payroll

/ˌpeɪˈroʊl/

/ˈpeɪrəʊl/

Other forms: payrolls

A company's payroll is a complete list of everyone who works there and how much money they make. The small coffee shop where you work might have just four employees on its payroll.

Any business or organization with a paid staff has a payroll. A school's payroll might include the principal, teachers, office workers, school nurse, and maintenance workers, for example. You can also use the term payroll for the entire amount of money that a company pays its workers over the course of a year, or for the department that calculates these salaries and hands out paychecks.

Definitions of payroll

1. noun

   a list of employees and their salaries
   “the company had a long payroll”

   synonyms: paysheet

   type of:

   register

   a book in which names and transactions are listed
2. noun

   the total amount of money paid in wages
   “the company had a large payroll”

   synonyms: paysheet

   type of:

   amount, amount of money, sum, sum of money

   a quantity of money
3. noun

   the department that determines the amounts of wage or salary due to each employee
   synonyms: payroll department

   type of:

   department, section

   a specialized division of a large organization