Netchex vs. FrankCrum: Which HR and Payroll Platform Is Right for Your Business in 2026?

It’s Tuesday afternoon, and a foreman needs a new crew member added before Friday’s payroll. If your payroll lives inside a PEO, you don’t just add them. You send the change to your payroll coordinator and wait for it to come back. That handoff sits at the center of the Netchex vs FrankCrum decision.

FrankCrum is a family-owned Professional Employer Organization based in Clearwater, Florida, and it’s been in business since 1981. It’s especially popular with contractors, skilled trades, and franchise owners, partly because it owns its own workers’ comp insurance company. Netchex is payroll and HR software your team runs directly. One model makes FrankCrum a co-employer of your workforce. The other keeps you as the only employer your people have.

Last updated: September 2026. Netchex data sourced from G2. FrankCrum details come from FrankCrum’s own site and press releases, plus the IRS public list of Certified PEOs, checked September 2026.

The Short Version

FrankCrum wraps payroll, HR advice, benefits, and workers’ comp into one co-employment package. Its biggest draw is real: an in-house, AM Best-rated workers’ comp carrier with pay-as-you-go premiums and no year-end audit. The cost of that package is structural. Your employees become FrankCrum’s co-employees, your payroll runs through FrankCrum’s coordinator, and administrative fees are set per employee, so they rise as you hire.

Netchex gives your team direct control instead. You stay the sole employer, under your own EIN. You keep your own benefits plans and your own broker. Most teams run payroll in about 15 minutes with OneScreen Payroll, and a US-based, FPC-certified support team answers 90% of calls in under a minute.

Company Overview

	Netchex	FrankCrum
Business model	Payroll and HR software, you remain the sole employer	Professional Employer Organization (co-employment)
Headquarters	Louisiana	Clearwater, Florida
Founded	2003	1981
Ownership	Privately held	Privately owned by the Crum family
Benefits	Your own plans, your own broker, administered in Netchex	FrankCrum’s master health plans
Workers’ comp	Your own policy, placed through your broker	Typically through Frank Winston Crum Insurance, FrankCrum’s own carrier

Netchex vs FrankCrum: Who Actually Employs Your Crew?

FrankCrum doesn’t hide how its model works. Its own site describes FrankCrum PEO as partnering with businesses “as a co-employer.” In practice, that means FrankCrum becomes an employer of record for payroll taxes and benefits, and your wages get reported under the PEO’s tax ID. Your superintendent still runs the job site. On paper, though, your crew now has two employers.

Benefits follow the same pattern. FrankCrum says its PEO model gives clients access to master health plans. That’s how PEOs get group buying power, and it can be appealing for a 20-person shop. But the plan belongs to the PEO, not to you. If you leave, your people lose that coverage and you’ll need to rebuild benefits, tax accounts, and payroll history in your own company’s name.

One more detail worth checking. FrankCrum isn’t on the IRS’s public list of Certified Professional Employer Organizations as of our September 2026 review. A CPEO carries certain federal employment tax protections for its clients. A non-certified PEO doesn’t offer that layer.

With Netchex, none of this applies. There’s no co-employer and no shared tax ID. Your people work for you, and their benefits are plans you picked with a broker you trust.

Structure	Netchex	FrankCrum
Who employs your people	You, as the sole employer	You and FrankCrum, as co-employers
Tax ID your wages report under	Your own EIN	The PEO’s
Whose benefits plan it is	Yours, with your broker	FrankCrum’s master health plans
What happens if you leave	Nothing to unwind, you already own it all	Benefits, tax accounts, and payroll history move back to you

Who Runs Your Payroll Day to Day

FrankCrum assigns every client a payroll coordinator who handles processing, deductions, garnishments, withholdings, and PTO. Its MyFrankCrum platform lets you submit and approve payroll, but the site is clear that the system “powers the workflows our FrankCrum team relies on.” Your admin enters the numbers. FrankCrum’s team runs the process.

Some owners like that. Plenty of payroll admins don’t. When you want a new pay code for a prevailing-wage job, a different approval path for a second location, or a report shaped the way your CFO reads it, you’re asking someone else to make it happen. Your payroll runs through their coordinator, on their process.

Tools matter too. FrankCrum’s own technology page marks several modules with “Additional fee applies,” including time and attendance (powered by UKG), applicant tracking (JazzHR), and custom onboarding forms. For a contractor with field crews clocking in across job sites, time tracking isn’t optional.

Netchex puts payroll, time and attendance, benefits administration, recruiting, onboarding, and performance in one system your team configures and runs. OneScreen Payroll gets most teams through a run in about 15 minutes. Support is there when you want it, not standing between you and your own payroll.

I love the integrated platform. With our old payroll company you would have to make the same change in several different areas of the software. With Netchex, it only takes once. This system is so user-friendly, it makes training a breeze. And the customer service is second to none!

Source: Chris Hayes, Payroll Specialist, Netchex customer

How the Fees Grow With Your Headcount

FrankCrum deserves credit for explaining its bill more openly than most PEOs. Its site lists what appears on each invoice: FICA, FUTA, SUTA, workers’ comp, administrative fees, its FrankAdvice HR service, EPLI, cyber liability, and any benefits you choose. It still quotes every client individually.

And by FrankCrum’s own description, that quote is built on your payroll size, your employee count, your industry’s workers’ comp risk, and your benefits selections, with administrative fees charged per employee on a sliding scale. Put plainly, the fee is tied to your headcount. Every seasonal hire and every new crew adds to it, on top of the wages, taxes, premiums, and comp you’d owe anyway.

Reviewers of other large PEOs describe where that leads. On Capterra, TriNet reviewers cite “rising per-employee costs at scale.” A crew that doubles in size doesn’t just double your wage bill. It grows the PEO’s cut too.

With Netchex, you’re paying for software and service. There’s no co-employment fee stacked on your own benefits, because the benefits already belong to you.

Where FrankCrum Is Genuinely Strong

Workers’ comp is FrankCrum’s calling card, and it earns it. The company owns Frank Winston Crum Insurance, an AM Best-rated carrier, so it can cover higher-risk trades like construction, roofing, and electrical work. Premiums are pay-as-you-go with no year-end audit, and contractors can pull certificates of insurance from MyFrankCrum any time a GC asks for one.

It’s also stable. Same family, same Clearwater campus, no private-equity owner looking for an exit. If you’re a small contractor who wants one phone number for payroll, HR, and comp, those are good reasons to consider it. Just know you’re buying that convenience with your employer relationship and a fee that scales with your crew.

Service and Support

FrankCrum’s model surrounds you with specialists: a payroll coordinator, an HR consultant, a benefits specialist, a safety specialist, and an account manager. That’s a lot of hands. It also means the team you depend on works for the PEO, and when someone on that team changes, you start over with a new contact.

Netchex takes a different approach. Every customer gets a dedicated Account Manager, backed by a US-based, FPC-certified support team that answers 90% of calls in under a minute, with first-call resolution. Customers rate that service 4.8/5, and G2 reviewers score it 8.9/10 for Quality of Support.

Netchex has the best support of any service provider I’ve ever worked with. There aren’t any hoops to jump through with Netchex support.

Source: Mary Lang, Accounting and Financial Control Director, Atlanta Air Charter, Inc.

Service factor	Netchex	FrankCrum
Who processes payroll	Your team, in Netchex	A FrankCrum payroll coordinator
Who you call	A dedicated Account Manager and a US-based, FPC-certified team	FrankCrum’s PEO service team
Time tracking and recruiting	In the same system as payroll and HR	Add-on modules marked “Additional fee applies”

Switching Considerations

Leaving any PEO takes a plan, and leaving FrankCrum has one extra step. Because FrankCrum clients typically get workers’ comp through its own carrier, you’ll need a standalone comp policy lined up through your broker before you go. Your workforce also moves back under your own EIN, and benefits get set up in your company’s name.

Netchex treats that move as a project, not a favor. Implementation is free and project-managed, takes about six weeks, and includes your data import. Customers rate it at 96% implementation satisfaction. Netchex works directly with your benefits broker and CPA, so the handoff doesn’t land on one admin’s desk.

Who Each One Is Actually Built For

Choose FrankCrum if: you’re a smaller contractor or franchise owner who wants payroll, HR, benefits, and workers’ comp bundled under one outside provider, you value an in-house comp carrier, and you’re comfortable with a co-employer sharing your employer relationship.

Choose Netchex if: you want your own team running payroll and HR, you want your crew to stay your employees, and you’d rather your admin costs weren’t tied to every person you hire. Netchex is built for hourly, multi-location businesses with lean HR teams.

Comparing more than two options? Our list of the 5 best FrankCrum alternatives lines up PEOs and direct software side by side. For the bigger picture, read 5 Best PEO Alternatives for Growing Businesses.

Frequently Asked Questions

This guide reflects publicly available product information and independent reviewer data as of September 2026. Feature availability may vary by plan. Contact each provider for current details.

Disclaimer: Any product roadmap or future plans provided herein are for informational purposes only. They do not represent a commitment to deliver any material, code, feature, or functionality. Plans may change without notification. The development, release and timing of any features or functionality described remain at the sole discretion of Netchex, its affiliates, and partners. Netchex does not give legal, tax, or accounting advice. You are responsible for ensuring your use of Netchex product meets your individual business and compliance requirements.

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