Payroll Specialist Job Description
A payroll specialist job description template covering multi-state payroll and tax compliance, plus the ATS keywords recruiters screen for.
Payroll gets talked about less than almost any other finance function, which is strange given how little room it has for error — miss a garnishment order or misclassify someone as exempt and the company has a legal problem, not just an accounting one. It's also a role with a real, specific credential attached: Certified Payroll Professional (CPP), from PayrollOrg, is the credential that genuinely gates a move into payroll leadership at larger organizations, the way the CPA does for accounting.
This posting is based in Chicago, and Illinois payroll carries its own specific complexity worth knowing about going in: state and local withholding rules that don't match every other state, wage garnishment procedures, and unemployment insurance filings that have to be tracked separately from federal requirements. A payroll specialist processing pay for employees in more than one state is doing meaningfully more than one running the numbers for a single-state workforce.
It's also worth separating this role from HR generalist, because smaller companies sometimes fold the two together in a way that undersells both. A payroll specialist's core skill is wage-and-hour compliance and getting the numbers right — exempt versus non-exempt classification, tax withholding, general ledger reconciliation of what payroll cost against what accounting recorded. An HR generalist's core skill is people process. They overlap at the edges, but the day-to-day expertise is genuinely different.
Tessworth · Chicago, IL
Full-time · On-site
$58,000 – $76,000
About the role
Tessworth is hiring a Payroll Specialist to run payroll accurately and on time, every cycle, for our Chicago-based team. You will process a multi-state payroll, keep withholdings and garnishments correct, and be the point of contact when someone's paycheck doesn't look right.
This is an on-site role working closely with HR and accounting — you'll need to be reachable in person on payroll processing days, since a same-day correction is sometimes the difference between a resolved issue and an off-cycle check.
What you'll do
- Process biweekly payroll accurately and on time for a multi-state employee population.
- Calculate and apply tax withholdings, garnishments and benefits deductions correctly for each pay cycle.
- Reconcile payroll registers against the general ledger and resolve discrepancies with accounting.
- Maintain payroll records and respond to employee questions about pay, deductions and time off.
- Prepare and file payroll tax returns and year-end W-2s in coordination with the tax team.
- Process off-cycle payments, corrections and terminations within required legal timeframes.
- Stay current on federal, Illinois and local wage-and-hour requirements that affect payroll.
- Support internal and external audits of payroll records and processes.
What we're looking for
- 3+ years of hands-on payroll processing experience, including multi-state payroll.
- Working knowledge of FLSA and wage-and-hour requirements, including exempt/non-exempt classification.
- Experience with a payroll platform such as ADP or Workday.
- Comfortable reconciling payroll to the general ledger and explaining variances to accounting.
- Strong discretion handling confidential compensation and personal data.
- High attention to detail — payroll errors are the kind employees notice immediately.
Nice to have
- Certified Payroll Professional (CPP) designation, or actively pursuing it.
- Experience processing payroll across more states than just Illinois.
- Familiarity with time-and-attendance systems such as Kronos.
- Experience handling wage garnishments and child-support orders directly.
- Prior experience supporting a company through a payroll platform or provider transition.
Benefits
- Medical, dental and vision coverage, with employee premiums covered in full.
- 401(k) with a 4% company match, vested immediately.
- On-site role in our Chicago office, with a standard business-hours schedule.
- CPP exam fee and study material reimbursement once you're eligible to sit.
- Eighteen days of paid time off plus company holidays.
Salary range
As posted for this sample role. Real pay varies by employer, location and experience.
$58,000–$76,000/ yr
ATS keywords for this role
The applicant tracking system (ATS) — the recruiting software a hiring team searches and filters applicants with — will screen for these. Weight shows how central each one is to this specific posting.
Required and central (5)
Important (7)
Mentioned in passing (5)
Frequently asked questions
What's the difference between a payroll specialist and an HR generalist?
A payroll specialist's core expertise is wage-and-hour compliance and getting pay calculations right — withholding, classification, GL reconciliation. An HR generalist's core expertise is people process — hiring, onboarding, policy. Smaller companies sometimes combine the two roles, which can undersell how specialized payroll actually is.
Is the CPP certification required for this role?
No, it's listed as preferred, not required. It matters more once you're aiming for payroll management at a larger organization, where PayrollOrg's Certified Payroll Professional credential functions the way a CPA does for accounting — a real signal, not a formality.
Why is this role on-site when so many finance jobs are remote or hybrid?
Payroll runs on hard, same-day deadlines and handles sensitive employee questions that often benefit from being resolved in person on processing days. Different finance functions get different remote policies for operational reasons — this posting's own Controller role is fully remote, while payroll here is not — and that's a real distinction, not an arbitrary one.
Do I need experience with a specific payroll platform to apply?
ADP or Workday experience is preferred, but platform knowledge transfers reasonably well between systems. The underlying compliance knowledge — FLSA, multi-state withholding, garnishment handling — matters more than which button is where in a given tool.
This was a sample. Your resume should be tailored to the real thing.
Rezi Ninja reads an actual job posting and rewrites your resume to match it, with a Ninja Score so you know it lands before you hit send. Free to start, with the AI usage included.