Florida payroll setup for your first hire

DOR collects reemployment tax. Florida does not withhold state income tax from paychecks.

Florida is its own path. The employer tax is reemployment tax. DOR collects it. The Florida Department of Commerce, formerly DEO, pays claims to workers who lose a job through no fault of their own. A DOR login is not a Commerce claims file.

Florida Constitution Article VII § 5(a) says the state may not levy a tax on the income of natural persons who are residents or citizens, except to the extent a similar federal or state tax allows a credit or deduction. That is why Florida does not take state income tax from paychecks. There is no state employee withholding certificate. There is no state paycheck-withholding account to open. A DOR sales-tax dealer number is not the reemployment-tax account. A Florida Business Partner ID is not the seven-digit RT number.

When you owe reemployment tax: $1,500 in a quarter, or one person in 20 weeks

Florida Statutes § 443.1215(1)(a) is enough by itself for a regular shop. You are an employer if you paid wages of at least $1,500 for service in employment in a calendar quarter in the current or preceding calendar year. You are also an employer if you employed at least one individual in employment for any portion of a day in each of 20 different calendar weeks, whether or not the weeks were consecutive, in the current or preceding calendar year. One of those two tests is enough.

Other employer definitions sit in the same section. A successor who takes a liable employer’s organization, trade, business, or assets is covered. An employing unit that already owes federal unemployment tax is covered. Agricultural labor, domestic service, nonprofit, and governmental units use the other tests in § 443.1215. This scorecard is the regular-business path. DOR’s What Employers Need to Know brochure restates those tests in agency language.

The clock is the month after the quarter you start hiring

DOR’s brochure and the Employer Guide to Reemployment Tax say a new business must report its initial employment in the month following the calendar quarter in which employment begins. That is Florida’s registration clock. Do not borrow another state’s day-count or dollar trigger.

A quarterly wage report alone is not enough to register. You must complete the Florida Business Tax Application (Form DR-1), or the same application online at floridarevenue.com/taxes/registration. When DOR finds you liable, it assigns a seven-digit account number. Use that number on letters, checks, and reports to DOR.

The Employer’s Quarterly Report (Form RT-6). Use the rate on the DOR notice.

Liable employers file the Employer’s Quarterly Report (Form RT-6) each calendar quarter. The report is due the first day of the month after the quarter ends. It is timely if it is filed, postmarked, or delivered by the last day of that month. File even if you paid no wages and owe no tax. Employers who had 10 or more employees in any quarter of the state’s prior fiscal year (July 1 through June 30) must file and pay electronically.

DOR’s brochure and the Business Owner’s Guide say the initial tax rate for new employers is 2.7%. That rate applies to the first $7,000 in wages paid to each employee in a calendar year. Wages over $7,000 in that year are excess wages and are not taxed. The initial rate stays until the employer has reported for 10 quarters. Then DOR rates the account. The Reemployment Tax Rate Notice (Form RT-20) is mailed in December. Use the rate on that notice, not a number from a software page.

Workers do not pay reemployment tax. Employers must not take it from paychecks. A unit that is not required to pay may elect coverage on the Election to Become an Employer Under the Florida Reemployment Assistance Program Law (Form RTS-2). That election is voluntary. It is not a first-hire default.

New hire is a DOR child-support report, 20 days

The new-hire report is a list of who you just hired. It is not a box on the RT-6. Florida Statutes § 409.2576 creates the State Directory of New Hires. DOR, or its agent, runs that directory. Employers must report each newly hired or rehired employee within 20 days of the hire date. Hire date is the first day of work for which the employee is owed income. Electronic reporters send two monthly reports, 12 to 16 days apart, if needed.

File at the Florida New Hire Reporting Center on DOR’s Child Support Services for Employers site. A W-4 or an equivalent form is enough. Independent contractors paid $600 or more in a calendar year for services in the trade or business must also be reported. That contractor clock is 20 days from the earlier of the first payment or the contract date.

Workplace injury insurance waits until four employees in most shops

Florida does not treat workplace injury insurance as due before the first shift in a regular shop. It also does not treat that coverage as a free choice once the headcount tests below are met.

DWC’s employer FAQ and Florida Statutes § 440.02 set the counts. A non-construction employer must carry coverage when it has four or more employees, including any non-exempt business owners. A construction employer must carry coverage when it has one or more employees, including any non-exempt business owners. Agriculture is a third test: six regular employees, and/or 12 seasonal employees who work more than 30 days in a season or more than 45 days in the same calendar year. DFS is the Department of Financial Services. DWC is the Division of Workers’ Compensation inside DFS.

A payroll login does not buy that policy. Construction exemptions and non-construction officer elections are DWC filings. They are not a payroll-tax form.

How Gusto and Patriot describe Florida

Confirm the live seven-digit RT number on DOR. Confirm workplace injury insurance on DWC.

Gusto’s Florida help article says Middesk (Gusto’s business-verification company) may register state income-tax withholding and state unemployment insurance (SUI). Florida has no state income-tax withholding (no SIT). That generic Middesk sentence is not a Florida withholding registration. The same article names DOR as the office for unemployment tax, called reemployment tax. It restates the $1,500 / 20-week tests. It asks you to enter the seven-digit reemployment account number (RT number), not the Florida Business Partner ID used for sales tax. It lists the Employer’s Quarterly Report (Form RT-6) and a New Hire Report among filings. It says Gusto needs third-party administrator (TPA) access and a power-of-attorney form. It leaves the E-Verify certification on you if you have more than 25 employees. Read Gusto’s article. See Gusto on the directory.

Patriot’s registration article says you create the reemployment-tax account on DOR. It does not claim Patriot opens that account. It tells you to report new hires to the Florida New Hire Reporting Center within 20 days. It says you must have workplace injury insurance if you have at least four employees. That sentence skips the construction one-employee test. Patriot’s tax table, dated July 21, 2026, says Full Service files Florida Reemployment Tax on Form RT-6. Use the RT-20 notice, not a percentage from a software page. Read Patriot’s registration article and Patriot’s tax table. See Patriot on the directory.

What still sits on the employer

• Decide that the $1,500-quarter test, or the 20-week test, has been met.
• File DR-1, or the online Florida Business Tax Application, in the month after the quarter employment begins.
• Hold the seven-digit RT number DOR issues. Do not substitute a Business Partner ID or a sales-tax number.
• Complete any third-party administrator (TPA) or power-of-attorney step the software asks DOR to recognize.
• Enter the rate from the RT-20 notice, not a marketing figure.
• File RT-6 each quarter, even if you paid no wages.
• File the new-hire report within 20 days. An RT-6 does not satisfy that clock.
• Buy workplace injury insurance when the four-employee, one-employee construction, or agricultural test is met. Payroll software does not issue that policy.
• Do not open a state paycheck-withholding account. Florida does not withhold state income tax from paychecks.
• Do not copy another state’s clock onto Florida. File DR-1 in the month after the quarter employment begins.

Related guide: Hiring your first employee lists the federal forms that still apply when Florida has no paycheck withholding.

Related guide: Independent contractor vs employee is the federal label check. No Florida paycheck withholding does not make a worker a contractor.

Related guide: Best payroll software for small business is a checklist for grading a product against reemployment tax when Florida has no paycheck withholding.

Related guide: How to pay employees covers the federal check. Florida still bars taking reemployment tax from wages.

Related guide: Employer payroll taxes percentage is the federal share on top of wages. Florida’s initial reemployment tax rate is 2.7 percent on the first $7,000, and workers do not pay it.

Related guide: How to pay tips to employees covers the federal tip report. Florida still bars taking reemployment tax from wages.

Related guide: How to run payroll is the federal payday. Florida still bars taking reemployment tax from wages.

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