PEO/ASO Brokerage
Stop managing HR like it’s your second full-time job.
Whatever seat you’re in — owner, CFO, or HR professional — nobody wants to be buried in HR administration. When you can offload the non-core work at a reasonable cost, your time goes back to what only you can do.
The OIS Group Approach
We evaluate every option across the full market — then work with you to find the fit.
First, the plain-language version: a PEO (Professional Employer Organization) lets you outsource HR, benefits, payroll, and compliance through a co-employment arrangement — often giving small and medium-sized businesses access to big-company benefits and infrastructure. It’s a powerful option, but it isn’t the only one, and it isn’t right for everyone.
Whether or not you’ve already talked to a PEO rep, two questions matter: is this the right structure for your company right now — and is anyone making sure it stays the right one? We help you answer both.
As an independent broker, we have no incentive to push you toward any vendor or structure. We evaluate PEOs, ASOs, payroll-only, and open-market benefits side by side — based on your headcount, industry, budget, and growth — then work with you to determine the best fit.
Compare the Options
What’s the difference between PEO, ASO, and payroll?
It can be confusing — so we lay the options side by side, in plain terms.
Depending on your needs, we help you figure out which fits.
| Features | PEO | ASO | Payroll Only |
|---|---|---|---|
| Group purchasing power (co-employment only) | ✓ | ||
| Transfer of liability (co-employment) | ✓ | ||
| Master health plan & Fortune-500 benefits | ✓ | ||
| Master 401(k) plan & administration | ✓ | ||
| Pooled workers’ comp & EPLI coverage | ✓ | ||
| Employee benefits administration | ✓ | ✓ | |
| HR consultation & support | ✓ | ✓ | |
| Compliance with labor laws | ✓ | ✓ | |
| Unemployment claims management | ✓ | ✓ | |
| Integrated HR & payroll software | ✓ | ✓ | ✓ |
| Payroll administration | ✓ | ✓ | ✓ |
The top rows require a PEO co-employment relationship — the pooled, “master” versions simply don’t exist outside one. With an ASO or payroll-only setup you still have benefits, workers’ comp, EPLI, and a 401(k); in this case, we source these plans for you on the open market and handle the setup so nothing falls through the cracks. We don’t tell you which path wins — we work with you to determine the best fit for where your business is right now, and we stay involved to make sure it’s built out right — and revisited as your business grows, so it still fits in the years ahead.
The hidden cost of doing it yourself.
$37B
LOST EACH YEAR BY U.S. BUSINESSES TO UNPRODUCTIVE MEETINGS
71%
OF EMPLOYEES CONSIDER MOST MEETINGS A WASTE OF TIME
82%
SAY THEY’VE SAT IN MEETINGS THAT COULD HAVE BEEN AN EMAIL
Sources: Atlassian, Asana (2024), Harvard Business Review, Microsoft (2025), Lucid, Fellow.
The True Cost of DIY Due Diligence
Evaluating your options alone vs. with an owner’s rep.
A thorough, on-your-own search of the full PEO, HR, and employee benefits market means a dozen-plus separate meetings, document chases, and proposal reviews — up to 27 hours of work, spread across months. We compress all of it into one discovery meeting and a single side-by-side analysis.
Due Diligence Task
Going it alone
With The OIS Group
PEO discovery meetings (4 vendors)
3 hrs
30–60 min
Gathering documentation / questionnaires
90 min
30 min
Underwriting questions / responses
90 min
20 min
PEO proposal review / follow-up (4 vendors)
5 hrs
Included
Group health benefits broker meetings
3 hrs
Included
Workers’ comp / EPLI quotes
2 hrs
Included
Payroll provider presentations & demos (2–3 vendors)
3 hrs
Included
401(k) provider evaluation
2 hrs
Included
HRIS software demonstrations
3 hrs
1-2 hrs
Side-by-side comparison & analysis
3 hrs
30-90 min
Estimated Total
~27 hrs
3-5 hrs
Save ~24 hours
One meeting with The OIS Group replaces dozens with individual vendors — and you get a better result: an unbiased, side-by-side market analysis instead of a stack of proposals you have to decode yourself.
What You Gain
What the right PEO or ASO actually means for your business.
The right employee benefits package doesn’t just check a box — it changes who you can attract and keep.
FEWER HOURS LOST TO ADMIN
The average owner spends 15–20 hours a month on HR tasks a well-structured setup handles automatically. That time goes back to running the business.
REDUCED EMPLOYER LIABILITY
In a PEO co-employment arrangement, your provider shares employment liability — a meaningful reduction in exposure as you grow.
BENEFITS THAT COMPETE
Through economies of scale, PEOs offer Fortune 500-style benefits normally out of reach for smaller employers — often richer and more affordable, though not always. Our side-by-side analysis shows how they compare to the open market.
COMPLIANCE YOU CAN TRUST
Employment law changes constantly. The right structure means someone is accountable for keeping up — not you.
ONE PLATFORM, NOT SIX
Payroll, onboarding, time tracking, compliance — consolidated into one system your team actually uses.
A SETUP THAT SCALES
The right structure today should still work at twice your headcount — we build that in from the start, so you’re not re-running this whole search in two years
Stay in the Loop
HR & benefits insights,
to your inbox
Plain-language breakdowns of PEO, HR compliance, and benefits — written for business owners, not HR attorneys. Once a month, no fluff.