Summary: For a Shanghai primary school with more than 130 staff members, every payslip run was a major monthly task involving time-consuming checks and individual follow-up. This is how its HR team simplified the process.
The Night Before Payday: A Monthly Rerun of the Same “Battle”
Two nights before every payday, the lights in a primary school office in Shanghai’s Pudong district are usually still on. In front of Ms. Zhou, who runs the school’s payroll, lies a spreadsheet listing more than 130 staff members — a full month of salary details for the entire faculty.
For a long time, after exporting this spreadsheet from the finance system, she had to check it line by line and then figure out how to “deliver” it to each person. More than 130 people may not sound like a lot, but behind them are more than 130 confirmations and more than 130 figures that cannot be wrong. In a public school, every cent of payroll must be accurate and on time — and confidential and traceable.
This school is widely recognized as one of the best in its district — more than 2,200 students and over 130 staff, holding a string of municipal honors such as “Shanghai Model School for Student Conduct” and “Shanghai Model School for Family Education.” Behind those honors lie even higher management standards. For Ms. Zhou, payroll leaves almost zero room for error.
The Scenarios That Made It a Headache
What really made the task heavier were a few recurring scenarios.
Start of term, new teachers arriving. Every school year brings new staff, which means adding people and adjusting base figures in the spreadsheet. One change to the sheet, and all the numbers checked earlier have to be redone.
End of term, performance pay and bonuses. With term reviews and year-end rewards, the more line items there are, the higher the chance of error. Every mistake could make a teacher question the school’s management.
School holidays, when no one is on campus. During breaks, teachers scatter across the country — paper payslips can’t reach them in time, and electronic methods raise worries about whether everyone actually received them.
Payroll confidentiality. In the public system, salary is sensitive information. Neither paper slips nor mass emails can guarantee that “only the intended employee can view it.”
These scenarios gradually made Ms. Zhou realize: the problem with issuing payslips wasn’t a lack of effort — it was the lack of a “better tool.”
A Turning Point: The Payslip That Couldn’t Be Recalled
The turning point came from a minor mishap.
After one round of distribution, a teacher’s payslip needed a correction. But in the old tool, a payslip that had already been sent could not be taken back — it couldn’t be edited or recalled, so all she could do was issue another copy and explain it separately. One small correction turned into an awkward conversation.
That incident sealed the school’s decision: switch. In 2024, the school officially dropped its old software and adopted Ant Payslip and purchased a 150-person plan to cover all staff.
After the Switch: From Two Days to Half an Hour
The change was immediate.
No more reformatting the spreadsheet. The existing Excel payroll sheet can be imported and sent directly, eliminating repeated checking and reformatting.
Email delivery made access more flexible. Teachers receive a secure payslip link by email, so they can view their payslips wherever they are — even during school holidays.
Incorrect payslips can be recalled. A payslip can be recalled, corrected, and resent without repeating the entire distribution process.
Acknowledgment status is visible. Viewing and acknowledgment records show which teachers have opened their payslips, giving the payroll team a clear audit trail.
The school reported that Ant Payslip made payslip delivery easier while providing the features its payroll team needed.
What Other Schools Can Learn
Looking back, this primary school’s experience holds lessons for many other schools.
- Scale is not a barrier. More than 130 people fit comfortably in a 150-person plan; a kindergarten of a few dozen or a middle school of a few hundred can both be matched flexibly by headcount.
- Migration costs can be minimal. As long as the payroll is in Excel, the switch requires minimal rework, reducing the burden on the school’s finance team.
- Confidentiality and traceability are non-negotiable. Whether public or private, salary is sensitive information; “acknowledgment tracking, recall, and traceability” should be a must-have on any shortlist.
- Solve the “hassle” first, and the savings will follow. The real value of a payslip tool is freeing the HR staff from repetitive work first; the efficiency gains come naturally after that.
Payslip delivery may be a routine administrative task, but accuracy, privacy, and timely access all affect employees’ trust in the school’s administration. This primary school offers a practical example for other education employers.