Nuvo Accountancy’s Payroll Transformation with Staffology Bureau

Nuvo Accountancy pride themselves on truly caring for their clients with the ‘Nuvo Spirit’, encompassing values of close collaboration and sincere communication. With 16 offices, including one in Scotland, Nuvo have 222 staff members which has grown from just 130 in the past year. Part of this growth has led to the payroll department growing as a separate entity. Running an impressive 26.4k payslips per month, Staffology Bureau has helped to transform Nuvo’s payroll department in the last 12 months.

Strategic separation: Launching Nuvo Payroll Limited

To meet the demands of a growing client base and streamline operations, Nuvo made the strategic decision to establish Nuvo Payroll Limited as a separate entity. Initially formed for legal clarity following an acquisition, the bureau quickly evolved into a professional, standalone service. Matt Turner, Senior Partner of Payroll at Nuvo, tells us, “We’ve got 2,400 payroll clients across the business now, and we’re slowly moving all of them onto Nuvo Payroll Limited. This is on top of all future growth and new acquisitions.”

This move reflects a broader industry trend, where many accounting firms are stepping away from payroll. Nuvo, however, is doubling down, positioning itself as a specialist in the field. Matt says, “we’re seeing a lot of accountants starting to leave payroll behind and starting to disinvest from it. This shows that we are going to be here for a long time. We very much believe in what we do and we’re specialists at what we do.”

The separation of payroll has led to an increase in client freedom Matt tells us, “It works in a great way; it means that we can offer our clients the choice to be flexible with the services they outsource.”

Why Staffology Bureau stands out

With their legacy product, IRIS Payroll Professional, nearing its discontinuation, Nuvo explored other payroll software on the market. However, Staffology Bureau stood out for its automation and ease of use. Matt says, “We chose Staffology for a few big reasons. One of those is the automation that it comes with. The full auto run on director only payrolls was huge, it enabled us to save one full-time equivalent staff member per year based on our size.”

Another compelling reason for choosing Staffology is the ease of transition from non-IRIS software. Matt tells us, “We moved our director only clients first and there were around 700 of them. All were from a combination of Brightpay, Xero, Quickbooks and just about every small payroll software you can imagine. The transition was seamless with about 99% of the cases working really well.”

Lastly, Matt mentions that Nuvo landed on Staffology for its position in the market, saying “The specialist features of Staffology are great, the links to dedicated HR products and the fact it’s continually being worked on are all really great and comforting.”

“We want to keep moving forward in the industry and Staffology helps us to achieve that. We love the fact that it’s completely cloud-based. I personally love the fact that I can gain access to it on my phone if I want to and I could do a client’s payroll on my phone if I absolutely needed to, which is great. In today’s world, with the need to be able to work flexibly from anywhere, it’s great to know we’ve got software that supports us with that.”

A faultless migration from IPP

Nuvo experienced a smooth migration onto Staffology as Matt tells us, “With the tool, being able to just click however many clients I wanted to transfer and then taking just a few minutes, it was absolutely amazing.” The main difference between the two pieces of software was surrounding automation and clarity: “Staffology is a big visual upgrade. IPP is very nineties and Staffology feels a lot smarter, cleaner and quicker.”

Matt reinforces the increase in efficiency regarding the move to Staffology. He tells us, “I anticipate that we’ll be seeing about a 20% increase in efficiency just from the integration of the tools. By the time we’re optimised, I’m hoping to double that.”

“Staffology is a fantastic piece of software that is still being actively developed by passionate people. I think it’s only going to get bigger and better in the future.”

Automation to enhance your payroll processes

A standout feature of Staffology that Nuvo particularly value is AutoPilot, which enables the automated process of finalising a payrun, email PDF payslips and file the FPS with HMRC. While automation can be a source of anxiety for some payroll professionals, Nuvo’s experience has been overwhelmingly positive. Matt acknowledges the initial hesitation many in the industry feel, “It can be very nerve-wracking and as a Payroll Professional, you start to think about your future and the longevity of your career. But it’s been fantastic, and we’ve had very few problems with it. These few problems are mostly emails being sent straight to junk and minor issues like that. We’ve had zero problems with HRMC or pension providers.”

This highlights how automation doesn’t replace the payroll function but enhances it. For Nuvo, AutoPilot has become a reliable tool that saves time, reduces manual error and allows the team to focus on higher-value work.  

Building a connected ecosystem through software integration

Staffology’s ability to integrate with a wide range of platforms has been a major asset. Nuvo uses connections with Deputy, Breathe and pension providers, as well as finance systems like Xero, Sage, and QuickBooks. The integration with Staffology HR has also been a game- changer, allowing seamless onboarding of new starters and reducing manual data entry.

Matt tells us, “I love the constant updates from HR, I think it’s fantastic. The HR team can put on a new starter and five minutes later it’s already done for me on payroll. That’s a beautiful thing that doesn’t seem like a lot, but when you are used to putting on so many new starters every month and dealing with the paperwork all day, it really is a great time saver.”

Despite this process taking 5-10 minutes for each new starter, Matt tells us that he has some clients with around a hundred new starters each month. The integration with Staffology HR ensures efficiency and accuracy. He says, “It’s very easy when you’re manually doing things to type something wrong and it’s very important when you’re dealing with people’s bank details. So, the automation saves me and the team a lot of time, stress and potential mistakes.”