Senior Accountant - Payroll

Role Description: 

The Senior Accountant is a key member of ShipBob’s Accounting team, responsible for ensuring the accuracy, integrity, and timeliness of all payroll-related accounting activities across our global operations. In this role, you will own end-to-end payroll accounting processes – from journal entry preparation and balance sheet reconciliations to audit support and cross-functional collaboration – playing a critical part in ShipBob’s financial close cycle and internal control environment. This is a highly visible role operating at the intersection of Accounting, Payroll Operations, HR, and Finance, requiring both technical accounting expertise and the ability to work effectively across teams and geographies. This role reports to the Senior Accounting Manager – GL, with a dotted-line reporting relationship to the Global Payroll Manager. 

What you’ll do: 

• Prepare, record, and review global payroll journal entries; own all payroll accruals (PTO, bonuses, commissions, equity impacts, and statutory employer costs) ensuring accuracy and alignment with GAAP. 

• Perform monthly balance sheet reconciliations for payroll, benefits, taxes, and bonus liabilities; identify and resolve variances between payroll results and GL accounts. 

• Prepare monthly financial statement flux analysis and variance commentary for payroll-related accounts, providing clear explanations of period-over-period changes to Finance and senior leadership. 

• Maintain the global accounting payroll close checklist, coordinating with Payroll Operations, Finance, HR, and regional partners; ensure timely/accurate booking of entries for temporary labor, contractors, and agency workers. 

• Serve as a key resource for global financial audits (internal, external, and statutory), owning all payroll accounting-related schedules, documentation, and walkthrough narratives; support SOX readiness and pre-IPO compliance efforts. 

• Assist with payroll tax reconciliations including quarterly and annual filings; support W-2 and global statutory year-end reporting; validate tax setups, withholding rules, and GL account mappings. 

• Work with international payroll providers to ensure reporting feeds are complete and timely; standardize accounting processes across US, India, Australia, UK, Spain, and future expansion countries. 

• Partner with HR, FP&A, Total Rewards, AP, and Legal on compensation changes, benefits updates, and regulatory impacts; act as a subject-matter resource for payroll accounting questions across the organization. 

• Build and maintain formal process documentation, reconciliation schedules, and controls; identify opportunities to streamline and automate payroll-to-GL integrations and reporting workflows. 

• Support special projects including system implementations, integrations, acquisitions, and country expansions. 

• Other duties/responsibilities as necessary. 

What you’ll bring to the table: 

• Bachelor’s degree in Accounting or Finance required; CPA or active CPA candidacy highly preferred. 

• 3–5+ years of progressive accounting experience, with at least 2 years focused on payroll accounting or compensation accounting within a multi-entity or global organization. 

• Sound working knowledge of GAAP (accruals, compensation expense recognition, payroll-related liabilities) and experience with ERP systems such as NetSuite, SAP, or Oracle. 

• Hands-on experience with payroll platforms and third-party providers (ADP, Deel, or equivalent); intermediate-to-advanced Excel skills (pivot tables, XLOOKUP, reconciliation modeling). 

• Demonstrated experience supporting financial audits and SOX compliance, including internal controls documentation, testing, and audit deliverable preparation. 

• Familiarity with multi-jurisdiction payroll tax compliance (federal, state, and international); exposure to international statutory reporting (UK, Australia, India, Spain) is a plus. 

• Excellent analytical and problem-solving skills with exceptional attention to detail; excellent organizational skills with the ability to manage competing priorities during high-volume close periods. 

• Collaborative team player with written and verbal communication skills; comfortable operating in a fast-paced, high-growth environment with a continuous improvement mindset. 

ShipBob believes in transparency while providing a competitive total compensation package with a pay for performance approach. We are targeting a salary range of $84,000 - $114,000 for this role. The full base pay range for this position in our compensation architecture is $77,775 - $129,625. In addition to base salary, this role includes the opportunity to be eligible for participation in the Company's discretionary bonus plan based on Company's plans and in accordance with Company’s policies.