GC-Required Certified Payroll Software: How to Comply When Your Prime Mandates the Platform

The Certified Payroll Software Your GC Requires: How to Comply

Most subcontractors do not pick their certified payroll software. On a covered job, the general contractor or the awarding agency mandates the platform, and you file through whatever they chose. LCPtracker is the one that comes up most. "A lot of GCs and agencies actually require it," one contractor wrote on r/CertifiedPayroll, "so you might end up on it anyway." People search for gc required certified payroll software hoping to compare tools. The honest version is narrower: the prime requires me to submit through platform X, now what? This page answers it: how to find out which platform your job uses, how to submit to the common ones, whether your existing payroll can feed it, and what you still owe after the portal is chosen for you.

This is an independent, affiliate-supported page, not a neutral one. If you book a demo through a link here, we may earn a commission; it never changes what we say (see the affiliate disclosure). We do not sell these platforms, and on a mandated job you are complying with one, not buying one.

First move: find out which platform your job actually uses

• Ask the prime's project manager or compliance contact which portal they file certified payroll through.
• Check the subcontract's labor-compliance exhibit; the platform is often named there.
• Raise it at the pre-construction meeting, before your first payroll runs.
• On California public works, the default is the state DIR eCPR unless the awarding body names another system.
• Confirm your payroll provider can export that portal's file format before you assume you can upload.

Many larger GCs hire a compliance company to collect and review certified payroll from every sub. That firm picks the portal, and kicks your report back when a line is off.

Ask the prime four things: which portal you submit through, who creates your login, what file format it accepts for upload, and what deadline they enforce. A sub on a couple of federal projects described the stakes: "the prime wants certified payroll submitted weekly, no exceptions." Knowing the platform on day one is the difference between a clean workflow and a month of resubmissions. It also tells you whether your payroll system can feed the thing, the next real question.

Why the prime or agency will not just take your PDF

The submission duty is in the contract clause. Under 29 CFR 5.5(a)(3)(ii), every covered contractor and subcontractor must submit a weekly certified payroll with a signed Statement of Compliance. The prime carries flow-down responsibility for its subs; the agency monitors the whole job. Across a dozen subs and forty weeks, nobody wants to reconcile forty PDFs a week by hand.

This is what makes gc required certified payroll software different from a normal buying decision: you are not the buyer. The platform is a monitoring tool first, your convenience second. LCPtracker, California's DIR eCPR, eMars, and B2Gnow all exist to centralize that flow. Federal and state agencies run weekly Davis-Bacon payroll tracking through these portals, where reports are uploaded and electronically signed online rather than emailed. That is the model you are joining.

The mandated platforms, and what a sub does on each

Here is the cross-platform view no vendor onboarding page gives you: where you meet each system, how you get in, and how a sub submits. Every platform below is davis-bacon compliance software, prevailing wage software built around the wage determination. It is the mandated set that shows up most in federal and state public works.

The prime mandates the platform; the sub submits into it every payroll week

Read the table as a router, not a review. The exact clicks change: vendors redesign, and an awarding body can wrap any of these in its own rules, so confirm the current steps with the compliance firm or the help docs. And this is the point of the page: every platform validates the format of what you enter, but none decides whether your classification and rate were right. That never leaves your desk.

Can your QuickBooks, ADP, or Sage export feed the portal?

The integration anxiety that fills the software threads is well founded. One contractor laid out the trap after a job under a bigger GC that used LCPtracker: "I had to get on the phone with my payroll provider and explain exactly what LCPtracker wanted. It took multiple tries and corrections on both ends." Their advice is the section in one line: "check your payroll subscription and see if your provider can actually export LCPtracker-compatible CPRs or integrate with it. Otherwise you're gonna be stuck in revision hell." See the head-to-head, eBacon vs LCPtracker.

QuickBooks is the common sore spot: it holds pay data and exports a register, but not a portal-ready file. A painting contractor who ran QuickBooks Online for almost three years was blunt: "all certified payroll has to be re-created and sent to each general contractor... It cannot be done inside of QuickBooks." Some shops bridge the gap with a third-party certified payroll reporting tool that exports the portal's format; others accept manual entry. Sage and ADP feeds behave the same way: it depends on the exact export, not the brand name. Ask about the integrations your provider supports, hand it the portal's import spec, and get a yes or no before the job starts.

What you still owe, even when the platform is mandated

Your QuickBooks, ADP, or Sage export rarely feeds the portal without reformatting

The mandated tool is not a safety net. LCPtracker or DIR eCPR confirm your columns add up and your form is complete. Neither tells you the wage determination lists $18.75 base plus a separate hourly fringe, or that the worker you filed as a laborer did operator work. The WH-347 automation each platform advertises still needs correct inputs; garbage in is accepted, then flagged in an audit. Put plainly: gc required certified payroll software checks your format, not whether your rate was right.

Three numbers stay your job, every week, on every platform:

• The right determination and classification. Pull the current county determination from SAM.gov and match each worker to the classification whose duties they performed. Wrong-classification underpayment is what monitors catch most.
• Fringe per hour worked. The determination lists an hourly fringe rate; you owe it on actual hours, not a flat weekly amount. Pay $750 flat to someone who logs 46 hours and the fringe drops to about $16.30 against an $18.75 rate. The fringe-per-hour guide walks the math, and the certified payroll calculator runs it per worker.
• The weekly deadline. Reports are due within seven days of the pay date under 29 CFR 5.5(a)(3)(ii)(A), including no-work weeks the prime wants on file.

Get those right before the data reaches the portal; the certified payroll pillar covers the full weekly workflow. If you have a free hand on tools, the software comparison and eBacon vs LCPtracker cover the self-serve alternatives, including Foundation Software for accounting plus certified payroll in one ledger. Or hand the reporting to a payroll consultant, for "the assurance that it is done correctly." On a mandated job the tool is settled; only the math is yours.

How to ask the prime for a different format

Pick the battles that save you time. The prime will not drop LCPtracker for your convenience; it is their monitoring backbone. What is reasonable is a written import spec, a first-submission walkthrough, and a named contact at the compliance firm. Those turn "revision hell" into a repeatable Friday routine. If the format genuinely breaks on a legitimate edge case, a multi-state crew or an unusual classification, raise it early and in writing, naming the field that fails. A precise question about one field gets an answer; a request to skip the platform gets a no.

Frequently asked questions