Sr Payroll Accountant

Join to apply for the Sr Payroll Accountant role at AVEVA

Salary Range: $94,000.00 - $

Title: Sr. Payroll Accountant

Location: Lake Forest, San Leandro and Houston, TX (Hybrid)

We are seeking a highly organized and detail-oriented Payroll and Financial Analyst to join our finance team. This role plays a critical part in managing comprehensive payroll operations, preparing and recording journal entries, and overseeing payroll-related accruals to ensure accurate financial reporting. The successful candidate will also be responsible for maintaining compliance with company policies, internal financial controls, and regulatory requirements, while providing analytical support to Payroll accounting related tasks.

In this role, you will collaborate with internal stakeholders and external payroll and benefit vendors to ensure timely and precise payroll execution, troubleshoot discrepancies, and implement best practices. You will also play a key role in month‑end and year‑end close processes, contribute to audit readiness, and participate in continuous improvement initiatives across payroll and accounting functions.

• Payroll Operations (40%)
• Review and Validation:
  Review, analyze, and validate bi‑weekly/monthly payroll reports to ensure completeness, accuracy, and compliance with internal policies and regulatory requirements.
• Issue Resolution:
  Collaborate closely with Human Resources, Finance, and external payroll service providers to investigate and resolve discrepancies related to earnings, deductions, taxes, and benefit contributions.
• Payroll Processing:
  Process complex payroll transactions including off‑cycle adjustments, garnishments, and final settlements.
• Reconciliation:
  Perform monthly reconciliations of payroll‑related general ledger (GL) accounts, ensuring that variances are identified, explained, and resolved in a timely manner.
• Data Integrity:
  Maintain accurate payroll data and ensure timely updates of employee information, job changes, compensation changes, and tax data within payroll systems.
• Audit Support:
  Prepare and provide payroll documentation for internal and external audits as needed.
• Journal Entries & Accruals (40%)
• Journal Preparation:
  Prepare and record timely and accurate payroll‑related journal entries, including but not limited to vacation accruals, health benefits, 401(k) contributions, bonuses, commissions, sales incentives, etc.
• Cost Allocation:
  Ensure that all payroll expenses are properly coded and allocated to appropriate cost centers, departments, and business units in the financial systems.
• Accrual Management:
  Maintain and update payroll‑related accrual schedules, ensuring that employee payroll, PTO, bonuses are captured and reported in line with company policy and accounting standards.
• Financial Accuracy:
  Collaborate with accounting teams to ensure payroll and personnel costs are accurately captured and reflected in monthly, quarterly, and annual financial statements.
• Close Support:
  Support the month‑end and year‑end financial close process, including variance analysis, reconciliations, and financial reporting.
• System Integration and system support:
  Work with ERP/payroll systems to ensure data flows are accurate and journal interfaces are functioning correctly.
• Compliance and Controls (10%)
• Policy Compliance:
  Ensure payroll processes adhere to internal financial controls, company policies, SOX requirements (if applicable), and local labor and tax laws.
• Documentation Management:
  Maintain up‑to‑date process documentation, control checklists, and audit trails for payroll transactions, journal entries, and accruals.
• Audit Participation:
  Assist in the planning and execution of internal and external payroll audits, addressing inquiries and implementing corrective actions from audit findings.
• Risk Mitigation:
  Identify risks within payroll operations and accounting, and propose enhancements to strengthen controls and reduce exposure.
• Other Duties (10%)
• Reporting & Analysis:
  Generate and analyze payroll‑related reports and dashboards for Finance, HR, and senior leadership, supporting decision‑making with accurate data insights.
• Process Improvement:
  Identify opportunities to…