Zellis handles UK and Ireland payroll for large employers, with real-time processing, anomaly detection, and support for multiple pay spines and union agreements. Some organisations have used the tool for decades.
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PROS
- Handles multiple pay spines, union agreements, and TUPE transfers common in public sector payroll.
- Security documentation covers ISO 27001, Cyber Essentials Plus, and UK-only data residency.
- Software and fully managed payroll are sold as separately priced options.
CONS
- Minimum term is three years, and licensing bills on authorised capacity including inactive records.
- Availability and support commitments run to UK working hours rather than around the clock.
- Implementation, support tiers, and hosting are charged on top of the per-employee rate.
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Zellis is the payroll engine running underneath a good deal of British public life. ResourceLink, its core product, has been paying council and NHS staff since the 1990s, and the company has been renamed around it twice: NorthgateArinso, then NGA, then Zellis in 2020. Apax funds have owned the group since April 2024, and Moorepay is the sister company for employers under 1,000.
Council committee papers tell you more here than any review site. Wirral has run ResourceLink since 1999, considered a move to Oracle in 2022, and kept Zellis after concluding it would cost more and reduce functionality for council and school users. Telford and Wrekin reviewed the framework and found only one supplier could meet its needs. Belfast City Council's 2025 tender notice states plainly that Zellis is the only company able to maintain its system.
Read that as strength or as lock-in. Argyll and Bute went the other way, its 2025 business case judging ResourceLink no longer fit for purpose. Highland Council has just signed through 2033.
What you get is depth in a narrow lane: multiple pay spines, union agreements, TUPE, school SLAs. What you do not get is anything outside the UK, Ireland, and the Crown Dependencies. Pricing sits on the G-Cloud framework, with a three-year minimum and licensing that counts inactive records, so read the terms as carefully as the rate.
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Zellis says its payroll pays more than 5 million UK and Ireland employees; public records name Wirral Council.
Zellis publishes rates on the GOV.UK G-Cloud framework, not its own site. These are public sector framework rates dated April 2026, per employee monthly excluding VAT.
- HCM AIR, payroll and HR: £4.25 at 1,000 to 2,000 employees, falling to £1.43 above 10,000.
- HCM Cloud, payroll only: £2.71 at 1,000 to 2,000 employees, falling to £0.92 above 10,000.
- Fully managed payroll: £3.15 to £1.79 PEPM, charged on top of the software.
- Modules, implementation at £900 daily, support, and hosting are priced separately.
Private sector quotes may differ, and the minimum term is three years.
UK and Ireland organisations above 1,000 employees with complex statutory payroll, particularly public sector bodies handling multiple pay spines, school SLAs, and TUPE transfers.
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