person responsible for all this work, tucked away in this little cupboard area, and we paid by using little brown envelopes with the money in them. I remember we had a contact in HMRC who we could phone and speak to directly. Then, at year- end, we would literally walk all the documents round to the local HMRC office and physically turn in. This was so very different than now, with real-time information and everything being done on computers. GPA: What was next for you in payroll? Lisa Orton: After about three years, I thought I needed a change, I needed to have an opportunity to see some progression. I went to do payroll for Birmingham Metropolitan College, and things were very different from the factory setting as I was paying lecturers and such. After that I moved into doing payroll for a firm in construction, which also was very different than my previous experiences. It was there I got my first chance to experience a global payroll, handling pay for expats coming
in and out of the UK and how their pay needed to be treated for tax purposes in this country compared to their home country. It’s that role that later got me into consulting work around global payroll. Getting into consulting was a big change for me. The practice at the first, large consulting firm I worked at involved not just helping clients with their payroll but also doing the payroll for some clients on their behalf. That again was a completely new experience for me which again I loved. I was there for seven years, helped lead and grow their clientele, and then went to PWC, where I also grew their business and then PWC sold the global mobility unit to a private equity business. I’ve spent the last seven years with first PWC and then that company. GPA: Tell us about your current role. Lisa Orton: I lead the UK payroll operations for clients, which means we actually process and operate payrolls for several hundred clients and a lot of that is international payroll. It’s expat payroll. It’s very niche areas like VIP payrolls or non-executive directors or things that have unique complexities. So, they’re all areas that I would say you don’t
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ISSUE 21 GLOBAL PAYROLL MAGAZINE
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