Senior Payroll Specialist, EMEA

clio; Dublin; On-site; EUR 80,000 - 110,000; Full time

Job summary

Clio is seeking a Senior Payroll Specialist to own UK & Ireland payroll end-to-end within the EMEA payroll team. You will ensure accurate, timely processing and compliance, coordinating with in-country providers and Workday.

You will review complex calculations, strengthen controls and documentation, and lead payroll setup for new countries as Clio grows. Collaboration with audits and training for peers is key.

Qualifications

• UK & Ireland payroll expertise with end-to-end ownership.
• Ability to review and validate complex payroll calculations.
• Strong controls and documentation discipline.
• Experience expanding payroll to new countries.

Responsibilities

• Prepare and process monthly UK & Ireland payroll end-to-end.
• Own complex calculations including terminations and cross-border cases.
• Review outputs across EMEA & APAC pay cycles before payroll release.
• Escalation point for payroll, benefits and tax matters.
• Sign-off on statutory payroll reporting and year-end processes.
• Support payroll setup for new countries and audits.
• Train and coach Payroll Specialists and maintain SOPs.

Skills

UK & Ireland payroll

Workday proficiency

Excel proficiency

Controls & documentation

AI in payroll

Education

CIPP qualification

Tools

Workday

Excel

Job description

Clio is the global leader in legal AI technology, empowering legal professionals and law firms of every size to work smarter, faster, and more securely.

We are transforming the legal experience for all by bettering the lives of legal professionals while increasing access to justice.

Summary

Senior Payroll Specialist, EMEA

About the job

Clio is more than just a tech company-we are a pioneer in legal technology with a mission to transform the legal experience for all. We are bettering the lives of legal professionals with technology solutions that make legal work more efficient, seamless, and effective, contributing towards increased access to justice.

Who you are:

We're looking for an experienced payroll professional to own our UK and Ireland payroll end to end, and to be the second set of eyes on everything the rest of our EMEA payroll team produces. You're the person others come to when a calculation doesn't look right, and you're comfortable holding a colleague's work to a standard - finding the error, explaining the root cause, and confirming the fix. You know UK and Irish payroll legislation deeply, you're rigorous about controls and documentation, and you'd rather build a teammate's capability than quietly rework their output. You're also energised by new territory: as Clio expands into new countries, you're the person who leads the payroll set-up rather than waiting for someone to hand you a process.

What your team does:

Our Payroll team sits within People and delivers accurate, compliant, on-time payroll for Clions across EMEA and beyond. We're a global team with presence in APAC, EMEA, North America and LATAM, and we own payroll and benefits reconciliation, statutory reporting, year-end, and the Workday payroll configuration that makes it all run - and we're actively strengthening our controls and documentation as Clio grows.

What you'll work on:

• Preparing and processing our monthly UK and Ireland payroll cycles end to end - inputs, validations, statutory calculations, funding and payment files, payroll journal entries, invoice payment and month-end reconciliation - working with our in-country providers to deliver on time every month;
• Owning complex and non-routine calculations, including terminations and settlement agreements, statutory and occupational leave payments, salary sacrifice and benefit-in-kind treatment, cross-border and multi-jurisdiction pay cases, and equ ity transactions in Workday;
• Acting as the reviewer on all Payroll Specialist output across our EMEA & APAC pay cycles - payroll register and gross-to-net review, variance analysis, off-cycle and manual payments, and final pay calculations - before payroll is released;
• Being the first escalation point for our Payroll Specialists, taking on the payroll, benefits and tax matters that can't be resolved at first line;
• Reviewing and signing off on statutory payroll reporting and remittances before submission - including HMRC RTI submissions and Revenue payroll submissions - and owning year-end reconciliation and the production of P60, P11D and equivalent Irish year-end reporting;
• Supporting the payroll set-up for new countries as Clio expands - scoping requirements, selecting and onboarding in-country or EOR providers, building the calendar, controls and documentation, and running the first cycles to a stable state;
• Acting as our primary payroll contact for annual financial audits and ad-hoc external payroll and tax audits;
• Training and coaching our Payroll Specialists, and owning the SOPs and operating manuals that keep the function resilient;
• Maintaining Workday, testing configuration changes and releases, and supporting Workday Payroll system changes alongside our Payroll Manager and Payroll Implementation Specialist;

What you bring:

• CIPP qualification (or equivalent), and 5-7 years of progressive payroll experience including at least two years reviewing and approving the work of others.
• Full-cycle UK and Ireland payroll experience, including PAYE, National Insurance, PRSI and USC, RTI and Revenue submissions, pensions auto-enrolment, statutory leave payments, and year-end.
• Experience standing up payroll in a new country, or leading a country onboarding with an in-country provider..
• Advanced Workday and Excel proficiency, and comfort reconciling high volumes of data across systems.
• Rigour when reviewing others' work - you identify the error, explain the root cause, and confirm the correction rather than reworking in isolation.
• Sound judgment on when to decide and when to elevate.
• AI fluency - you actively use AI tools in your day-to-day work and look for ways to apply them to payroll processes, with the judgment to know where human review is non-negotiable.

Bonus points if you have:

• A second-country payroll qualification, or IPASS (Ireland) certification.
• Experience with equity and stock-based compensation payroll reporting.
• Exposure to payroll in other EMEA countries - Spain, Denmark, France, Germany, Ita