Vestavia Hills small business payroll impacted by Silicon Valley Bank collapse

VESTAVIA HILLS, Ala. (WBRC) - The Silicon Valley Bank collapse is impacting businesses across the country, even right here in our own backyard.

A Vestavia Hills small business switched to paper checks after the collapse so their employees can get paid on time.

Rocky Ridge Hardware uses a company based in San Francisco for their payroll called Home Base, which uses Silicon Valley Bank. The owner says last week, employees couldn’t access their money for hours.

“So Friday morning, employee payroll was not available to the employees in their accounts so I started getting text messages and phone calls,” said Dan Moran, the owner of Rocky Ridge Hardware. “We really didn’t know it was related to the banking issue on Friday. It was just that their partner had an issue and that payroll would be landing sometime that day.”

They didn’t find out the issue was related to the SVB collapse until days later.

Fortunately, Moran says by 7 p.m. Friday all employees had their paychecks, but he doesn’t want his workers experiencing another delay on payday.

“If you’re not focused on what’s going on in front of you, if you’re concerned about rent not being paid or water being cut off or a spouse needing funds that she typically may count on being available, we need to make sure that all those concerns are out of the employees mind so they can focus on the customer that’s in front of them,” he explained.

So for now, Moran says they’re going old school.

“We’re using paper checks right now to make sure there’s not a disruption again this week,” said Moran. “They’ve assured us there won’t be any problem. However, just as a preventative measure, to prevent any problems, we’ve just paid everyone manually this week by paper check.”

Moran says they’ll continue using paper checks until he’s sure his employees won’t be impacted again, adding he’s looking for a new payroll company that’s more reliable. He plans on keeping Home Base for timekeeping, though.

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