Designing a Scalable Payroll System for Southeast Asia's F&B Sector

Designing a flexible payroll system to streamline wage calculations, reduce errors, and drive business growth in a complex regulatory landscape.

• Company: Series A Workforce Management SaaS Start-Up for F&B Based in Singapore

• Project: Design and implementation of a comprehensive, regionally compliant payroll system.

• Timeline: 2022-2024 (Focus on the payroll feature development period)

• My Role: Head of Design (full-time), leading a remote team of 7 Product Designers and UX Researchers across Singapore, Malaysia, and Indonesia.

Project Overview

The Challenge

Problem: The existing platform is able to manage rostering, attendance, and timesheets, but payroll was a manual, time-consuming, and error-prone process for F&B owners. This created significant pain points:

• Time-Consuming: Manual calculations could take days, diverting valuable time from core business operations.

• Error-Prone: High risk of calculation errors, leading to compliance issues, penalties, and employee dissatisfaction, damaging trust.

• Regional Complexity: Different payroll regulations, tax laws, and reporting requirements across Indonesia, Malaysia, and Singapore presented a significant design challenge.

• Limited Upsell Potential: The lack of an integrated payroll feature limited the platform's value proposition and upsell opportunities in a competitive market where other solutions offered end-to-end management.

Business Goal: Develop a comprehensive, automated payroll system to complete the Product ecosystem, improve user experience, and drive upsells in the Southeast Asian market.

My Approach

• Team Expansion and Leadership: Recognizing the scale of the project and the need for regional expertise, I expanded the design team from 2 to 7 designers across Indonesia, Malaysia, and Singapore. I established clear communication channels, design processes, and quality standards, fostering a collaborative remote work environment.

• Regional Research & Competitive Analysis: We began with extensive research into the specific payroll regulations, tax laws, and reporting requirements in each target market. We also conducted a competitive analysis to identify best practices and opportunities for differentiation.

• User Research & Alpha Testing: We recruited and onboarded several F&B businesses in each region as alpha testers. We conducted user interviews, contextual inquiry, and usability testing sessions to understand their specific needs and pain points. Example: We found that many users struggled with setting up complex pay rules, so we prioritized a streamlined setup process with clear visual cues.

• Iterative Design Process: We followed a user-centered design approach, using wireframes, prototypes (low-fidelity and high-fidelity), and usability testing to iterate on the design. Example: Early prototypes revealed that the initial workflow was confusing, so we redesigned the information architecture based on card sorting exercises with users.

• Focus on Flexibility and Scalability: We prioritized design flexibility to accommodate different business models, pay structures (hourly, salaried, commission), and regional regulatory variations. The system was designed to be scalable to accommodate future growth and expansion into new markets (Taiwan, and Hongkong).

• Design System Integration: The payroll system was designed to seamlessly integrate with StaffAny's existing design system, ensuring consistency in UI elements, typography, and interaction patterns. This also streamlined the development process and ensured a cohesive user experience across the platform.

The Solution

Automated Payroll System: Designed and implemented a fully automated, cloud-based payroll system that integrated seamlessly with the existing platform.

• Intuitive, one-time setup wizard for user-specific configurations, including pay rules, deductions, and tax settings.

• Automated calculations for wages, bonuses, overtime, deductions, and taxes, adhering to regional regulations.

• Automated generation of payslips (with regional language support), tax reports, bank transfer files (compliant with local banking formats), and secure, direct payslip delivery to employees' mobile devices.

• Comprehensive reporting dashboards providing real-time insights into payroll data.

Key Features

The Impacts

• 30% Upsell in 3 Months: The payroll system became a primary sales driver, achieving a 30% upsell rate within the first three months of launch, exceeding initial projections.

• Improved User Experience: Streamlined the payroll process, reducing the average time spent on payroll by 80% based on user feedback.

• Increased Customer Satisfaction: Provided a complete workforce management solution, significantly enhancing customer satisfaction and reducing churn.

• Strengthened Market Position: Positioned as one of the leading end-to-end workforce management platform in Southeast Asia based on market cap percentage, attracting new customers and strengthening its competitive advantage.

Learnings

• Managing Remote Teams: Learned effective strategies for managing and coordinating remote teams across multiple time zones and cultures, emphasizing clear communication and collaboration tools.

• Designing for Regional Differences: Gained valuable experience in designing for diverse regulatory environments and user needs, highlighting the importance of thorough research and user testing.