Perplexity gathers cited facts on PEO and payroll-only options, Julius AI models costs from your quotes, and you decide with HR. Justworks and Gusto are the typical comparison.
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Goal
Pick the right employment setup for a small US team.
Connects through: Upload / export
Not advice
IonBin provides general information and software comparisons, not tax, legal, accounting or financial advice. Tax and legal rules vary by situation and jurisdiction; consult a qualified professional (CPA, enrolled agent or attorney) before acting.
AI tools can make mistakes. Verify every figure against the original documents and official IRS or state guidance before filing or signing.
Redact Social Security numbers, account numbers and EINs before uploading documents to any AI assistant, and check its data-retention settings. Upload originals only to the filing or signing software.
Confirmed means the vendor documents it (linked). It doesn't mean IonBin has tested it. AI-platform and human steps need no source.
Human approval
You decide with HR input.
Watch out for
Keep the human approval step: You decide with HR input.
Starter prompt
Goal: Pick the right employment setup for a small US team. Tools involved: Perplexity, Julius AI. Your part: summarizes peo vs payroll-only trade-offs with citations. Work step by step, show me each draft or proposed change, and wait for my approval before anything is sent, published, signed, filed or changed in a live system.
Assembled from this page’s goal and steps. Paste it into your AI platform and adjust it to your situation.
No platform-specific connection: the steps run in the tools themselves (browser, upload or built-in).
ChatGPT
Confirmed
No platform-specific connection: the steps run in the tools themselves (browser, upload or built-in).
Gemini
Confirmed
No platform-specific connection: the steps run in the tools themselves (browser, upload or built-in).
Perplexity
Confirmed
No platform-specific connection: the steps run in the tools themselves (browser, upload or built-in).
Computed from the MCP and API steps only: "Confirmed" needs the tool's docs to name the platform and the platform to support the connection. Browser, upload and human steps work from any platform.
What we found (checked 2026-10-17)
Option
Listed price
Justworks Payroll
$8 per employee a month plus a $50 base fee
Justworks PEO Basic
$79 per employee a month, no base fee
Justworks PEO Plus
$124 per employee a month, adds medical, dental and vision administration
Gusto Simple
$49 a month plus $6 per person
Gusto Plus
$80 a month plus $12 per person
These are list prices. Benefit premiums are separate, and that’s usually where a PEO and payroll-only differ most, so model them from real quotes.
How to use it
Ask Perplexity to summarize the trade-offs between a PEO and payroll-only (co-employment, benefits access, control), with citations.
Put your quotes, including benefit premiums, in a CSV and upload it to Julius AI to compare total cost by headcount.
Review the result with HR and decide. Re-check prices on the vendors’ pages before you sign, because list prices and promotions change.
Sources
Julius AI · Julius AI · official · accessed 2026-10-17
