Payroll has traditionally been the "Cinderella" back office function yet nothing damages the employee/employer relationship more quickly than systematic failure to pay accurately and a haphazard approach to putting mistakes right. The burden of legislation surrounding the payroll function grows while, at the same time, both staff and IS infrastructure become more expensive.

Hewitt has the answer to these problems in its Managed Payroll Service:

• Pan-European capability
  We have extensive local payroll knowledge across Europe and are experienced in managing payroll across the region in the most economic and effective way possible for our clients.
• Easy to understand value proposition
  Unlike other suppliers we charge a single price per employee per annum for our standard service…there are no hidden extras.
• "Common Data Store" architecture allows clients to build on other HR services
  We hold HR data in our common data store. This means we are able to expand the range of HR services we offer you, should you wish us to, with minimal effort.
• Pan-European capability
  We have extensive local payroll knowledge across Europe and are experienced in managing payroll across the region in the most economic and effective way possible for our clients.
• Transformational proposition to improve processes and employees' experience We are not about "your mess for less". Our model is to transform both your payroll and your employees' experience.
• Six Sigma quality Six Sigma is the tool famously used by Jack Welch to recover the business of GE. Literally speaking, it refers to the reduction of errors to six standard deviations from the mean value of a process output or task opportunities. In other words, about 3.4 errors in a million opportunities.

The process of measurement encompasses all aspects of a business, including management, service delivery, design, production and customer satisfaction. Six Sigma companies typically spend less than five percent of their revenues addressing and repairing quality problems. As a philosophy, Six Sigma drives business culture and requires a nearly flawless execution of key processes making it a high standard for companies and individuals to achieve.

A good outsourcing provider should be able to operate at about five sigma, or 200 errors per million transactions.