Bristol, UK: April 2025: The London Borough of Harrow has selected Zellis, the leading provider of AI-enabled HR and payroll software to the UK and Ireland, as its payroll provider of choice following a competitive government tender. Just six months into the partnership, the Borough Council has already reduced payroll processing time by fifty percent. This allows the team to start processing the next cycle sooner, with more time to resolve issues as they arise.
The London Borough of Harrow has a resident population of 260,000 and is committed to serving people’s needs, including those of its own 2,500 employees and 6,000 pensioners. After the Borough Council’s existing payroll provider gave notice that it would be exiting UK operations, Harrow had just over a year to identify and implement a new payroll system before December 2024.
The Harrow procurement team selected Zellis due to its proven experience in local government, strong automation capabilities, and complementary technology infrastructure. A clear partnership ethos and strong cultural fit were cited as key factors in the decision.
Ben Goward, Director of IT at London Borough of Harrow, said: “We needed a system that was very referenceable in UK local government; a payroll partner that was established in our space. That was very important because we had this cliff-edge deadline. If we didn’t get our payroll migrated [in time], we wouldn’t be able to pay our 2,500 staff and 6,000 pensioners.”
“It was also important that, in addition to meeting our deadline, the chosen payroll solution could integrate with our existing Microsoft Dynamics HR system,” added Goward. “Beyond that, we wanted a partner that would provide a good cultural fit because we really care about our delivery culture and how we work together with our partners.”
The Borough Council was looking to reduce administrative burden and increase efficiencies in its payroll department.
Head of Payroll at London Borough of Harrow, Yvette Salthouse, explained: “We tend to get a lot of late notifications because we have a large frontline workforce. That was creating quite a bit of manual data entry so we wanted [a payroll system] that would automate a lot of that — and in a joined-up way.”
The Zellis implementation began in April 2024 and went live, as planned, in November 2024 – one month before Harrow’s deadline.
Just six months into the partnership, the Harrow team also reports a substantial 50% reduction in payroll processing time due to fewer manual interventions and increased automation. A task that used to take the payroll team four days to complete each month has been reduced to just two days, creating significant efficiency gains. Salthouse added: “The knock-on effect is that we can now open the next month’s payroll earlier. That’s helpful because we can start processing the next pay cycle and get ahead of ourselves, which reduces the pressure on us as a team.”
“To learn that, just six months in, the organisation has also reduced its payroll processing by 50% is absolutely fantastic,” added Dresner, “and we’re fully committed to building on these tangible productivity benefits as the partnership progresses.”
ENDS
About Zellis
Zellis powers organisations to achieve better outcomes through exceptional employee experiences. We are the leading supplier of AI-enabled human resources (HR), payroll, and workforce management (WFM) software, and managed services, for UK and Ireland-based midsize to large size employers. In 2025 we acquired elementsuite, bringing together their AI enabled HR and WFM suite with our own award-winning payroll and HR platform. Combined, we offer best-in-class tools and expertise through an end-to-end solution which delivers the AI-enabled HR, WFM, and payroll outcomes our customers need. Zellis was named Payroll Software Supplier of the Year at the Global Payroll Awards 2024. Our flagship solution, Zellis HCM Cloud has won the Payroll Software of the Year Award (CIPP 2020, 2021, and 2024) and Payroll & HR Software Product Award (The Rewards 2019, 2021, 2023, and 2024).
