Service-based small businesses with hourly workers sometimes have to subscribe to multiple applications to meet their financial needs. Homebase covers the all-important payroll component decently well, along with scheduling and time tracking. We like how simple the app makes it to fill out the details for a payroll run, and its scheduling and time import tools prove particularly thorough. However, Homebase costs more than many alternatives that provide more features and flexibility. Our Editors' Choice winners for the category are ADP Run, which is highly scalable, Gusto, which has the best user experience, and OnPay, which offers an especially strong value.

Pricing and Subscription Plans: A Two-Part Model

Homebase costs more than other payroll services I tested because it has a different pricing model. You first need to subscribe to the core Homebase application, which includes features like hiring, shift scheduling, time off management, and time tracking. I tested Homebase Plus, which has a base charge of $48 per month (billed annually) for one location and unlimited employees. A free Basic plan with a limit of 20 employees and a more affordable Essentials tier ($20 per month) with fewer features are also available, as is a more expensive All-in-One option ($80 per month) that includes more HR tools.

With all of these plans, you then need to pay for the Payroll add-on. That adds $39 per month, plus $6 per worker per month. If you choose the plan I did, the starting cost for just one employee is $93 per month. It's among the most expensive services I reviewed.

Homebase offers a few add-ons that support payroll features. For example, tip management (which pulls from numerous integrated applications like Shopify, Square, and Toast) is $25 per month per location. Background checks (the only available HR add-on for the Plus tier I tested) are $30 each, and task management is $13 per month per location.

More affordable payroll applications are available. OnPay is the best value. For $49 per month, plus $6 per worker per month, you get robust payroll and HR management features. If you’re willing to file payroll taxes by yourself, you can subscribe to Patriot Software for $17 per month, plus $4 per worker per month. That software's Full-Service tier, which handles tax filing, goes for $37 per month, plus $5 per person per month.

Interface and Ease of Use: An Intuitive Design

Homebase understands that you might have never run a payroll. The site breaks down all of the information it requires and provides good step-by-step walk-throughs for adding your workers, setting up your account, and working with time cards and time sheets.

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Two steps that you should address early are setting up your company’s benefits and time off policies. Homebase handles this well, providing the formulas you need to use to take care of both. The service partners with Stride to provide medical benefits and will soon announce a partner for retirement plans. Of course, you can also stick with your existing providers. Homebase doesn’t serve as a broker, like Gusto and others.

Pages throughout the site are clean and understandable. They’re not as state-of-the-art as Gusto’s, but they’re clear and simple enough that you should be able to manage them regardless of your experience. That said, the site unnecessarily opened up new windows at times.

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You can integrate Homebase with Intuit QuickBooks Online, but the site can’t connect with any other accounting or time tracking applications.

Homebase doesn’t have an AI-generated chatbot like some competitors do, but it offers numerous support options. A searchable database of help articles and a number of help videos are available. If you can't find an answer to your question in those resources, you can reach out to the company via email, live chat, or phone.

Employee Profiles: Mostly Sufficient

Employee records in Homebase are not as detailed as those in most competing payroll applications, such as ADP Run. But they are still thorough enough to support the site’s payroll and HR functions. You can either complete all the fields yourself or invite employees to log in and provide bank account (it's possible to split direct deposits), personal, and W-4 information directly from within Homebase. One page exclusively stores documents (like W-4s and W-9s); you can upload these in a variety of common formats, including DOC, PDF, PNG, and JPEG.

Access permissions are not as deep as they are in QuickBooks Payroll. You can designate workers only as employees, managers, or general managers (this is different from roles such as cook and server). Time-off balances and assignments to benefits like health and retirement plans appear on profile pages. 

The Performance section of employee records is unusual but very helpful for hourly workers. The entries here tally metrics like missed breaks, no shows, on-time rates, and shifts worked.

Running Payroll: Plenty of Options for Hourly Workers

Homebase gives you multiple ways to import worker hours for payroll runs. Employees can clock in and out on their mobile phones (geofencing is available). You can also install an app on a tablet or on a desktop web browser. The last option is to just enter hours manually. Other elements or payroll setup include defining break and overtime requirements. You can also opt in to numerous alerts and notifications. You might want to know when an employee hasn’t logged in for a certain number of minutes, for example. Homebase is the best app I've tested for customizing shift work rules.

Every payroll application must find a way to display as many columns as it needs in the payroll worksheet. Homebase allows you to include more columns of earnings types than are possible to display at once, so some horizontal scrolling is necessary. The page looks professional and isn't overcrowded. You can click an employee’s name to see their time card, but you can’t get to the employee record from this page like you can on other sites.

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The next page, Net Pay, is just that, a table with gross and net pay for all workers. It includes company and employee benefits and taxes, so you can see how it calculates the net. The page after that, Review and Submit, is disappointing because it offers much less information than competitors. I could see only the amount Homebase would automatically withdraw, the total payroll cost, and the pay date. You can download the payroll preview report as an Excel spreadsheet that’s rather cramped and challenging to read. It requires reformatting to be useful.

Once you submit your payroll, Homebase gives you an hour to go back and make changes before it starts to withdraw funds. The site has a great post-payroll page that describes the run in great detail on multiple pages, which you navigate through via a toolbar. You can see an overview that lists what the company will pay and how it will pay it. Other pages here cover deductions, earnings, and taxes. You can download the Payroll Journal and all pay statements, too.

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Reports: Just Some for Payroll

Homebase’s collection of preformatted reports focuses on employee scheduling. But a handful of reports concern payroll, some of which appear during the payroll process itself. Examples include Employee and Contractor Overview, Payroll Journal and Summary, and W-2 preview. These aren’t as customizable as those in QuickBooks Payroll. You do get a custom report option, however. It's not nearly as powerful as ADP Run’s equivalent, but you can select a date range, department or role, and payroll classification, as well as specify what columns should appear and in what order.

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HR Tools: Available at the Highest tier

If you need HR tools beyond those included in payroll, like benefits administration and team management, you need to pay for the aforementioned All-In-One tier. This tier includes access to expert advisors, along with compliance and labor cost management features. OnPay provides more HR tools and data as part of its subscription price.

Is Homebase Safe To Use?

Homebase prevents intrusions by partnering with trusted security firms to run ongoing bug bounty programs. The company regularly evaluates access control and permissions. Its security team performs dynamic web application security scans against all assets quarterly. The site supports multi-factor authentication.

Mobile Experience: Dedicated Apps

Homebase offers mobile apps for Android and iOS, but I wasn't able to test them with my account. I will update this section if I am able to get access.