Enterprise gold and payroll

@GingerTexas  Gotta say, the column for QuickBooks Enterprise Gold sounds like they're applying income tax bracket methodology to the employee count, but in reverse.

It'd be funny except it's really not.

Thanks for taking the time to reach out to the QuickBooks Community, @GingerTexas.

How are you doing today? I hope all is well. 

There will be an increase in fees per employee (EE) for our Gold users, which are applied at each level and discounted as the number of employees paid increases. For 15 EEs, the first 9 will be priced at $3/EE/month, the next 6 will be priced at $2.50/EE/month. I'm pleased to inform you that this is the only change for our Gold users. 

Beginning August 1, 2025, QuickBooks Enterprise Gold customers who use payroll will start on their next renewal date. The per-employee fee will be billed monthly, based on the number of unique employees paid.

You can read more about these changes in: Announcing upcoming innovations, changes to QuickBooks pricing, and FAQs. 

If you have any additional questions or concerns about the price changes, please don't hesitate to let us know. Take care! 

@GingerTexas 

Our client started trying third-party payroll apps and downgrade to Enterprise Silver to lower their expenses. Some of them were even downgrade to Pro/Premier + 3rd party payroll app.

As an accountant, I considered QuickBooks Desktop to be one of the best on the market, and have been using the program for over 20 years.  I have been an advocate for QuickBooks desktop and have signed up more clients than I can count with QuickBooks.  When they payroll and software hikes started getting steep several years ago, I helped several businesses switch from Pro/Premier to Enterprise Gold to save them some money, as payroll was completely included.  And now that these clients are paying for the more costly program, Intuit is tacking on payroll costs.  What a slimy move! It is fascinating to me that Intuit is abandoning their original client base by pricing themselves out of the market for small businesses. Guess what, Intuit, the large businesses are too big for you, so quit thinking you can charge as much as the big programs.  The rate of increases to both software pricing and payroll pricing is extraordinary. The strong arming of Intuit to get businesses to switch to QuickBooks Online is also absurd.  All business are not square pegs and QBO is not a good fit for everyone. Intuit has killed my loyalty to QuickBooks.  Congratulations, Intuit, you have just created a boom for your payroll competitors, like ADP & Gusto, as that is what I will be suggesting to clients to use as opposed to paying Intuit their ridiculously overpriced fees. No need to reply with an AI response, QuickBooks Team.  I just needed to rant and let the community know they are once again going to be disappointed by the Intuit price hikes.  I hope Intuit will wake up and realize who has been buttering their bread all these years and make some changes at the corporate level. 

I understood the new payroll per employee fee would start after our annual renewal following August 2025 and that sounds the same as Tori explained. Our annual renewal is December 19, 2025 but we were charged the fee for October. I wasn't expecting it until January 2026 after receiving the first month free as noted in the email.

I called priority circle support and was told it started in August and had nothing to do with our annual renewal date.

Please clarify this for me.

Thanks,

Carmel Brown

Global Maintenance, LLC

Hi there,

Thank you for reaching out and allowing us to clarify the situation. The new payroll per employee starts based on your actual billing cycle, not strictly your annual renewal date.

Although you expected the fee after December 19, 2025, the charge began in August 2025 as per the updated pricing for QuickBooks Payroll Enhanced. The first month free offer applies from the start of the new fee schedule, which Priority Circle support confirmed began in August. This means the October charge reflects the new fee structure effective from August, regardless of your December renewal date.

You can refer to this article to understand changes to your per-employee fees: Understand changes to your per-employee fees.

For additional clarification about your situation, I recommend contacting our support team. They will collect the necessary information and provide you with clear guidance on the next steps.

Here's how you can contact them:

1. Open your QuickBooks Desktop.
2. From the Help menu, select Contact Desktop Help.
3. Click Contact Us.
4. You can type your concerns.
5. Click Continue.
6. Follow the on-screen instructions to contact us via Chat with, or have us call you.

You can also check this link to see their support hours and when agents are available.

You can return here whenever you need assistance.