Lead, Payroll Tax

The Payroll Tax Lead independently manages payroll tax compliance and related deliverables across federal, state, and local jurisdictions in a multi-state hybrid work environment. The role serves as the Payroll team’s primary resource and first escalation point for moderately complex employment tax matters, applying strong knowledge and judgment to resolve issues, identify compliance risks, recommend improvements, and coordinate solutions with internal stakeholders, third-party providers, and taxing authorities. The position escalates novel, high-risk, or policy-setting matters to Payroll management.

Essential Job Functions:

Payroll Tax Compliance

• Independently manage federal, state, and local payroll tax compliance, including withholding, unemployment, tax accounts, employee tax treatment, and multi-state and local tax setups.
• Own validation of payroll tax files and resolution of exceptions to ensure accurate and timely remittance and filing; coordinate required funding with the Cash team.”
• Manage payroll tax correspondence, registrations, agency notices, compliance follow-up, and complex employee tax inquiries through resolution.
• Independently analyze and resolve moderately complex payroll tax issues, including multi-jurisdictional withholding, employee work-location changes, tax exceptions, agency discrepancies, and system configuration concerns; perform variance analysis, compliance reviews, Workday tax adjustments, root-cause research, and escalate novel, high-risk, or precedent-setting matters to Payroll leadership.
• Monitor payroll tax law changes, assess impacts to FINRA employees and operations, recommend required configuration or process updates, and coordinate implementation of approved changes with the Payroll management and appropriate stakeholders.
• Own quarter-end and year-end payroll tax activities, including reconciliations, ADP/Smart Compliance coordination, reciprocity review, fringe benefit analysis, W-2 processing, and W-2-C corrections.
• Coordinate annual payroll tax filing activities and serve as the primary Payroll resource for tax-related audit requests, resolving routine matters and escalating material issues to Payroll management.
• Corporate Tax Cross-Functional Responsibilities
• Manage compensation-related analysis and reporting, including Form 990, Form 4720, taxable fringe benefit analysis, and related imputation adjustments.
• Analyze employee data and perform state and local regulatory reporting and filings, including programs such as environmental impact and parking cash-out requirements.

General Payroll      

• Analyze biweekly multi-state payroll results and support processing activities with tax impacts, including retroactive transactions, employee changes, and exception review.
• Lead defined payroll-tax projects and the payroll-tax workstream for system upgrades, enhancements, and user acceptance testing, including evaluation of tax configuration, reporting, controls, and compliance impacts.
• Manage payroll-tax SOPs and identify, recommend, and implement approved improvements to payroll-tax processes, controls, reporting, and system configurations.
• Provide backup payroll support as needed.
• Provide technical guidance, training, and work support to payroll team members on payroll tax procedures, compliance requirements, and issue resolution, without formal people-management responsibility.

Financial Reporting and External Department Support

• Prepare payroll GL reconciliations and journal entries, respond to ad hoc payroll tax data requests, and support ICM control testing.
• Coordinate payroll-tax audit requests, validate supporting documentation, resolve routine inquiries, track responses through completion, and escalate material findings to Payroll management.
• Demonstration of FINRA’s values.
• Collaboration, both in-person and virtually, in furtherance of FINRA’s mission of investor protection and market integrity.

Education/Experience Requirements:

• Bachelor's degree in Accounting, Finance, or a related field, or an equivalent combination of education and experience, and six (6) years of directly applicable multi-jurisdictional payroll and payroll tax compliance experience 
• Advanced knowledge of federal, state, and local employment tax requirements, multi-jurisdictional withholding, payroll tax compliance, and related operational practices 
• Workday Payroll processing experience required; ADP/Smart Compliance experience strongly preferred 
• Strong analytical, research, and problem-solving skills; capable of conducting thorough tax research and communicating findings and recommendations 
• Exemplary verbal and written communication and customer service skills 
• Proficiency with Microsoft Excel, Word, and electronic tax research tools 
• Ability to self-direct and manage multiple priorities simultaneously in a deadline-driven environment 

Work Conditions:

• Hybrid work environment, with defined in-person presence requirements
• Extended hours as needed

For work that is performed in CO, CT, IL, PA, MA, MD, VA, WA, DC, NY, NJ, WA please refer to the chart below for the salary range for the corresponding location. FINRA complies with all state and local pay transparency laws and regulations requiring the disclosure of salary ranges for the position. In addition to location, actual compensation is based on various factors, including but not limited to, the candidate’s skill set, level of experience, education, and market considerations. 

Boston, MA: $96,600 - $172,800

Chicago, IL: $92,400 - $165,300

Denver, CO: $83,900 - $150,300

Jericho, NY: $96,600 - $172,800

Jersey City, NJ: $100,800 - $180,400

Philadelphia, PA: $92,400 - $165,300

New York, NY: $100,800 - $180,400

Rockville, MD: $96,600 - $172,800

Tysons, VA: $96,600 - $172,800

Washington, DC: $96,600 - $ 172,800

Woodbridge, NJ: $96,600 - $172,800

Connecticut State: $83,900 - $180,400

Washington State: $83,900 - $180,400

#LI-Hybrid

To be considered for this position, please submit an application. Applications are accepted on an ongoing basis.

The information provided above has been designed to indicate the general nature and level of work of the position. It is not a comprehensive inventory of all duties, responsibilities and qualifications required.

Please note: If the “Apply Now” button on a job board posting does not take you directly to the FINRA Careers site, enter www.finra.org/careers into your browser to reach our site directly.

Employees may be eligible for a discretionary bonus in addition to base pay. Non-exempt employees are also eligible for overtime pay in accordance with federal, state, or local law. As part of its dedication to employee wellness, FINRA provides comprehensive health, dental and vision insurance. Additional insurance includes basic life, accidental death and dismemberment, supplemental life, spouse/domestic partner and dependent life, and spouse/domestic partner and dependent accidental death and dismemberment, short- and long-term disability, long-term care, business travel accident, disability and legal. FINRA offers immediate participation and vesting in a 401(k) plan with company match and eligibility for participation in an additional FINRA-funded retirement contribution, tuition reimbursement, commuter benefits, and other benefits that support employee wellness, such as adoption assistance, backup family care, surrogacy benefits, employee assistance, and wellness programs.

Time Off and Paid Leave*

FINRA encourages its employees to focus on their health and wellness in many ways, including through a generous time-off program starting at 15 days of paid time off (increasing with years of service, up to 25 days), 5 personal days, and 9 sick days, unless otherwise required by law (all pro-rated in the first year). Additionally, we are proud to support our communities by providing two volunteer service days (based on full-time schedule). Other paid leave includes military leave, jury duty leave, bereavement leave, voting and election official leave for federal, state or local primary and general elections, care of a family member leave (available after 90 days of employment); and childbirth and parental leave (available after 90 days of employment). Full-time employees receive nine paid holidays.

*Based on full-time schedule

Important Information

FINRA’s Code of Conduct imposes restrictions on employees’ investments and requires financial disclosures that are uniquely related to our role as a securities regulator. FINRA employees are required to disclose to FINRA all brokerage accounts that they maintain, and those in which they control trading or have a financial interest (including any trust account of which they are a trustee or beneficiary and all accounts of a spouse, domestic partner or minor child who lives with the employee) and to authorize their broker-dealers to provide FINRA with duplicate statements for all of those accounts. All of those accounts are subject to the Code’s investment and securities account restrictions, and new employees must comply with those investment restrictions—including disposing of any security issued by a company on FINRA’s Prohibited Company List or obtaining a written waiver from their Executive Vice President—by the date they begin employment with FINRA. Employees may only maintain securities accounts that must be disclosed to FINRA at one or more securities firms that provide an electronic feed (e-feed) of data to FINRA, and must move securities accounts from other securities firms to a firm that provides an e-feed within three months of beginning employment.

You can read more about these restrictions here.

As standard practice, employees must also execute FINRA’s Employee Confidentiality and Invention Assignment Agreement without qualification or modification and comply with the company’s policy on nepotism.

Washington state applicants: click here for required notice(s).

Search Firm Representatives

Please be advised that FINRA is not seeking assistance or accepting unsolicited resumes from search firms for this employment opportunity. Regardless of past practice, a valid written agreement and task order must be in place before any resumes are submitted to FINRA. All resumes submitted by search firms to any employee at FINRA without a valid written agreement and task order in place will be deemed the sole property of FINRA and no fee will be paid in the event that person is hired by FINRA.

FINRA is an Equal Opportunity Employer

All qualified applicants receive consideration for employment without regard to any legally protected category, including race, color, age, national origin, ethnicity, religion, disability, genetic information, military or veteran status, sex, or any other status or classification protected by state or local law.

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FINRA abides by the requirements of 41 CFR 60-741.5(a). This regulation prohibits discrimination against qualified individuals on the basis of disability and requires affirmative action by covered prime contractors and subcontractors to employ and advance in employment qualified individuals with disabilities.

FINRA abides by the requirements of 41 CFR 60-300.5(a). This regulation prohibits discrimination against qualified protected veterans and requires affirmative action by covered prime contractors and subcontractors to employ and advance in employment qualified protected veterans.

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