New-employer payroll, unemployment insurance, and workers’ compensation

Payroll Score is an independent directory for new-employer payroll, unemployment insurance, and workers’ compensation onboarding — state by state. We grade how payroll software describes the EDD account, the recurring California returns, and new-hire reporting. We do not invent SUTA rates, registration fees, or form numbers the agency did not publish.

A new employer in California is not finished when the first paycheck prints. Unemployment Insurance Code § 675 makes a commercial employer an “employer” once it has one or more employees and pays more than $100 in wages in a calendar quarter. § 1086 is the clock: register with the Employment Development Department. The EDD restates that registration as within 15 days of paying more than $100 in a quarter.

Workers’ compensation is a different clock and a different agency. The Department of Industrial Relations says coverage is due before the first employee starts work. Labor Code § 3700 is the insurance requirement. Payroll software can run wages. It does not, by itself, buy that policy.

This directory does not publish a “best payroll 2026” list. Each vendor on the homepage gets three letters that are allowed to disagree:

EDD / UI account — who opens the eight-digit Employer Payroll Tax Account Number, and what the employer still has to enter.
CA returns — which California wage and deposit forms the vendor’s own help article claims to file.
New-hire DE 34 — whether the vendor claims the 20-calendar-day New Employee Registry report, or leaves it on the employer.

A vendor that files quarterly returns can still leave the first EDD registration on you. That is not a contradiction. It is the point.

Pick the product before you pick the brand

State unemployment and withholding

The eight-digit EDD account, the UI rate the agency assigns, and the deposit and wage returns. Confirm clocks on EDD pages, not a vendor checklist.

New-hire reporting

DE 34 to the New Employee Registry within 20 calendar days of the start-of-work date. That is EDD’s NER page and UIC § 1088.5.

Workers’ compensation

Insurance or approved self-insurance before anyone clocks in. DIR, not EDD. A payroll login is not a policy.

Live scorecard

California is the live state page. Letters are explained on the methodology page. They are not Trustpilot restatements. Vendor scorecards appear once on this homepage. The California page walks the EDD and DIR clocks and quotes the statutes.

California new-employer scorecard — the $100 / 15-day EDD clock, DE 1, DE 34, and workers’ compensation before the first shift.

Vendor scorecards

Buttons say Official page and go to each vendor’s public site. Help-center claims are labeled vendor copy. We do not print a new-employer unemployment rate a vendor published as if it were an EDD fact.

Gusto

Payroll software

EDD / UI account: B-

Middesk may open SIT/SUI if no California account exists. You still enter the eight-digit EDD number and UI rate.

CA returns: B

Help article claims DE 9, DE 9C, and DE 88. That is vendor copy, not an EDD audit.

New-hire DE 34: B

Help article claims electronic DE 34. Confirm the live EDD New Employee Registry, not a software checklist.

EDD account: Vendor copy: Middesk may register state income-tax withholding and state unemployment insurance when there is no existing California account. The employer still has to enter the eight-digit EDD account number and the agency UI rate, and to exclude ETT from that rate field.

Returns: Vendor copy: Gusto’s California help article lists DE 9, DE 9C, DE 88, and DE 34 among the forms it files or reports.

New hire: Vendor copy: Gusto lists DE 34 (California report of new hires) as filed electronically.

Retrieved: 2026-08-31

Official page

Patriot

Payroll software

EDD / UI account: C

Help article tells the employer to register at EDD. We do not treat that as a Gusto-style registration service.

CA returns: B-

Full Service claims DE 9 / DE 9C after 8655 + TPA. Confirm what your plan actually files.

New-hire DE 34: C

Vendor copy puts DE 34 on the employer. The 20-day NER clock is still UIC § 1088.5.

EDD account: Vendor copy: the employer registers with EDD. Patriot’s California help article does not claim it opens the eight-digit employer payroll tax account for you.

Returns: Vendor copy: Full Service claims DE 9 and DE 9C after Form 8655 and TPA authorization. That path is Patriot’s description, not an EDD rule.

New hire: Vendor copy: Patriot puts DE 34 on the employer. The statutory 20-calendar-day clock still sits on the employer either way.