Rippling saves Aptera $225,000 per year on compliance, benefits administration, and payroll

With Rippling HR Services, Aptera gets end-to-end compliance and HR support. “I can run a clean and compliant system for our startup,” Sarah said. The system handles federal, state, and local tax account registrations in every jurisdiction the company hires—so she doesn’t have to drain countless hours researching varying tax laws and managing every account. “I don’t spend time on that. It’s done. It’s automated,” Sarah said. Ditto for legally required workplace trainings, which Rippling’s Learning Management System (LMS) administers to employees automatically. “It’s one less thing to worry about. We set it up and Rippling does the rest,” Sarah said. 

“We’re going to be in compliance because of Rippling. There’s a lot of ‘I can sleep at night,’ comfort because I rely that much on Rippling and have yet to be let down.”

Rippling HR Services also gives Aptera access to expert compliance support whenever needed. Instead of going through an expensive employment law firm like she’s done in the past, Sarah used Rippling’s partner, Mineral to update Aptera’s employee handbook for 2025. Through Rippling, she can also speak with an HR advisor whenever she has questions about dealing with performance issues, employee relations, or anything else that comes up. “Their expertise is really invaluable,” she said. “It’s super meaningful to have someone I consider a colleague available to help make difficult decisions.” According to Sarah, Mineral and HR advisors save the company $10,000 a year.

When Aptera decided to break away from its PEO in March of 2022, Sarah promised one of the co-founders she’d implement an alternative HR solution by July. Within those few months, she joined Rippling, found a benefits broker, went through open enrollment, and got every employee in the system—with the plans they wanted— by the deadline. “That was only possible through Rippling,” she said. “We gave our brokers access and they set up the whole thing. It was magical.” 

The startup prides itself on offering a great benefits package to employees, which it pays for out of its own pocket and administers on its own terms. Sarah appreciates how Cobra, HSA, FSA, and commuter benefits are all in the same platform and easy to update. “Rippling is my benefits manager,” she said. “Anyone who walks into my office and is confused about something, I open up Rippling and 99 percent of the time get an answer.” 

Rippling does so much that it spares Sarah from making a full-time hire. “I don’t have a benefits person. Rippling eliminates the need for a higher-level specialist or manager which would require a salary between $100,000 and $130,000.”

Sarah oversaw payroll in past roles at prior companies and found it a constant headache. During one stint, because of an unreliable payroll provider, she had to run corrections every pay run. She’d spend 20 hours a week fielding employee complaints and trying to pinpoint how errors kept occurring. “When I got to Aptera, I said I’m not doing payroll. It’s a nightmare,” Sarah said. Then she found a solution that handled the most cumbersome parts of it for her. “It’s a dream with Rippling.”

Rippling Payroll automatically deducts the right tax withholdings from employees’ paychecks—no matter where they live. And if the company makes a mistake and needs to run a correction, Sarah can handle it in seconds instead of hours. “It’s a manual process with other systems. With Rippling, if we’re short four hours on an employee’s paycheck, we put in the correct information, and across the board, every withholding autocorrects.” 

Just like Rippling HR Services saved Sarah from making a full-time benefits hire, Rippling Payroll saved Sarah from making a full-time hire dedicated just to paying employees. “Without Rippling, I could not have done payroll,” she said. “I’m not a tax person. I’m not a payroll person. I’m able to essentially fill that role for the company without having to pay someone to do it. I’m saving us an entire headcount’s salary. On the cheap end, that’s $85,000 for a role that Rippling fills for us.” Sarah also appreciates that she doesn’t have to duplicate any work across her HRIS and payroll platform. For example, when she changes an employee’s salary in the HRIS, Rippling automatically updates the payroll data to match.

“People who have actually done HR work created Rippling’s solutions,” she said. “You can feel it because it automatically solves everyday problems that I’ve had to handle manually or outside of any other system that I’ve used.”