BambooHR® vs. Patriot Payroll

Overview
ProductRatingMost Used ByProduct SummaryStarting Price
BambooHR®
Score 8.5 out of 10
N/A
BambooHR is an cloud-based human resources solution that provides onboarding, payroll, and benefits management. It also offers automated time-off management and employee self-service.
$250
per month
Patriot Payroll
Score 9.7 out of 10
N/A
Patriot Software headquartered in Canton, Ohio offers Patriot PAY, their benefits administration and payroll software.
$174
Pricing
BambooHR®Patriot Payroll
Editions & Modules
Core
$250
per month
Pro
Contact Sales
per month
Elite
Contact Sales
per month
Basic Payroll
$17/mo + $4 per employee/contractor
Accounting Basic
$20/mo (unlimited use)
Accounting Premium
$30/mo (unlimited use)
Full Service Payroll
$37/mo + $4 per employee/contractor
Offerings
Pricing Offerings
BambooHR®Patriot Payroll
Free Trial
YesYes
Free/Freemium Version
NoNo
Premium Consulting/Integration Services
NoNo
Entry-level Setup FeeOptionalNo setup fee
Additional DetailsPatriot Software has two payroll options to choose from: Basic Payroll, and Full Service payroll software. Both start with a simple three-step payroll process. With the Full Service Payroll, Patriot will collect, deposit, and file federal, state, and local payroll taxes on the customer's behalf; end-of-the-year payroll tax filing is included at no extra charge. Print W2s on 8 x 1/2 x 11 plain white office paper to hand to employees, or post to the free employee portal. Also, Patriot Software offers free direct deposit.
More Pricing Information
Community Pulse
BambooHR®Patriot Payroll
Considered Both Products
BambooHR®
Chose BambooHR®
None. We used our own self made folders and spreadsheets prior to Bamboo.
Chose BambooHR®
scalability is an issue with BambooHR (missing lot of competent), integration with other tools (EDI feed, compliance etc)
Chose BambooHR®
BambooHR® is not in the same category as others that I have used. BambooHR is truly comprehensive and if you pay for all the extras, you wouldn't need anything else. The parts we use are great for us and the fact that we can add custom fields means that our unique needs are …
Chose BambooHR®
Lattice is much more oriented towards performance management. It includes many more advanced performance management features from building actual assessments to also performance development planning. BambooHR® for us was a place to centralize our data and build from within as …
Chose BambooHR®
In my experience, I prefer overall reporting and functionality of Rippling, Gusto, and Ease.
It is on par with Employee Navigator and Paycom (due to more user friendly design)
Prefer to Worklio, Paylocity, and ADP Workforce.
Chose BambooHR®
I used to use workday at a past company and BambooHR® is less extensive but very easy to use. Again, the features and functionality on the former were more fleshed out and readily available but the functions that I use most often are more easily accessible via BambooHR®.
Chose BambooHR®
Not as well as any of them. I am not a QBO Payroll fan either but they are better than BambooHR®.
Chose BambooHR®
We have tried other system, but they were less user friendly and they were doing so much other stuff that they were not fulfilling correctly our needs. BambooHR® is a really nice tool to use, user friendly, and just the functions we need from an HR tool. It's great for the …
Chose BambooHR®
Used them before and wanted to try something new, overall it was a much easier product to use and get a handle on.
Chose BambooHR®
Bamboo HR is so so much more user-friendly and easier to navigate on both the admin and employee side of things. This significantly helps reduce headaches and frustration when something needs correction. There is always something that will need to be fixed, so having a platform …
Chose BambooHR®
BambooHR is the best, but unfortunately, it doesn't currently have an adequate payroll module for our needs.
Chose BambooHR®
We switch our clients from the other HRIS platforms to BambooHR, because they do everything better and have amazing customer support.
Chose BambooHR®
Less expensive than ADP and much more up to date and efficient than Heartland
Chose BambooHR®
At my previous employer, I evaluated over 20 HRIS platforms before choosing and implementing BambooHR® (in 2019). I love it! The continuous improvements are promising and I actually feel like product feedback is reviewed and, at times, implemented.

With BambooHR®, it truly …
Chose BambooHR®
BambooHR® was able to provide excellent value for money when compared to the other options we looked at when we carried out a review of them. A previous member of the team had also used BambooHR® at another company and rated them highly which influenced our decision greatly. …
Chose BambooHR®
Different companies and each proved to be beneficial for the particular company that had it implemented.
Chose BambooHR®
The platform for both employees and employer were way easier to use and navigate. Additionally, VensureHR generated many errors which we did not see with BambooHR.
Chose BambooHR®
We moved to BambooHR time tracking from Clicktime once BambooHR's functionality improved and we prefer to have all functions on the same platform.
Patriot Payroll
Chose Patriot Payroll
I haven't tried any online ones.
Chose Patriot Payroll
Paychex is considerably more expensive software granted they have services and analytics that are not available in Patriot. I am a small business with a tight budget, and that's why I ultimately selected Patriot Software because I can reinvest the savings in so many ways.
Chose Patriot Payroll
Overall a much easier to use interface, a more competitive price point, excellent customer service—just what we needed for our small nonprofit.
Chose Patriot Payroll
I briefly used Intuit Online Payroll, and it was expensive, had no support, and was very frustrating to use.
I also used 3 local tax companies for payroll - they were extremely expensive and messed up all of the time. Their employee turnover was very annoying (and it seemed to …
Chose Patriot Payroll
Patriot Payroll is cheaper with their partner program and customer service seems better. As well Quickbooks Desktop Payroll specifically was charging per direct deposit action which is cost prohibitive and Quickbooks customer service is virtually non existent. As well, Patriot …
Chose Patriot Payroll
I found Patriot Software to offer the best price and service package for me to be able to process payroll for a number of my smaller clients while still allowing me to make a profit on the added revenue.
Chose Patriot Payroll
Quickbooks Online Payroll is literally the devil. They make things unclear, very difficult to tell what has been filed and what has been missed, hard to adjust owner salary whenever you want. I hate it! Gusto is more robust than Patriot and so for bigger companies with more …
Chose Patriot Payroll
I did an internet research and it seemed like Patriot Pay was the most user-friendly and affordable and I am glad I chose Patriot.
Chose Patriot Payroll
My early experience with Gusto was exceptional...then the wheels started falling off. I won't go into the details but I lost a couple payroll clients due to their errors and was on the verge of losing more. That coupled with massive fee increases made it necessary to find …
Chose Patriot Payroll
I did A LOT of research prior to making a decision on which software to use. Patriot had an abundance of high reviews, so I finally decided to give them a try. And while I don't normally find reasons to rave about software, I loved both the product and the service!
Chose Patriot Payroll
I switched from ADP to Patriot PAY almost 2 years ago. I switched because Patriot was a much better financial deal. Also, Patriot has MUCH better customer service than ADP. They have an online chat, which is very quick and easy to obtain an answer. They also (usually) …
Chose Patriot Payroll
I don't think that Patriot PAY is more powerful than QuickBooks. However, it is way cheaper and so much easier to use.
Chose Patriot Payroll
I prefer Patriot to Paychex for several reasons. First of all, for a small business with less than 10 employees, the fees charged by Paychex are unnecessary overhead when Patriot offers high quality and more than sufficient tools to perform the same tasks. Paychex also does not …
Chose Patriot Payroll
Cost is the major factor here, but the ease of use (and design of the interface) is a big advantage for Patriot PAY. Items are (ironically) more "intuitive" to find and manage in Patriot PAY than Intuit. Patriot PAY is closer to ADP/Gusto/Paychex in how it looks and feels and …
Features
BambooHR®Patriot Payroll
Human Resource Management
Comparison of Human Resource Management features of Product A and Product B
BambooHR®
7.6
Ratings
3% below category average
Patriot Payroll
-
Ratings
Employee demographic data8.20 Ratings00 Ratings
Employment history7.80 Ratings00 Ratings
Job profiles and administration7.90 Ratings00 Ratings
Workflow for transfers, promotions, pay raises, etc.7.50 Ratings00 Ratings
Organizational charting6.60 Ratings00 Ratings
Organization and location management8.00 Ratings00 Ratings
Compliance data (COBRA, OSHA, etc.)7.10 Ratings00 Ratings
Payroll Management
Comparison of Payroll Management features of Product A and Product B
BambooHR®
6.6
Ratings
19% below category average
Patriot Payroll
8.3
Ratings
1% above category average
Pay calculation7.30 Ratings9.50 Ratings
Support for external payroll vendors5.80 Ratings10.00 Ratings
Off-cycle/On-Demand payment6.00 Ratings8.70 Ratings
Benefit plan administration5.70 Ratings6.00 Ratings
Direct deposit files7.00 Ratings9.20 Ratings
Salary revision and increment management7.80 Ratings8.20 Ratings
Reimbursement management6.20 Ratings6.30 Ratings
Leave and Attendance Management
Comparison of Leave and Attendance Management features of Product A and Product B
BambooHR®
8.7
Ratings
8% above category average
Patriot Payroll
-
Ratings
Approval workflow8.40 Ratings00 Ratings
Balance details8.50 Ratings00 Ratings
Annual carry-forward and encashment9.30 Ratings00 Ratings
Employee Self Service
Comparison of Employee Self Service features of Product A and Product B
BambooHR®
8.0
Ratings
1% below category average
Patriot Payroll
-
Ratings
View and generate pay and benefit information7.70 Ratings00 Ratings
Update personal information8.80 Ratings00 Ratings
View company policy documentation8.10 Ratings00 Ratings
Employee recognition7.10 Ratings00 Ratings
View job history8.30 Ratings00 Ratings
Asset Management
Comparison of Asset Management features of Product A and Product B
BambooHR®
9.1
Ratings
12% above category average
Patriot Payroll
-
Ratings
Tracking of all physical assets9.10 Ratings00 Ratings
HR Reporting
Comparison of HR Reporting features of Product A and Product B
BambooHR®
6.8
Ratings
10% below category average
Patriot Payroll
-
Ratings
Report builder6.60 Ratings00 Ratings
Pre-built reports6.90 Ratings00 Ratings
Ability to combine HR data with external data6.70 Ratings00 Ratings
Onboarding
Comparison of Onboarding features of Product A and Product B
BambooHR®
7.7
Ratings
3% below category average
Patriot Payroll
-
Ratings
New hire portal8.10 Ratings00 Ratings
Manager tracking tools7.30 Ratings00 Ratings
Performance and Goals
Comparison of Performance and Goals features of Product A and Product B
BambooHR®
7.5
Ratings
5% below category average
Patriot Payroll
-
Ratings
Corporate goal setting6.60 Ratings00 Ratings
Individual goal setting7.30 Ratings00 Ratings
Line-of sight-visibility9.20 Ratings00 Ratings
Performance tracking6.70 Ratings00 Ratings
Performance Management
Comparison of Performance Management features of Product A and Product B
BambooHR®
7.5
Ratings
4% below category average
Patriot Payroll
-
Ratings
Performance plans6.80 Ratings00 Ratings
Performance improvement plans6.70 Ratings00 Ratings
Review status tracking8.60 Ratings00 Ratings
Review reminders8.00 Ratings00 Ratings
Multiple review frequency7.40 Ratings00 Ratings
Succession Planning
Comparison of Succession Planning features of Product A and Product B
BambooHR®
9.1
Ratings
15% above category average
Patriot Payroll
-
Ratings
Create succession plans/pools9.00 Ratings00 Ratings
Candidate ranking9.10 Ratings00 Ratings
Candidate search9.00 Ratings00 Ratings
Candidate development9.40 Ratings00 Ratings
Recruiting / ATS
Comparison of Recruiting / ATS features of Product A and Product B
BambooHR®
7.8
Ratings
1% above category average
Patriot Payroll
-
Ratings
Job Requisition Management7.30 Ratings00 Ratings
Company Website Posting7.30 Ratings00 Ratings
Publish to Social Media9.30 Ratings00 Ratings
Job Search Site Posting7.20 Ratings00 Ratings
Duplicate Candidate Prevention7.60 Ratings00 Ratings
Applicant Tracking8.00 Ratings00 Ratings
Notifications and Alerts8.00 Ratings00 Ratings
Best Alternatives
BambooHR®Patriot Payroll
Small Businesses
Dayforce Powerpay
Dayforce Powerpay
Score 9.5 out of 10
Dayforce Powerpay
Dayforce Powerpay
Score 9.5 out of 10
Medium-sized Companies
Paypro Workforce Management
Paypro Workforce Management
Score 9.7 out of 10
Paypro Workforce Management
Paypro Workforce Management
Score 9.7 out of 10
Enterprises
PeopleStrong
PeopleStrong
Score 9.9 out of 10
Infor Human Resources
Infor Human Resources
Score 7.1 out of 10
All AlternativesView all alternativesView all alternatives
User Ratings
BambooHR®Patriot Payroll
Likelihood to Recommend
8.3
(0 ratings)
9.7
(0 ratings)
Likelihood to Renew
9.9
(0 ratings)
9.0
(0 ratings)
Usability
8.3
(0 ratings)
9.3
(0 ratings)
Availability
9.3
(0 ratings)
-
(0 ratings)
Performance
8.7
(0 ratings)
-
(0 ratings)
Support Rating
8.8
(0 ratings)
8.7
(0 ratings)
Online Training
9.2
(0 ratings)
-
(0 ratings)
Implementation Rating
8.6
(0 ratings)
-
(0 ratings)
Configurability
8.7
(0 ratings)
-
(0 ratings)
Ease of integration
9.6
(0 ratings)
-
(0 ratings)
Product Scalability
8.9
(0 ratings)
-
(0 ratings)
Vendor post-sale
8.9
(0 ratings)
-
(0 ratings)
Vendor pre-sale
9.1
(0 ratings)
-
(0 ratings)
User Testimonials
BambooHR®Patriot Payroll
Likelihood to Recommend
I think if you're a small organization and you're trying to get out of paper, this is a really good first step to doing that. I've heard from other people that are in larger organizations where they have thousands of employees that there may be better platforms, but for smaller organization it's awesome.
Read full review
Patriot is well suited for an office with a small staff without complicated tax issues to manage. My office had 2 employees: one full-time and one part-time. There were no 1099's issued, and no special tax exemptions or other special tax situations for employees. The owner was a sole proprietor, so she was not paid as an employee through Patriot. It was easy to quickly run simple payroll tasks on a bi-weekly basis in my situation. However, I believe a more complex situation with more employees would still be suitable for this software if there was an employee dedicated to performing payroll and human resources tasks. Information must be manually entered each payroll period and submitted before 8pm to process at the scheduled pay date, so if there was not a dedicated employee for the task, it would be easy to end up paying employees a business-day late. I know that Patriot offers add-on services for human resource tasks, such as time sheets and tools to manage sick days, benefits, and record employee attendance. I did not require these extra services, but I like that Patriot offers services a la carte so that there is no need to pay for tools you do not need
Read full review
Pros
  • BambooHR® allows you to preview as a user in a specific access level. This is VERY helpful for providing instructions to employees or double checking that information is secure.
  • BambooHR® customer support is unmatched. Any time I have a question, I can quickly get an answer as well as additional resources.
  • Employees are able to easily find their information without coming to HR for questions. This cuts down on the questions coming into HR departments, big and small.
Read full review
  • Patriot's software is very easy to use for running payroll. It takes about 30 seconds to do.
  • The payroll reports are abundant, easy to find and print, and make my accounting very easy.
  • Having a full service payroll provider as easy to use as Patriot leaves me with more availability to focus on treating patients and running other aspects of my business.
Read full review
Cons
  • Notices for approving hours don't always coincide with pay periods well.
  • Payroll reports are by pay period without the ability to combine hours, etc. into a monthly report.
  • There is not an easy way to fix payroll errors. Must get it right the first time.
Read full review
  • The third party direct deposit processor Patriot previously used was not particularly easy to work with...but Patriot just brought all direct deposit processing in house.
  • Clergy housing allowance has to be manually entered each payday. They tell me they're close to adding the capability of making it (and other similar pay types) as a recurring item.
  • The setup process is geared toward novice users who need to be hand-held through the process. That's great for those who need it but a more streamlined, no-frills process payroll pros would be welcome.
Read full review
Likelihood to Renew
There's nothing wrong with this platform. I would recommend it to any business starting with more than 10 employees. I will continue to use the program for as long as I need to, hoping they continue being tremendous and finding other ways to incorporate more technology.
Read full review
It works well because it is cheap for us.
Read full review
Usability
BambooHR® is helpful, but I still handle some tasks manually due to missing features relevant to my needs. Certain processes require additional functionality, limiting full automation. While it streamlines HR operations, gaps in usability mean I must supplement workflows with manual efforts to ensure efficiency and meet specific business demands.
Read full review
I think it is great once things are setup as for general user looking to look for simple things like a copy of a paystub or a current pay rate for an employee. However, to find specialized things like a state withholding number or payroll integration settings those do require a bit more digging to find or possibly a call to customer service for help.
Read full review
Reliability and Availability
Yes, there is a huge team in the back of the online platform or it looks like it because I have never been left without an answer when I have a question or waiting from a response on my chat .... There must be a huge team, this is so great and I always seem to have someone that is very knowledgeable too. So many times in the past I had to leave with customer service that would connect you with someone else because of the expertise, here everyone seems to be some kind of an expert in the HR function.
Read full review
No answers on this topic
Performance
I love BambooHR. Reports are easy to run and download and it usually covers any types of requests I get from the management team. You get excel or .csv downloads/reports and it is fast and simple, not too crowded so it is easy to read through. We don't integrate the tool yet but again, soon we will. we just did not had the time to utilize it yet but that's the plan.
Read full review
No answers on this topic
Support Rating
The support can be slow as they are a US based company and therefore we often have to wait for them to be online before we can speak to somebody and they are not particularly responsive to emails. The service itself has always been helpful and in most cases, the issue was resolved.
Read full review
Generally speaking it is pretty good that when I need to call somebody up for a payroll question I can generally within five minutes get somebody on the phone and they can help me resolve the problem or specify where specifically I need to go or contact to find my answers. However, that being said, for my specific situation as a partner my assigned contact has not always been very responsive.
Read full review
In-Person Training
I didn't have in-person training besides teaching my managers how to use the program. However, I couldn't omit this question (maybe a system glitch).
Read full review
No answers on this topic
Online Training
As far as I can recall, everything went well with doing it online and got questions answered. Was thankful to work with a dummy file to get used to some practices prior to getting our own domain within bamboo to then place our personnel information in the system, this helped a lot!
Read full review
No answers on this topic
Implementation Rating
We implemented bambooHR in Fall, 2023 then implemented Payroll 1/1/24. A vital piece of information was not known or missed in that we are exempt from State Unemployment Tax and have a Reimbursement Set-up, so bambooHR did not send Payroll Reports to the State. Those reports need to be sent regardless if we are exempt or not.
Read full review
No answers on this topic
Alternatives Considered
I needed a system that was easy to use from an admin level as well as employee level. We run a pretty simple operation as we do not have shift diffs or multiple approval levels. Some of the systems reviewed were too much for us and, as a result, too expensive. BambooHR® fit our needs and budget accordingly.
Read full review
Cost is the major factor here, but the ease of use (and design of the interface) is a big advantage for Patriot PAY. Items are (ironically) more "intuitive" to find and manage in Patriot PAY than Intuit.

Patriot PAY is closer to ADP/Gusto/Paychex in how it looks and feels and operates in a full-service capacity, but it is much more affordable.
Read full review
Scalability
There is so much you can do with this platform, it is incredible and so welcoming. We don't utilize it 100% yet just because we are growing and the HR team has not been able to concentrate on other areas offered to us but but we will soon. Which is also why we got the product, specifically because what BambooHR can do to help us meet our growing business needs.
Read full review
No answers on this topic
Return on Investment
  • HR team members have been saved thousands of hours over the 3.5 years we've had BambooHR®. It saved me personally several hours a day once BambooHR® was set up. Specifically, onboarding, offboarding, and a formal Hiring system are the major time savers.
  • Employee Information is much easier to access and is all centralized. Employees are empowered to update their information when applicable, and we have designed custom access levels for different positions and managers to ensure every individual is seeing the appropriate types of information about employees.
  • We saved significant money by switching from Lattice to BambooHR®'s Performance Management solution. This solution is less advanced, but the simplicity meets our needs perfectly fine, and it even saves time for managers and employees by BambooHR®'s standard questions, carefully designed to get to the heart of performance and improvement.
Read full review
  • Patriot allows the entire team to be on the same page when it comes to a campaign or donor. All of the information is in one place to see how much a donor gave or communication with that donor by a specific team member.
  • It provides comparative historic data and donor analysis. The organization of donations by appeal allows teams to know which campaigns were successful in previous years.
Read full review
ScreenShots

BambooHR® Screenshots

Screenshot of Job Info TabScreenshot of Onboarding TasksScreenshot of New Hire PacketScreenshot of Employee Performance ReportScreenshot of Employee Satisfaction (eNPS®)Screenshot of Open Enrollment

Patriot Payroll Screenshots

Screenshot of the 3-step process to carry out payrollScreenshot of the Payroll interface, which can be used run payroll on any device with internet or data connection. There is no need to download and maintain a separate payroll app.Screenshot of a payroll report, to sort by work location, employee, and date range.