this feedback to find out which companies were worth the time and effort to investigate more thoroughly, and which ones I could eliminate from my list.
I accessed reviews on major online review platforms and found which New York PEO providers didn’t even meet the basic New York PEO standards with their product offerings, support, or pricing, and I eliminated them from my list.
Stage 2: Offering Analysis
Unfortunately, the New York PEO industry isn’t uniform. Different New York PEO providers offer different services and they all have different price points.
The second stage of my investigation was reviewing the services offered by each of the New York PEO providers on my list. I was able to quickly toss out any companies that had inferior service offerings or overly expensive prices.
Stage 3: Speaking with Real Customers
You can get a good deal of information about a New York PEO company from reading online reviews, but there are two major limitations to online reviews.
The first of these limitations is that people usually only leave a review if they’ve had either an epically good or a flabbergastingly bad experience with a business. This means that if you rely solely on online reviews to learn about a business, you won’t get the whole picture.
The second limitation is one of space. Most online review platforms only allow customers to leave a review of 200 characters or less. That’s not enough room for customers to leave thorough reviews that tell us if a company is worth partnering with or if you should run from them.
To get around the limitations of online reviews, I spoke directly to customers of the New York PEO companies on my list. I did this by using my website to reach out to customers, as well as speaking to people I already knew who had used the New York PEO providers on my list. I asked them probing questions, and they provided me with thoughtful answers. From this stage, I was able to learn more about what it’s like to partner with the New York PEO providers I had investigated.
Stage 4: Speaking with Their Sales Teams
The last stage of my investigation involved speaking with the sales team of each of the New York PEO providers. This allowed me to understand what it’s like to work with each company in the long run. Do they find ways to grow and evolve, or are they set in their ways? Do they take responsibility for their failings, or do they try to put the blame on their customers? The answers to these questions really separated the best from the rest of the New York PEO providers.
Ranking Factors
I used a total of five factors to rate each New York PEO company and choose the best PEO.
Factor 1: Offerings
The first ranking factor is the service offerings of each of the providers.
It doesn’t make any sense to partner your New York business with a New York PEO company with the intent of getting better benefits if the company doesn’t offer better benefits. To ensure that you get the best New York PEO for your needs, I made a spreadsheet to keep track of all the different services that each New York PEO offers, then compared them to each other.
Factor 2: Price
The second ranking factor for each New York PEO is their price.
When learning about New York PEOs, it became apparent that the price of services can vary widely from company to company, even if they’re the same services. They also hide the cost of their services and require you to participate in a sales call before they’ll divulge their prices, which is tricky. So, to save you some time and confusion, I rated each of the New York PEOs on the value for money that their services provide.
Factor 3: Ease of Sign-up
The third factor that I rated each of the New York providers with is how easy it is to sign up with them and get set up in their system.
Some New York providers require you to spend weeks tracking down information that you’d stored away because it was pretty useless in every other instance, while other companies get most of their information from government websites and require less paperwork from you.
So that you don’t wind up with a PEO in New York that wastes valuable time with the sign-up process, I rated each of the New York PEOs based on the automation and ease of their sign-up process.
Factor 4: Ease of Use
The fourth rating factor I used to assess the New York PEO companies on my list is how easy their system is to use.
Once you’ve reviewed several New York PEOs, it’s clear to see that some companies have spent millions of dollars to provide their customers with a user-friendly and intuitive system, and other New York PEOs simply tack new features on their outdated systems and write gigantic user manuals to explain them because they’re so complicated.
Of course, you’d rather partner your business with a PEO in New York that has an automated, user-friendly system, as opposed to a PEO in New York with an antiquated, confusing system. So, to make sure that you don’t wind up with a New York PEO with a nightmarish system, I rated each New York PEO on how easily you can use and navigate their systems.
Factor 5: Customer Service
No matter how easy it is to use a New York PEO’s system or how much money they’ve spent to update it, you’re going to run into a problem somewhere along the way. This is why customer service is so important.
Some New York PEOs leave you on hold for hours before you’re finally connected with an untrained agent who isn’t even capable of fixing your problem or answering your question but promises to escalate your issue to management, which never happens. Other New York PEOs are quick to answer your call and answer your questions just as fast, leaving you with time to focus on other important business tasks.
The Best PEO for Your Business
PEO Companies is a great choice for most New York businesses, but I can’t recommend the best New York PEO for your business until I know more about your business and needs.
I need to know things like the industry of your business, its size, number of employees, and the benefits you hope to offer (as well as other factors), so that I can recommend the right New York PEO for your needs.
If you’d like a customized PEO recommendation for your New York business, fill out the form below.
Once you’ve completed the form, I’ll send you a personalized business analysis, as well as a New York PEO recommendation, both for free.
In the meantime, you should consider the business structure of your New York business. There are several options available, such as a corporation, sole proprietorship, or an LLC. If you’d like to learn more about starting an LLC, check out my article about how to start a New York LLC.
While you’re learning about New York PEOs, you should also consider a registered agent. A registered agent is a person or business entity that accepts mail or service of process on behalf of your business. To learn more about how your business can benefit from a good registered agent, check out my article about the best New York registered agents.
Frequently Asked Questions
How much does it cost to use a PEO?
The cost of using a New York PEO can vary depending on lots of different factors, like the size of your business, the benefits and services you choose, and the number of employees you have, to name a few. But a good baseline number is $1,000–$2,000 per employee per month for PEO services.
How does a PEO charge?
There are two different fee structures that New York PEOs use: flat fee and percentage of payroll fees.
With a flat fee structure, you’ll be charged a static price per employee. This is a good option for any business that demands monthly billing certainty, or for any business owner who doesn’t want any billing surprises.
With a percentage of payroll structure, the New York PEO charges you an agreed upon percentage of the wages you pay your employees monthly. This is a good fee structure for any company in low-wage industries because the amount you pay your PEO will be less.
How long does it take to get set up with a PEO?
It always takes a lot of time to get set up with a new PEO service provider. This is because they need to complete and file a ton of paperwork with the government, and they need a lot of paperwork from you as well. And all of this needs to be done before they can get your PEO services for your business up and running.
On average, this process can take between three and six weeks. But people usually find that the setup process takes around four weeks.
Does it cost to change PEOs?
None of the PEOs on my list charge any true exit fees for leaving. However, every PEO service charges a setup fee due to the extensive and lengthy setup process. It takes a lot of time to get set up with a new PEO company. So, if you do choose to leave your current PEO and start services with a new PEO, you won’t be charged any sort of exit fee from your current PEO. However, you will be required to pay a setup fee to your new PEO.
