Payee Onboarding Process
How managers onboard a payee through the guided fork — manager-completes or send-to-payee.
After you create a payee, a manager guides them through onboarding before that payee can be paid: engagement and pay details, allowances and deductions, any representatives, and finally tax ID, payment method, and signed documents (I-9, startwork packet). Onboarding isn't a single linear form — it's a shared scroll that ends at an explicit fork, where the manager chooses whether to finish the record themselves or hand the rest to the payee.
The onboarding scroll and fork
Onboarding is one continuous scroll on the payee detail page, not a numbered wizard. A manager (or the payee, on their own portal) fills in, in order:
- Basics — legal name (business name for a loan-out or vendor), email, phone. Before the payee is approved, this section deliberately collects only name and contact info — no date of birth, tax ID, or address yet.
- Engagement & Union — classification (employee/loan-out/contractor/vendor), union affiliation if applicable, job start date.
- Pay & wages — production role, compensation structure, and pay rate(s). This is also the section a payee needs at least one rate in before Path B, below, can send.
- Allowances and Deductions — per diem, housing, wardrobe, and any deduction lines.
- Representatives — optional; set up an agent or manager if the payee has one.
Right after Representatives, the scroll reaches an explicit "Complete onboarding" card. The product deliberately stops here and asks the manager to choose the next step, rather than assuming the manager will fill in everything themselves.
Two paths, one flow
The fork card lays out both options side by side:
Finish setup yourself. The manager continues directly on the same page: the payee's tax ID (SSN or EIN — encrypted at rest, replace-only once set), the I-9 work-eligibility module, and any outstanding startwork documents. A wet-signed, uploaded Form I-9 satisfies work eligibility — the payee doesn't have to e-sign anything for this path to be complete. Each signed document can still be individually handed off for the payee to e-sign instead of uploading a paper copy, so "finish it yourself" doesn't have to mean paper for every single step.
Employees need a separate Section 2 from the manager — this is a federal requirement, not optional
For employees specifically, uploading the payee's I-9 Section 1 and documents isn't enough on its own. A manager must separately examine the documents the payee uploaded and complete Section 2 — a distinct certification card on the payee record where the examiner records each document's title, issuing authority, document number, and expiration, then certifies under penalty of perjury (the exact federal 8 CFR 274a.2 attestation text) that they examined the originals. Federal law requires this within 3 business days of the employee's start date. Work-authorization status doesn't move from pending to complete for an employee until Section 2 is certified — manager approval of the rest of onboarding does not, by itself, complete work authorization for employees the way it does for loan-outs, contractors, and vendors. Loan-outs, contractors, and vendors don't owe an electronic Section 2 and aren't affected by this gate.
The W-4 is optional and skippable on the payee's behalf. Greenroom never requires it to finish setup, and a skipped W-4 never gets pushed to Check — follow up with the payee directly if you skip it.
Send it to the payee. The manager sends an account-aware link instead. If the payee's email already has a Greenroom account — because they work with another production on the platform — the link reads as an invitation to join this company rather than create a new account; the send mechanism is identical, only the wording changes. The payee then completes the remaining tax, payment, I-9, and signature steps themselves, from any device, without further help from the manager. The link expires after 14 days; if the payee doesn't act in time, re-sending (see Following up with a payee, below) revokes it and issues a fresh one.
First sends are rate-gated
Until the payee has at least one pay rate, the send-to-payee button is disabled, with an inline note explaining that sending becomes available once the payee has a pay rate — with a link back up to Pay & wages. Vendors are exempt (they bill per invoice, not a standing rate, so there's never a rate to wait for). The gate applies only to the very first send — once an invite has gone out, or the payee has an account, resending and password resets are always available. "Finish setup yourself" is never gated.
Startwork packet
The same fork card lets a manager pick which signed-document packet the payee (or the manager, on Path A) works through, or leave it on the company's automatic default. Either path ends in the same set of signed documents, so this choice applies no matter which way the manager sends.
Payment details are separate from the fork
Bank and payment information doesn't live inside either onboarding path. It's a standalone Payment card on the payee detail page — visible both before and after approval, right after the fork — showing the payment method (direct deposit or paper check), bank name, account type, and the routing/account numbers masked to their last 4 digits, with an audited "reveal" action for the full value. An Edit payment method button opens a drawer to make changes.
The edit drawer requires double-entry confirmation (you type the account number twice) and validates the routing number against the standard ABA checksum before saving — a routing number that fails the checksum is rejected with an explanation rather than silently accepted. Payment edits are never blocked by review status, so a manager can fix a bank-detail typo mid-review without waiting for approval to reopen.
Replacing an already-approved payee's bank details isn't silent: Greenroom emails the payee a notice when their bank numbers change post-approval, as an anti-fraud measure. The save itself still goes through — this is a notification, not a block.
Saving progress
While a manager is filling out Path A, entries save automatically to the browser — not the server — so the manager can navigate away and come back without losing work, or recover after a crash or an accidental back-button press. These local drafts never include the tax ID, date of birth, or bank numbers; they expire after 24 hours; and they're cleared on sign-out. Restoring a draft is always an explicit choice — Greenroom offers it in a banner ("Restore" / "Discard draft") rather than silently reapplying it, since this is a payroll record, not a low-stakes form.
Onboarding status
Track where each payee is in the onboarding process using these status indicators.
| Status | Indicator | Description |
|---|---|---|
| Not Started | Yellow | Invitation sent but payee hasn't begun; can send reminder |
| In Progress | Yellow | Payee started onboarding but has incomplete sections; can send reminder |
| Complete | Green | All sections completed, documents uploaded, signatures provided; ready for payroll |
| Needs Review | Red | Submitted but requires administrator review; may need to approve or request changes |
Managing Onboarding
Following up with a payee
There's no separate "reminder" button. You follow up the same way you sent the original link: on the payee's detail page, the Send it to the payee control now offers a re-send, which revokes the outstanding link and issues a fresh one — only the newest link works. This is available any time an invite is outstanding, with no rate-gate to worry about; the gate only ever applies to the first send.
Tracking progress
The payee detail page is a single continuous scroll, not a set of tabs — there's no per-tab badge system to check. Instead:
- A status pill at the top of the page, next to the payee's name, shows where they stand overall.
- A second, more specific pill on the Complete onboarding fork card reflects the manager-approval state.
- Once setup is under way, the fork card also shows a plain-language progress line — "N of M setup steps complete" — with a link straight back to whichever step is unfinished.
See Onboarding status above for what each status value means.
Navigating Payee Details
The payee details page includes breadcrumb navigation at the top — "Payees" followed by the payee's name — for easy navigation back to the payee list. When creating a new payee, breadcrumbs show "Payees > New Payee."
Assisting Payees
Provide support to payees who encounter difficulties during onboarding. This may include answering questions about required information, helping with document uploads, or guiding them through specific steps in the process.
Required Documents by Payee Type
| Payee Type | Required Documents |
|---|---|
| Employee | W-4 form, I-9 verification, direct deposit authorization (if applicable) |
| Contractor | W-9 form, contract agreement, payment authorization |
| Loan-Out | Corporate W-9, corporate documents, payment authorization, corporate agreements |
Onboarding Validation
The system validates information and documents throughout the onboarding process.
Information Validation
Email format is checked for validity, required fields are verified as complete, tax information is validated against IRS requirements, and payment details are confirmed with the financial system.
Document Validation
Required documents are checked for completeness, file formats are verified as acceptable (typically PDF, JPG, PNG), file sizes are validated against limits, and document content is verified for completeness.
Best Practices
- Follow up with payees who haven't completed onboarding after 3-5 days
- Provide proactive support to help payees through the process
- Monitor onboarding completion regularly, especially before payroll deadlines
- Review submitted information thoroughly before approving
- Keep onboarding requirements updated as regulations or company policies change
Tip: Set a calendar reminder to check onboarding status a few days before each payroll run to ensure all necessary payees have completed the process.
Next Steps
Continue with Managing Payee Information to learn about updating payee details, see Payment Details to understand payment configuration, or see Representatives & Payment Direction to set up an agent or manager for a payee.