Construction payroll softwareThe right rate on every hour, before payroll sees it.
Appello prices every hour the way your union agreement or prevailing wage job pays it: by trade level, wage region, overtime rules, travel zone, board and parking. Foremen log hours by job on the phone, or the office enters a crew in bulk. Once the week is approved and locked, Appello exports it to the payroll system you already run. Appello does not run payroll, withhold taxes or fill in certified payroll forms. It hands your payroll system hours and rates that are already right.
Union and prevailing wage rules, built in
On a union or public job, the rate on a timesheet row depends on half a dozen things. Appello keeps each one on the record.
Agreements with start dates
Each agreement version has its own rates and start date. Hours before the date keep the old rates, and approved days never change.
Prevailing wage by region
Each wage region keeps its own rate table, and every job sits in one region. A crew moving between jobs is paid each job's rate.
Rates built from their parts
Each rate is a base wage plus fringe items like vacation pay or health and welfare, added up for you.
Overtime by the agreement
Daily and weekly thresholds per agreement and wage region split a crew's hours into straight time and overtime when the office enters them in bulk. Overtime carries its own rate.
Travel, board and parking
Travel zones measured from the union hall, the office or the worker's home. Travel, board and parking are paid once a day, not once per job.
Exports to your payroll system
Only approved hours export, to QuickBooks Online, QuickBooks Desktop (IIF), Sage 50 US, Payroll4Construction, ComputerEase or a plain CSV. A locked week can't be edited.
Why the record behind each row matters
On Davis-Bacon and state prevailing wage work, you pay from the hours, classification and rate on every row. Appello keeps the three together.
- 1A classification on every rowEach worker has a trade level, and hours can be logged at a different classification when the job calls for it.
- 2Geofenced clock-inA radius per job. A punch outside it is flagged with a reason, not blocked.
- 3A locked weekOnce approved and locked, the hours you exported are the hours on record.
What Appello leaves to your payroll provider
- Running payroll, paychecks, tax withholding, filings and W-2s.
- Filling in the WH-347 or any state certified payroll form. Appello holds the hours, classifications and rates those forms are built from, and exports them to CSV.
- Union dues and fringe benefit remittance reports to the hall.
Contractors running on Appello
Questions contractors ask
Does Appello run payroll?
No. Appello works out hours and rates, then exports an approved, locked week to the payroll system you already use, such as QuickBooks Online, QuickBooks Desktop, Sage 50 US or Payroll4Construction. Your payroll system or provider still cuts the checks, withholds taxes and files with the IRS and the state. Appello makes sure the hours it receives are already right.
Does Appello produce certified payroll reports like the WH-347?
No. Appello does not fill in the WH-347 or any state certified payroll form. It holds what those forms are built from: hours per worker, per job, per day, with the trade classification, wage region and rate. You export that to CSV for your payroll provider or certified payroll tool, so nobody re-keys timesheets to build the report.
Can one worker be paid different rates on the same day?
Yes. Every job is tied to a wage region, and each region has its own rate table. Four hours on a prevailing wage job and four hours on a private job are each priced from their own region at the worker's trade level. The timesheet log shows the wage region beside every row.
Does it work for merit shops as well as union shops?
Yes. Agreements and trade levels are how rates are set up in Appello. A merit shop sets its own pay scales the same way and skips the union halls. It still gets wage regions for prevailing wage work, overtime rules, travel pay and the same payroll exports.
Keep reading
How agreements and trade levels set every rate.
A wage table per region, a region per job.
Every format, by payroll system.
What the week looks like from the payroll desk.
The schedule tells you who should be clocking in.
See it on one of your own jobs.
Built for the trades who actually do the work.
Checked against the product 2026-10-13. Customer figures are from each company's published case study.