沛齊 (PAYX) 2025 Q3 法說會逐字稿

Good morning, and welcome to the third-quarter fiscal 2025 Paychex earnings conference call. Participating on the call today are John Gibson and Bob Schrader. (Operator Instructions) As a reminder, this conference is being recorded, and your participation implies consent to our recording of this call. If you do not agree to these terms, please disconnect at this time.

早安，歡迎參加 2025 財年第三季 Paychex 收益電話會議。今天參加電話會議的有 John Gibson 和 Bob Schrader。（操作員指示）提醒一下，本次會議正在錄音，您的參與即表示同意我們錄音本次通話。如果您不同意這些條款，請立即斷開連線。

I would now like to turn the call over to Bob Schrader, Chief Financial Officer. Please go ahead.

現在我想將電話轉給財務長鮑勃·施拉德（Bob Schrader）。請繼續。

Thank you for joining us for our review of Paychex's third-quarter 2025 financial results. Joining me today is John Gibson, our Chief Executive Officer.

感謝您加入我們對 Paychex 2025 年第三季財務表現的回顧。今天與我一起的是我們的執行長約翰·吉布森 (John Gibson)。

This morning, before the market opened, we released our financial results for the quarter ended February 28, 2025. You can access our earnings release and investor presentation on our investor relations website. Our Form 10-Q will be filed with the SEC within the next couple of days. This teleconference is being broadcast over the Internet and will be archived and available on our website for approximately 90 days.

今天早上，在市場開盤之前，我們發布了截至 2025 年 2 月 28 日的季度財務表現。您可以在我們的投資者關係網站上造訪我們的收益報告和投資者介紹。我們的 10-Q 表將在接下來的幾天內提交給美國證券交易委員會 (SEC)。本次電話會議將透過網路進行廣播，並將存檔並在我們的網站上發布約 90 天。

Today's call will contain forward-looking statements that refer to future events and involve some risk. We encourage you to review our filings with the SEC for additional information on factors that could cause actual results to differ from our current expectations. We will also reference non-GAAP financial measures. A description of these items along with a reconciliation of non-GAAP measures can be found in our earnings release.

今天的電話會議將包含涉及未來事件並涉及一定風險的前瞻性陳述。我們鼓勵您查看我們向美國證券交易委員會提交的文件，以獲取有關可能導致實際結果與我們當前預期不同的因素的更多資​​訊。我們也將參考非公認會計準則財務指標。這些項目的描述以及非公認會計準則指標的對帳表可在我們的收益報告中找到。

I will now turn the call over to our CEO, John Gibson.

現在我將電話轉給我們的執行長約翰·吉布森 (John Gibson)。

Thanks, Bob. I'll start the call today with an update on our business highlights for the third quarter. Then I'll turn it back over to Bob for the financial update. And then, of course, we'll open it up for your questions. This is an exciting quarter for Paychex.

謝謝，鮑伯。今天我將在電話會議上介紹我們第三季的業務亮點。然後我會將其交還給鮑勃來報告財務最新情況。然後，當然，我們會開放您的提問。對於 Paychex 來說，這是一個令人興奮的季度。

As we enter the digitally an AI-driven era of human capital management, we believe the combination of our positive underlying momentum and the pending acquisition of Paycor position us well for continued success.

隨著我們進入數位化、人工智慧驅動的人力資本管理時代，我們相信，我們積極的潛在發展動能和即將收購 Paycor 的舉措將使我們有能力繼續取得成功。

Total revenue growth was 5% in the third quarter, excluding the impact of the discontinued ERTC program, revenue growth was 6%, driven by the strength of our industry-leading HCM solutions. Diluted earnings per share increased 4% and adjusted diluted earnings per share grew 8% during the quarter. Our investments in automation and technology are boosting efficiency across the company, resulting in a strong 180 basis point increase in adjusted operating margins compared to the prior year.

第三季總營收成長 5%，除去 ERTC 計畫停止的影響，營收成長 6%，這得益於我們業界領先的 HCM 解決方案的強勁成長。本季度，每股攤薄收益成長 4%，調整後每股攤薄收益成長 8%。我們對自動化和技術的投資正在提高整個公司的效率，導致調整後的營業利潤率與去年相比強勁增長了 180 個基點。

During the third quarter, we announced that we entered into a definitive agreement to acquire Paycor, a leading provider of HCM, payroll and talent software. The waiting period under HSR expired on February 21. After other customary closing conditions are met, we look forward to welcoming Paycor to the Paychex family in the coming weeks.

在第三季度，我們宣布已達成最終協議，收購領先的 HCM、薪資和人才軟體供應商 Paycor。HSR 的等待期已於 2 月 21 日到期。在滿足其他常規成交條件後，我們期待在未來幾週內歡迎 Paycor 加入 Paychex 大家庭。

Our companies are highly complementary, and our dedicated employees share a common set of values, most importantly, a strong customer orientation and a relentless focus on providing innovative solutions to real-world challenges. Our expected nearly 800,000 customers combined will benefit from having access to the most comprehensive HCM portfolio from the most trusted provider of technology and expertise in the industry.

我們的公司高度互補，我們敬業的員工擁有共同的價值觀，最重要的是，他們具有強烈的客戶導向，並堅持不懈地致力於為現實世界的挑戰提供創新的解決方案。我們預計將有近 80 萬名客戶受益於業界最值得信賴的技術和專業知識提供者提供最全面的 HCM 產品組合。

We believe the acquisition of Paycor will strengthen our competitive position upmarket while giving us the ability to offer Paychex's robust set of HR and employee solutions to Paycor's approximately 50,000 customers and their 2.7 million employees. We are optimistic about what we can achieve together by leveraging the best of both of our current and future offerings.

我們相信，收購 Paycor 將增強我們在高端市場的競爭地位，同時使我們能夠向 Paycor 的約 50,000 名客戶及其 270 萬名員工提供 Paychex 強大的人力資源和員工解決方案。我們對透過充分利用我們目前和未來的產品和解決方案共同取得的成果充滿信心。

We are working diligently towards a closing of the Paycor acquisition in the coming weeks, and we have already made several important decisions related to the integration. We are planning to operate Paycor as a stand-alone business unit. Adam Ante, Paycor's current CFO, will be joining Paychex as Senior Vice President of Paycor and Ryan Bergstrom, Paycor's current Chief Product Officer, is also joining Paychex to become the new Chief Product Officer of Paychex. We are excited to welcome both Adam and Ryan to the Paychex executive team.

我們正在努力在未來幾週內完成對 Paycor 的收購，我們已經做出了與整合相關的幾個重要決定。我們計劃將 Paycor 作為獨立的業務部門運作。Paycor 現任財務長 Adam Ante 將加入 Paychex 擔任 Paycor 資深副總裁，Paycor 現任首席產品長 Ryan Bergstrom 也將加入 Paychex，成為 Paychex 新任首席產品長。我們非常高興地歡迎 Adam 和 Ryan 加入 Paychex 執行團隊。

Paycor and Paychex customers will remain on the platforms they're currently using and continue to receive support through their existing service team relationships. They will shortly gain access to the most comprehensive, flexible and innovative set of HCM technology and advisory solutions in the industry.

Paycor 和 Paychex 客戶將繼續使用他們目前使用的平台，並繼續透過現有的服務團隊關係獲得支援。他們很快就會獲得業界最全面、最靈活、最具創新性的 HCM 技術和諮詢解決方案。

With our SurePayroll, Paychex Flex, Paychex HR advisory solutions and now Paycor's capabilities, we have solutions to meet the diverse needs of businesses of all sizes. We are making great progress on the acquisition and on integration planning. The work we have done since announcing the transaction has increased our confidence in achieving the cost synergies and we now expect synergies over the $80 million that we shared with you in January.

憑藉我們的 SurePayroll、Paychex Flex、Paychex HR 諮詢解決方案以及現在的 Paycor 功能，我們可以提供滿足各種規模企業的不同需求的解決方案。我們在收購和整合規劃方面取得了重大進展。自從宣布交易以來，我們所做的工作增強了我們實現成本協同效應的信心，現在我們預計協同效應將超過我們在一月份與您分享的 8000 萬美元。

Given this, we now expect the acquisition to be accretive to our adjusted earnings per share next fiscal year. The third quarter was successful as we continue to improve our customer experience and value proposition. Client retention has improved over last year's solid performance and retention in our HR outsourcing solutions remain near record levels. Client losses are down across all employee size segments.

有鑑於此，我們現在預計此次收購將增加我們下一財年的調整後每股盈餘。由於我們繼續改善客戶體驗和價值主張，第三季取得了成功。客戶保留率較去年的穩健表現有所提高，我們的人力資源外包解決方案的保留率仍接近創紀錄的水平。無論員工規模大小，客戶流失均下降。

Our revenue retention improved over last year and remain above pre-pandemic levels as we continue to focus on acquiring and retaining high-value clients. Our strong retention rates attest to our compelling value proposition which was validated by a recent Wall Street Journal ranking of the best managed companies, in which Paychex achieved the second highest increase in customer satisfaction out of all 250 companies on the list.

由於我們持續專注於獲取和留住高價值客戶，我們的收入保留率比去年有所提高，並且仍高於疫情前的水平。我們強勁的留任率證明了我們令人信服的價值主張，這在《華爾街日報》最近對最佳管理公司進行的排名中也得到了驗證，其中 Paychex 在上榜的所有 250 家公司中，客戶滿意度增幅排名第二。

Similar to what we shared with you last quarter, while the PEO business remains strong and participant levels in our health plans across the country continue to increase, enrollment in our specialty Florida at-risk medical plan decreased year-over-year. We also continue to see more employees opting for lower cost health plans to offset rising health care costs. These factors continue to present a pass-through revenue headwind but have no impact to our earnings or the value proposition of the PEO model.

與我們上個季度與您分享的情況類似，雖然 PEO 業務依然強勁，並且我們在全國各地的健康計劃的參與者水平持續提高，但我們佛羅裡達州專科高風險醫療計劃的參保人數同比有所下降。我們也看到越來越多的員工選擇成本較低的健康計劃來抵消不斷上漲的醫療費用。這些因素持續對轉嫁收入造成不利影響，但對我們的收益或 PEO 模型的價值主張沒有影響。

We also continue to drive innovation in the quarter, and I'm proud to announce that we were just named one of Fortune's Most Innovative Companies for the third consecutive year. This is truly a validation of our strategy to become the digitally driven HR leader. As an example of how we are driving innovation in AI, we recently built a Gen AI-powered HR Copilot tool that covers the HR questions most frequently asked by our clients. The tool was developed from our proprietary data sourced from the hundreds of thousands of conversations our HR professionals have with our clients every year.

我們也持續在本季推動創新，我很自豪地宣布，我們連續第三年被評為《財富》最具創新力的公司之一。這確實驗證了我們成為數位化驅動人力資源領導者的策略。作為我們推動人工智慧創新的一個例子，我們最近建立了一個由 Gen AI 驅動的 HR Copilot 工具，涵蓋了客戶最常問的人力資源問題。該工具是根據我們的專有數據開發的，這些數據來自我們人力資源專業人員每年與客戶進行的數十萬次對話。

The HR Copilot tool will enable our HR professionals to leverage the collective knowledge base we have built over the years to drive both efficient and effective answers to our clients' concerns. The testing phase for this new tool is nearly complete, and we are on track to launch it at the start of our next fiscal year.

HR Copilot 工具將使我們的人力資源專業人員能夠利用我們多年來建立的集體知識庫，高效、有效地解答客戶的疑慮。這個新工具的測試階段已接近完成，我們計劃在下一個財政年度開始時推出它。

We are committed to helping our clients leverage the power of new technologies and specifically AI. Another example of our innovation and employee solutions is Paychex Perks, an award-winning digital marketplace that offers our clients employees access to affordable benefit and discounted products and services from third-party providers.

我們致力於幫助客戶利用新技術特別是人工智慧的力量。我們的創新和員工解決方案的另一個例子是 Paychex Perks，這是一個屢獲殊榮的數位市場，為我們的客戶員工提供來自第三方供應商的實惠福利和折扣產品和服務。

Perks is available at no cost to the employer, and payments are processed automatically through payroll deduction. Since we launched this product in September over 180,000 client employees have purchased at least one product offered in the marketplace. While I'm extremely proud of all the innovation and all the hard and great work of our employees and what they do each and every day to make Paychex successful, I'm even more proud of how they do it by living our company's values and finding ways at the same time to impact the communities in which we serve and live.

雇主無需支付任何費用即可享受福利，並透過薪資扣除自動處理付款。自從我們在九月推出該產品以來，已有超過 18 萬名客戶員工購買了市場上提供的至少一款產品。我為我們員工的所有創新和辛勤工作以及他們每天為使 Paychex 取得成功所做的努力感到非常自豪，但我更為他們感到自豪的是他們如何實踐公司的價值，並同時找到影響我們服務和生活的社區的方法。

I am pleased to report that Paychex was recently named one of the world's most ethical companies for the 17th time by Ethisphere, 1 of only 3 companies in the world to achieve this distinction. Congratulations to the team.

我很高興地報告，Paychex 最近第 17 次被 Ethisphere 評為全球最具商業道德的公司之一，是全球僅有的三家獲此殊榮的公司之一。祝賀這個團隊。

Turning to the macro environment. The pace of U.S. job growth has moderated from the robust levels observed coming out of the pandemic but has been relatively stable during the past year and in line with historical averages. Our customer employment levels were a little softer than expected in the third quarter and likely impacted by weather-related challenges and devastating fires in California, as well as lower bonus checks than last year and our expectations.

轉向宏觀環境。美國就業成長速度已從疫情爆發後的強勁水準有所放緩，但過去一年相對穩定，與歷史平均水準一致。第三季度，我們的客戶就業水準略低於預期，可能受到天氣相關挑戰和加州毀滅性火災的影響，以及獎金低於去年和我們的預期。

Year-to-date, our checks per client have been flat compared to the prior year, suggesting relatively stable U.S. labor market conditions. And as I look back on it, we have accomplished a lot in the third quarter, both in terms of day-to-day execution and driving our strategy forward, including our preparations to add Paycor to the Paychex's family of companies in the coming weeks.

今年迄今為止，我們每位客戶的支票金額與去年同期持平，這表明美國勞動力市場狀況相對穩定。回顧過去，我們在第三季度取得了許多成就，包括日常執行和推動策略發展方面，包括我們準備在未來幾週將 Paycor 添加到 Paychex 的公司家族中。

As I said earlier, this is an exciting quarter for Paychex. We exit the third quarter of this fiscal year better positioned than ever in the company's history to deliver on our purpose, and that is to help businesses of all sizes succeed. I'll now turn it over to Bob to give us a brief update on our financial results for the quarter.

正如我之前所說，對於 Paychex 來說，這是一個令人興奮的季度。在本財年第三季結束時，我們處於比公司歷史上任何時候都更有利的位置來實現我們的目標，那就是幫助各種規模的企業取得成功。現在我將把話題交給鮑勃，讓他向我們簡要介紹本季的財務表現。

Thank you, John, and good morning, everyone. I will start with a summary of our third quarter financial results and then provide an update on our fiscal 2025 outlook. Total revenue for the quarter increased 5% to $1.5 billion. This includes the headwind from the expiration of ERTC program that we have called out for the past several quarters. Excluding this headwind, total revenue grew 6% and as you guys can all imagine, I'm very happy to say that we have now anniversaried the end of ERTC, and this will be the last call that I will have to talk about the quarterly impact of ERTC.

謝謝你，約翰，大家早安。我將首先總結我們的第三季財務業績，然後介紹我們 2025 財年的展望。本季總營收成長 5% 至 15 億美元。這包括我們過去幾季所呼籲的 ERTC 計劃到期所帶來的阻力。除去這一不利因素，總收入增長了 6%，正如大家可以想像的那樣，我很高興地說，我們現在已經慶祝了 ERTC 的結束週年紀念日，這將是我最後一次談論 ERTC 的季度影響。

Management Solutions revenue increased 5% to $1.1 billion, this was driven primarily by growth in the number of clients served across our suite of HCM solutions and client worksite employees for HR solutions as well as higher revenue per client resulting from price realization, and product penetration partially offset by the lower ERTC revenues. PEO and Insurance Solutions revenue increased 6% to $365 million, driven primarily by growth in the number of average worksite employees and an increase in PEO insurance revenues.

管理解決方案收入成長 5% 至 11 億美元，這主要得益於我們的 HCM 解決方案套件服務的客戶數量和 HR 解決方案的客戶工作現場員工數量的增長，以及價格實現和產品滲透率帶來的每個客戶收入的提高，但 ERTC 收入的下降部分抵消了這一增長。PEO 和保險解決方案收入成長 6% 至 3.65 億美元，主要得益於平均工作現場員工數量的成長和 PEO 保險收入的增加。

Interest on funds held for clients decreased 2% to $43 million, primarily due to lower average interest rates. Total expenses, excluding onetime costs related to the pending Paycor acquisition, increased 1% to $801 million, continued investments in product, technology and data and AI were offset by productivity and efficiency gains realized from these investments.

為客戶持有的資金利息下降 2% 至 4,300 萬美元，主要原因是平均利率下降。總支出（不包括與即將進行的 Paycor 收購相關的一次性成本）增加 1% 至 8.01 億美元，對產品、技術、數據和人工智慧的持續投資被這些投資實現的生產力和效率提升所抵消。

Operating income grew 6% to $692 million with an operating margin of 45.8%. As a reminder, operating income was also impacted by the expiration of the ERTC program. Adjusted operating margins for the quarter were 46.9%. As John mentioned, this represents an increase of approximately 180 basis points due to increased productivity and cost discipline.

營業收入成長 6% 至 6.92 億美元，營業利益率為 45.8%。需要提醒的是，營業收入也受到了 ERTC 計畫到期的影響。本季調整後的營業利益率為46.9%。正如約翰所提到的，由於生產率的提高和成本的嚴格控制，這意味著大約 180 個基點的成長。

Diluted earnings per share increased 4% to $1.43 per share and adjusted diluted earnings per share increased 8% to $1.49 in the third quarter. I will now quickly touch on the results for the year-to-date period. Total revenue grew 4% to $4.1 billion. Management Solutions revenue increased 3% to $3 billion. PEO and Insurance Solutions increased 7% to $1 billion, and interest on funds held for clients increased 8% to $117 million.

第三季每股攤薄收益成長 4% 至每股 1.43 美元，調整後每股稀釋收益成長 8% 至 1.49 美元。現在我將快速介紹今年迄今為止的業績。總收入成長4%至41億美元。管理解決方案營收成長 3%，達到 30 億美元。PEO 和保險解決方案成長 7%，達到 10 億美元，為客戶持有的資金利息成長 8%，達到 1.17 億美元。

Total expenses year-to-date grew 3% to $2.4 billion. Operating margins expanded approximately 40 basis points to 42.9%, and our adjusted operating margins year-to-date increased approximately 80 basis points to 43.3%.

今年迄今總支出成長 3%，達到 24 億美元。營業利益率擴大約 40 個基點至 42.9%，年初至今的調整後營業利益率增加約 80 個基點至 43.3%。

Diluted earnings per share increased 4% to $3.76 a share and adjusted diluted earnings per share increased 5% to $3.79 a share. Our financial position remains strong with cash, restricted cash and total corporate investments of $1.7 billion and total borrowings of approximately $817 million as of February 28, 2025. Cash flow from operations was $1.6 billion in the first 3 quarters of the year, driven by net income and reflects changes in working capital influenced by timing.

每股攤薄收益成長 4% 至每股 3.76 美元，調整後每股攤薄收益成長 5% 至每股 3.79 美元。我們的財務狀況依然強勁，截至 2025 年 2 月 28 日，現金、限定現金和企業總投資為 17 億美元，總借款約 8.17 億美元。今年前三個季度的營運現金流為 16 億美元，主要由淨收入推動，並反映了受時間影響的營運資本變化。

We returned a total of $1.2 billion to shareholders during the first 3 quarters in the form of cash dividends and share repurchases, and our 12-month rolling return on equity remained robust at 45%. I will now turn to our guidance for the fiscal year ended May 31, 2025. This outlook assumes a continuation of the current macro environment and exclude the anticipated impact from our pending acquisition of Paycor, which is expected to close in the coming weeks.

前三個季度，我們以現金股利和股票回購的形式向股東返還了總計 12 億美元，12 個月滾動股本回報率仍保持強勁，達到 45%。現在我將談到我們對截至 2025 年 5 月 31 日的財政年度的指導。這項展望假設當前宏觀環境將持續，且不包括我們即將收購 Paycor 的預期影響，該收購預計將在未來幾週內完成。

Our current outlook is as follows: Total revenue is still expected to grow in the range of 4% to 5.5%. We do now expect that it will be at the low end of the range, primarily due to the continued headwinds from our pass-through insurance revenues and as a reminder, this range includes approximately 200 basis points of headwind from the expiration of the ERTC program last year.

我們目前的展望如下：預計總收入仍將成長 4% 至 5.5%。我們現在確實預計它將處於該範圍的低端，這主要是由於我們的直通保險收入持續面臨阻力，並提醒一下，該範圍包括去年 ERTC 計劃到期帶來的約 200 個基點的阻力。

Management Solutions is still expected to grow in the range of 3% to 4%. PEO and Insurance Solutions is now expected to grow in the range of 6% to 6.5% due to the factors that we referenced earlier, we previously had guided to the lower end of the range of 7% to 9%. Interest on funds held for clients is expected to be in the range of $145 million to $155 million. Adjusted other income net is expected to be income in the range of $30 million to $35 million, and adjusted operating income margin is now expected to be approximately 43%. We had previously guided to the high end of the range of 42% to 43%.

管理解決方案預計仍將成長 3% 至 4%。由於我們先前提到的因素，PEO 和保險解決方案目前預計將成長 6% 至 6.5% 之間，而我們先前曾預測該範圍的下限為 7% 至 9%。預計為客戶持有的資金利息將在 1.45 億美元至 1.55 億美元之間。調整後的其他收入淨額預計在 3,000 萬美元至 3,500 萬美元之間，調整後的營業收入利潤率預計約為 43%。我們之前曾預計該範圍的上限為 42% 至 43%。

Our effective income tax rate is expected to be in the range of 24% to 25%, and adjusted diluted earnings per share is still expected to grow in the range of 5% to 7%. As John mentioned earlier, we are making great progress on the acquisition, which has increased our conviction on the near-term expense synergies. And given this, we would now expect the acquisition to be accretive to our adjusted diluted earnings per share next fiscal year.

我們的有效所得稅率預計在24%至25%之間，調整後每股稀釋收益預計仍將在5%至7%之間成長。正如約翰之前提到的，我們在收購方面取得了很大進展，這增強了我們對近期費用綜效的信心。有鑑於此，我們現在預計此次收購將增加我們下一財年的調整後每股稀釋收益。

With the anticipated closing in the coming weeks, we would also like to provide an update on the expected financial impact to this fiscal year. Including Paycor, we expect revenue growth of 10% to 12% in the fourth quarter and the impact from the acquisition to adjusted EPS would be neutral. Of course, all of this is based on our current assumptions, which are subject to change, and we will update you again on the fourth quarter call. I will refer you to our investor slides on our website for additional information. And with that, I will now turn the call back over to John.

隨著預計未來幾週的結束，我們也想提供有關本財年預期財務影響的最新資訊。包括 Paycor 在內，我們預計第四季營收將成長 10% 至 12%，收購對調整後每股盈餘的影響將是中性的。當然，所有這些都是基於我們目前的假設，這些假設可能會發生變化，我們將在第四季度電話會議上再次向您更新。我將向您推薦我們網站上的投資者幻燈片以獲取更多資訊。說完這些，我現在將電話轉回給約翰。

Thank you, Bob. Madison, we will now open the call to questions.

謝謝你，鮑伯。麥迪遜，我們現在開始提問。

(Operator Instructions) Andrew Nicholas, William Blair.

（操作員指令）安德魯·尼古拉斯，威廉·布萊爾。

This is Daniel Maxwell on for Andrew today. Just to kick things off, I was wondering if you had any updates on the preference between ASO and PEO models. I know you called out switching to lower cost health plans, but is anyone trading down at the product level? And then is the lower implied 4Q for PEO, just the at-risk Florida plan that came in worse than expected in Q3? Or maybe how long you expect that to last?

今天由丹尼爾·麥克斯韋爾代替安德魯報道。首先，我想知道您是否對 ASO 和 PEO 模型之間的偏好有任何更新。我知道您呼籲轉向成本更低的健康計劃，但是是否有人在產品層面降低價格？那麼，PEO 隱含的 4 季業績較低，是否只是面臨風險的佛羅裡達計畫在 3 季的表現比預期更差？或者您預計這種情況會持續多久？

Yes. So Daniel, maybe I'll start with the lower Q4 that you mentioned, and certainly bringing the total revenue guide to the low end of the range is primarily driven by the continued challenges that we've seen with the MPP attachment in Florida. I think when we talked to you guys last quarter that we weren't seeing the growth there that we expected. I would say it was flat.

是的。所以丹尼爾，也許我會從你提到的較低的第四季度開始，當然將總收入指南帶到該範圍的低端主要是由於我們在佛羅裡達州的 MPP 附件中看到的持續挑戰。我想當我們上個季度與你們交談時，我們並沒有看到我們預期的成長。我想說它是平的。

And then as we've come through the annual enrollment, overall our health care attachment across the PEO is up. It's down in the state of Florida, and that has an impact from a revenue standpoint, a pass-through revenue standpoint, really has no impact in net revenue or earnings, and that's really the primary driver as it relates to kind of the -- what you see in Q4 in the low end of the guidance range on total revenue.

然後，隨著我們完成年度招生，整個 PEO 的醫療保健附件總體上有所增加。佛羅裡達州的收入下降，從收入的角度，即轉嫁收入的角度，這產生了影響，但對淨收入或收益沒有影響，這才是真正的主要驅動因素，因為它與第四季度總收入指導範圍的低端有關。

And as it relates to ASO and PEO, both have been strong. We see strong upper digit worksite employee growth in both models, and we haven't seen a switch from a preference standpoint. And I think your other question related to the buy down, we have seen that. Certainly, this year, we've seen, particularly in Florida, more of our client employees selecting lower-cost options, and that certainly has an impact as well on the MPP in Florida.

就 ASO 和 PEO 而言，兩者都表現強勁。我們看到，兩種模式下工作場所員工數量均出現了強勁增長，而且從偏好角度來看，我們並沒有看到任何轉變。我認為您的另一個問題與買斷有關，我們已經看到了這一點。當然，今年，我們看到，特別是在佛羅裡達州，更多客戶員工選擇了成本較低的選項，這當然也對佛羅裡達州的 MPP 產生了影響。

I think, Daniel, the thing I would take away from the PEO performance getting to Bob's point, we're not seeing a trade-off or a downgrade from PEO to ASO, that's not what we're seeing at all. PEO performance really across the country is strong. Our bookings were double digits. We got a solid pipeline going into Q4 and it continued to be strong. I would say the challenge you have in the specialty program that we have just in Florida that all of you are familiar with, small changes in a participation level can really make a big difference.

丹尼爾，我認為，從 PEO 表現來看，鮑勃所說的是，我們沒有看到從 PEO 到 ASO 的權衡或降級，這根本不是我們所看到的。PEO 在全國範圍內的表現確實很強勁。我們的預訂量是兩位數。我們在第四季度擁有穩固的管道，這種勢頭持續強勁。我想說的是，我們在佛羅裡達州開展的專業計畫中面臨的挑戰是大家都熟悉的，參與程度的微小變化確實可以帶來很大的不同。

I mean you're talking about plans that can range between $11,000 and $14,000 per employee.

我的意思是你談論的計劃金額在每位員工 11,000 美元到 14,000 美元之間。

So you add that, that adds up pretty quickly. So what you really have there was, overall, we increased the number of clients that are attaching health care across the country and actually saw better participation in our health plans across it, but because we saw a reduction in one specific program that we have in Florida, which has an outsized impact on revenue. That's really what drove the issues.

所以，如果你把它加起來，結果很快就會加起來。因此，實際情況是，總體而言，我們增加了在全國範圍內接受醫療保健的客戶數量，並且實際上看到了我們在全國範圍內更好的健康計劃參與度，但由於我們看到佛羅裡達州的一項特定計劃的減少，這對收入產生了巨大的影響。這才是問題的真正根源。

It was a combination of things. It was, when you look at the pipeline, the average deal size was smaller than what we saw last year. Then when you look inside a small deal, the percentage of employees that took benefits was lower than what we typically see and then as we said before, when they did pick a plan, it would tend to be the lower end plan.

這是多種因素的綜合作用。當你查看管道時，你會發現平均交易規模比去年小。然後，當您查看一筆小交易時，享受福利的員工百分比低於我們通常看到的百分比，然後正如我們之前所說，當他們選擇一項計劃時，往往會選擇較低端的計劃。

So it's just some of the health care inflation things that I think we see people trading down to. But overall, I think we should really see this as a positive outcome. As you know, in Florida, we're also very conservative in our underwriting. So the fact of the matter is, what we're not going to do is we're not going to try to do anything that's going to jeopardize that plan.

所以，我認為我們看到人們正在朝著醫療保健通膨目標邁進。但總的來說，我認為我們應該將此視為一個正面的結果。如您所知，在佛羅裡達州，我們的承保也非常保守。所以事實上，我們不會試圖做任何危及該計劃的事情。

So we did not change our underwriting guidelines. We're not going to do that. And we have a lot of options with our agency to be able to get them on stand-alone plans, and we've done that, and we'll continue to do that. So I just don't -- what I don't want to do is I don't want to chase the headline number in the PEO and then create a risk problem on the backend that once you have that problem, it's hard to get out of.

所以我們沒有改變承保準則。我們不會這麼做。我們與代理商有很多選擇，可以讓他們制定獨立的計劃，我們已經這樣做了，而且我們會繼續這樣做。所以我只是不——我不想做的是，我不想追逐 PEO 中的標題數字，然後在後端創建風險問題，一旦遇到該問題，就很難擺脫。

I think many of you cover the PEO industry, and several examples of where that's not turned out well. So we're going to manage the book well. Certainly, we're going to have to wait for open enrollment, which starts in that October time frame. We've already started looking at the plan approach, looking at the plan design approach and doing our research. I think we've done this several times to make sure that we have the right lineup there that's going to be attractive for what people can afford, hope that helps you, Daniel.

我想你們當中有很多人都關注過 PEO 產業，也知道一些結果不太好的例子。所以我們要管理好這本書。當然，我們必須等待十月開始的公開招生。我們已經開始研究計劃方法、計劃設計方法並進行調查。我想我們已經這樣做過好幾次了，以確保我們擁有合適的陣容，能夠吸引人們負擔得起，希望這對你有幫助，丹尼爾。

Yes, super helpful detail. And then maybe as my follow-up, the client hiring coming in slightly lower than expected. Was that concentrated in Florida as well or any specific geographical or vertical that, that was kind of concentrated in? Or was that more of a broad-based experience?

是的，非常有用的細節。然後也許作為我的後續行動，客戶招募人數略低於預期。這種現像是否也集中在佛羅裡達州，還是集中在任何特定的地理或垂直領域？或者這更像是一種廣泛的體驗？

No. I would say the hiring was pretty broad-based. We did have some hotspots in terms of -- I say hotspot were not the right word because I'm extremely sensitive to the people that were impacted by the fires in California. So that was a poor choice of words on my part. But we did see some specific areas that would probably indicate some natural disaster disruption.

不。我想說的是，招募範圍是相當廣泛的。我們確實有一些熱點——我說熱點不是正確的詞，因為我對受到加州火災影響的人們極為敏感。所以這是我的措詞不當。但我們確實看到一些特定區域可能預示著一些自然災害的發生。

We saw that in the PEO and in the ASO business, in particular, in California. And then we just saw slower checks than what we expected. And particularly, one of those factors was bonus checks and bonuses was interesting this year to me because the overall bonus dollar volume that was paid out by our clients was about 8% higher than the prior year, but the number of people who got bonuses was less.

我們在 PEO 和 ASO 業務中看到了這一點，尤其是在加州。然後我們發現檢查速度比我們預期的要慢。其中一個特別有趣的因素是獎金支票和獎金，因為今年我們的客戶支付的整體獎金金額比前一年高出約 8％，但獲得獎金的人數卻減少了。

And so that also kind of led to some of the check compression. So we're flat right now. When I look at the macro environment, our small business index continues to show moderate growth in small businesses, and we really see no signs of recession.

所以這也導致了一些支票壓縮。因此，我們現在處於平穩狀態。當我觀察宏觀環境時，我們的小型企業指數繼續顯示小型企業溫和成長，我們確實沒有看到衰退的跡象。

Mark Marcon, Baird.

馬克馬康，貝爾德。

Good morning, John and Bob. It sounds like a very exciting time at Paychex. You mentioned very specifically that you now expect the Paycor transaction to be accretive. You mentioned that you would now expect over $80 million in expense synergies. I'm wondering -- it sounds like you're feeling really excited.

早安，約翰和鮑伯。這聽起來像是 Paychex 的一個非常令人興奮的時刻。您非常明確地提到，您現在預計 Paycor 交易將會帶來增值。您提到現在預計費用綜效將超過 8,000 萬美元。我想知道——聽起來你真的很興奮。

Can you give us any more color with regards to what your expectations are with regards to revenue synergies?

您能否進一步說明一下您對收入綜效的期望？

And then also, just based on client calls that I've had, I'm wondering if you could also provide some detail in terms of when you're talking about the deal being accretive, like what would be the things that you would end up excluding or adjusting out in order to get to that accretion. So amortization of goodwill, bonuses, stock comp where testings are occurring, things of that nature so that people have a clear idea in terms of the accretion potential as we go into '26.

而且，根據我接到的客戶電話，我想知道您是否可以提供一些細節，說明當您談到交易具有增值性時，例如，為了實現這種增值，您最終會排除或調整哪些因素。因此，商譽攤銷、獎金、正在進行測試的股票補償等性質的事情讓人們對我們進入'26年時的增值潛力有一個清晰的認識。

Mark, I'll start with that, and then John can comment on the revenue synergies. And I thought we were fairly clear on this when we announced the deal on January 7, what we were going to exclude going forward. It's really 3 things. It's certainly the amortization of the intangible, given the size of this transaction. We communicated that.

馬克，我先從這個開始，然後約翰可以評論一下收入綜效。我認為，當我們在 1 月 7 日宣布這項協議時，我們對這一點已經相當清楚，我們今後要排除哪些內容。這實際上是三件事。考慮到這筆交易的規模，這肯定是無形資產的攤銷。我們已經傳達了這一訊息。

There is stock-based comp related to existing shares that will convert over and I kind of view that as consideration -- deal consideration, the accounting rules account for that as period costs. And so we are going to just that out. To me, that was part of the purchase price that we paid for the asset, although there will be quite a few Paycor people, employees joining the Paychex team that will be getting stock-based comp going forward, we will not exclude that.

與現有股份相關的股票補償將會轉換，我認為這作為對價——交易對價，會計規則將其視為期間成本。所以我們就這麼做吧。對我來說，這是我們為資產支付的購買價格的一部分，儘管會有不少 Paycor 員工、加入 Paychex 團隊的員工將來獲得股票補償，但我們不會排除這一點。

We will treat that like we normally do. So anything that we give out new prospectively as they join the Paychex family will be included. It's just the stuff that was outstanding that had invested that converts, again, that I viewed as consideration. And then the third thing is, obviously, there's a lot of onetime transaction-related costs, investment banking fees, lawyers and those types of things that we would normally exclude. So it's really just those 3 items.

我們將像平常一樣對待此事。因此，當他們加入 Paychex 家族時，我們未來提供的任何新產品都將包括在內。我只是將那些出色的東西投入到轉換中，再次將其視為考慮。第三件事是，顯然有很多一次性交易相關成本，投資銀行費用、律師費以及我們通常會排除的那些費用。所以其實只有那 3 項。

And then John can comment on the revenue synergy opportunity.

然後約翰可以對收入協同機會發表評論。

Yes. So Mark, let me just step back and just maybe get -- try to handle a broader question about where we are in this process overall. So obviously, we're excited. We're tired all at the same time. I think things are going better than we planned, both in terms of the timing of getting this still done and the expected benefits that we think we're going to realize as a combined company.

是的。所以馬克，讓我退一步來看看，也許可以嘗試回答一個更廣泛的問題，即我們在整個過程中處於什麼位置。顯然，我們很興奮。我們所有人都同時感到疲倦。我認為事情的進展比我們計劃的要好，無論是從完成的時間來看，還是從我們認為合併後的公司將實現的預期收益來看。

And I think in a very short period of time, I think we're going to be able to really bring to the market the most comprehensive and flexible and innovative set of HCM solutions in the industry.

我認為在很短的時間內，我們將能夠真正向市場推出業界最全面、最靈活、最具創新性的 HCM 解決方案。

So I'm excited about what we're putting together from a product road map and some of the capabilities that we've been able to find that both Paycor was working on, and we were working on that I think are going to be synergistic.

因此，我對我們所製定的產品路線圖以及我們能夠發現的 Paycor 和我們正在研究的一些功能感到非常興奮，我認為這些功能將產生協同作用。

We have been very focused on making sure we're integrating the 2 companies to make sure that our customers and our strategic partners are cared for from day 1. And so the second part, we've been very focused on making sure that the cost synergies that we've committed to can be achieved and that we're putting the effort that needs to be done to take care of those cost synergies in a respectful way for those that may be impacted from that. That's where our focus has been.

我們一直非常注重整合兩家公司，以確保從第一天起我們的客戶和策略合作夥伴就得到照顧。因此，第二部分，我們非常注重確保能夠實現我們所承諾的成本協同效應，並且我們正在盡一切努力以尊重的方式為那些可能受到影響的人實現這些成本協同效應。這正是我們關注的重點。

Now we are starting to turn towards the revenue side of this. We have a long list of potential opportunities that we -- are potential. And I would say that we're making good headway. So as you think about it on an overall view a year ago at 50,000 feet, I thought this was a good deal. At 30,000 feet when we got to December, I like what I was seeing.

現在我們開始轉向收入方面。我們有一長串的潛在機會。我想說我們正在取得良好進展。因此，當你從一年前 50,000 英尺的高度來整體思考時，我認為這是一筆很好的交易。當我們到達 12 月時，我們已經到達了 30,000 英尺的高空，我喜歡我所看到的景象。

Now we're at the 10,000-foot level, have a very good clear visibility relative to expenses, beginning to see line of sight of what the potential is from a revenue perspective, feeling really good about where we are on those. We just got to get the plane landed.

現在我們已經處於 10,000 英尺的高度，對費用有了非常清晰的了解，開始從收入角度看到潛力，對我們所處的位置感到非常滿意。我們只需讓飛機降落。

As you know, this is a public company competitor that we're acquiring. We don't have access to everything. We can't have access to everything yet. We want to get through the close. And once we have the close, we're going to -- we have the teams identified that are going to get together and begin to work the revenue synergies in earnest.

如您所知，這是我們正在收購的上市公司競爭對手。我們並不能存取所有的東西。我們目前還無法存取所有內容。我們希望能夠順利完成交易。一旦我們完成了交易，我們就會確定團隊，他們將聚在一起，開始認真發揮收入協同效應。

And where we want to be is effective very quickly beginning to introduce our full comprehensive set of products and services to our mutual clients as soon as possible. So that being said, the other thing I just want to make sure everyone understand that I think it's going to be a challenge as we go forward is we're going to combine the 2 companies. And part of Paychex is going to become part of the new Paycor in the upmarket. And for competitive reasons, I'm not going to get into details of our go-to-market strategy.

我們希望能夠盡快有效地開始向我們共同的客戶推出全套全面的產品和服務。話雖如此，我想確保每個人都明白的另一件事是，我認為合併兩家公司將是我們未來面臨的挑戰。Paychex 的一部分將成為高階市場新 Paycor 的一部分。出於競爭原因，我不會詳細介紹我們的行銷策略。

But effective day 1, we're going to become one Paychex. There's not going to be a stand-alone Paychex. There's no upper market and spin-off of Paycor upper market. There's parts of Paycor as we went through that we feel we're doing better. There's parts of Paycor that's doing better than Paychex.

但從第一天起，我們將成為一個 Paychex。不會有獨立的Paychex。沒有上游市場，也沒有 Paycor 上游市場的衍生性商品。在經歷 Paycor 的某些部分後，我們感覺自己做得更好了。Paycor 的部分業務表現比 Paychex 更好。

And what Bob and I got to work with the team on over the next 3 to 4 weeks, is really how do we take the best of those worlds together and put together a viable '26, '27 and beyond plan.

在接下來的 3 到 4 週內，鮑伯和我要與團隊一起研究的問題是如何綜合各個領域的最佳優勢，制定一個可行的 2026 年、2027 年及以後的計畫。

So that's where we are in the process. And so I just want to do that probably to head off some other questions you're going to have about why don't I know what's going to happen 6 months from now. There is a ton of opportunities that we're trying to work through. in terms of what we're seeing that they're doing, it's better than what we were doing. And if we can apply their learnings to us, that's going to improve our stand-alone results, and there's things that we're doing that are better than what they're doing.

這就是我們所處的進程。我這樣做可能只是為了解答你們可能提出的一些其他問題，例如為什麼我不知道 6 個月後會發生什麼。我們正在努力抓住大量機會。就我們所看到的，他們所做的比我們所做的還要好。如果我們能夠將他們的學習成果應用到我們自己身上，這將會改善我們的獨立結果，而且我們所做的事情比他們所做的更好。

And if we can apply those things to them and assume those things are going to happen, they're going to have better results. So we're really putting the best of both worlds together. So sorry for the long-winded answer, but I think this will hopefully cover a lot of questions that are going to be behind you.

如果我們可以將這些事情應用到他們身上並假設這些事情將會發生，他們就會得到更好的結果。因此，我們確實將兩全其美的優勢結合在一起。很抱歉我的回答這麼冗長，但我認為這將有望解答您將要遇到的許多問題。

I really do appreciate the comprehensive answer to that. And then for my follow-up, obviously, from a macro perspective, there's been a lot of fluctuations with regards to sentiment, both from a business and a consumer perspective. I'm wondering if you can talk a little bit about what -- how bookings were during the key selling season? And how things have evolved in terms of just the business sentiment. And typically, during the third quarter, you gave us preliminary guides for preliminary thoughts for the following year.

我真的很感謝你對此問題的全面回答。然後，我要說的是，顯然從宏觀角度來看，無論是從企業角度還是消費者角度來看，情緒都發生了很大的波動。我想知道您是否可以稍微談談在主要銷售季節的預訂情況如何？以及從商業情緒的角度來看事態如何發展。通常在第三季度，您會為我們提供下一年初步想法的初步指導。

Obviously, with Paycor, you've got a lot of things up and still to be developed.

顯然，借助 Paycor，您還有很多事情要做，但還有許多事情有待開發。

But I'm wondering if you were thinking about things on a stand-alone basis, would -- you typically end up talking about the fourth quarter exit rate as being something to think about with regards to the following year. If we were just thinking about Paychex's on a stand-alone, which obviously is not the case, would that still be the case?

但我想知道，如果您是從獨立的角度考慮問題，您通常會將第四季度的退出率作為考慮下一年的事情來討論。如果我們只是獨立考慮Paychex，這顯然不是事實，情況仍然會如此嗎？

Let me start. And thanks for the question, Mark. I'm not sure that that's one follow-up. It sounds like it might have been a few follow-ups in there, but good questions. Typically, we provide some, what I call breadcrumbs as it relates to next year.

讓我開始吧。謝謝你的提問，馬克。我不確定這是否是一個後續行動。聽起來好像其中可能有一些後續問題，但都是好問題。通常，我們會提供一些與明年相關的、我稱之為「麵包屑」的東西。

And as John mentioned, we've been heads down. I think we kicked off our integration work on the afternoon of January 7 when we announced the deal. And I would say we're maybe not as far along in our planning process that we normally are just given the work that we've been working on over the last several months on the integration itself. And so we obviously want to own the asset. We want to get through our plan review process and come back to you guys at the end of Q4 with a combined guidance and outlook for the next fiscal year.

正如約翰所提到的，我們一直在埋頭苦幹。我認為我們在 1 月 7 日下午宣布這筆交易時就開始了整合工作。我想說的是，我們的規劃過程可能還沒有像往常一樣順利進行，過去幾個月我們一直致力於整合工作。因此我們顯然想擁有該資產。我們希望完成我們的計劃審查流程，並在第四季度末向大家提供下一財年的綜合指導和展望。

With that being said, when I look at kind of the base business because obviously, I have visibility into kind of the base business and the KPIs and so forth. When I look at the base business, and I look at what's currently assumed out there from a consensus standpoint for next year from both a revenue growth standpoint and a margin expansion standpoint. Again, we haven't been through our full plan process, but I would expect to be able to put together a base case Paychex's plan that's in line with those assumptions that are out there. So that's a little bit of the breadcrumbs that we would normally give in a little bit additional color. But we still need to kind of work through our planning process and bring these 2 businesses together, as John mentioned.

話雖如此，當我查看基礎業務時，顯然我可以了解基礎業務和 KPI 等。當我審視基礎業務時，我會從營收成長和利潤率擴張的角度來觀察目前對明年的共識假設。再次強調，我們尚未完成完整的規劃流程，但我希望能夠制定符合現有假設的基本 Paychex 計畫。這就是我們通常會給出的一點額外顏色的麵包屑。但正如約翰所提到的，我們仍然需要透過我們的規劃流程來將這兩家企業整合在一起。

Yes. Mark, I just want to make a finer point so everybody understands the challenge of the question you just asked, because only a small group of us are able to really be involved in some of the details of exchanging information because of the nature of where we are in the process.

是的。馬克，我只是想更詳細地說明一下，以便每個人都能理解你剛才提出的問題的挑戰性，因為由於我們所處過程的性質，只有我們中的一小部分人能夠真正參與到交換信息的一些細節中。

So you asked a good question. Well, I'm sitting in a room and we have members of our team that are in the clean room, and they recognize, "Oh, my gosh, look at what Paycor is doing to drive demand? Why didn't we think about that?" I can assure you the day that we close that, day 2, I'm going to walk over to our marketing department and say, you better start doing X, Y and Z.

所以你問了一個好問題。好吧，我坐在一個房間裡，我們團隊的成員在無塵室裡，他們意識到，「哦，天哪，看看 Paycor 正在做什麼來推動需求？我們為什麼沒想到這一點呢？ 」我可以向你保證，我們完成這件事的第二天，我就會走到我們的行銷部門，對你說，你最好開始做 X、Y 和 Z。

So I don't -- if I can get the benefit of some of the things we're doing, I give you another list of examples of things that we're doing that they're not doing that as soon as we own them, we're going to tell them to start doing. And that's going to improve their stand-alone results as well.

所以我不會——如果我能從我們正在做的一些事情中獲益，我會給你另一個清單，列出我們正在做的事情的例子，而他們沒有這樣做，一旦我們擁有他們，我們就會告訴他們開始做。這也將改善他們的獨立業績。

So we've got a list of things that are going to -- I think are going to impact both businesses on a stand-alone basis to improve the businesses, you've got change management involved. There's always a risk around that, that we're working to manage. That's one of the things I'm talking to Adam and Ryan about. And I just think you have all of this working together. And then on top of it, you dropped the question, there's a lot of macro uncertainty out there as well.

因此，我們列出了一系列將對兩個業務產生獨立影響的事項，以改善業務，並涉及變革管理。這總是存在風險的，我們正在努力管理。這是我和亞當和瑞安談論的事情之一。我只是認為你們已經將所有這些結合起來了。除此之外，您還提出了一個問題，那就是還存在著許多宏觀不確定性。

So we've got a lot of things that we need to stand back and Bob and the team has not only been focused on all the things they've always been doing and the integration. We're also doing a public debt offering as well, bond offering. So that's in progress as well, need to be done. So I just would ask everyone to be patient with us.

因此，我們有很多事情需要退後一步，鮑勃和團隊不僅專注於他們一直在做的事情和整合。我們也在進行公開債務發行和債券發行。所以這也是正在進行中的，需要完成。因此我只是請求大家對我們保持耐心。

I know that you're used to hearing from us, a good understanding of what's going to happen in the next fiscal year. And I can tell you when we get to next year's third quarter call, we will be back to standard Paychex, but this is just not a stable third quarter. So just bear with us.

我知道您已經習慣聽到我們的消息，並且很好地了解下一財年將要發生的事情。我可以告訴你，當我們進入明年第三季電話會議時，我們將回到標準 Paychex，但這不是一個穩定的第三季。所以請耐心等待。

Pete Christiansen, Citi.

花旗銀行的 Pete Christiansen。

Really nice execution here, good to hear progress on your views on the Paycor acquisition. I was just wondering if we could do a little bit of a dive on the 401(k) business. It's something I don't think that's been called out in particular recently. And obviously, it sounds like a potential for revenue synergy there with Paycor.

這裡的執行真的很好，很高興聽到您對 Paycor 收購的看法的進展。我只是想知道我們是否可以對 401（k）業務做一些深入研究。我認為最近沒有人特別提到這一點。顯然，這聽起來像是與 Paycor 實現收入綜效的潛力。

Just curious if you could speak to some of the growth, attachment rates that you're seeing there? I know the SECURE Act was a catalyst for that area in the past. Just if you could give us kind of like where are we now kind of point of view on that business, that would be really helpful.

我只是好奇您是否可以談談您在那裡看到的一些增長和附著率？我知道《安全法案》在過去是該地區發展的催化劑。如果您能告訴我們目前對該業務的看法，那將會非常有幫助。

Yes. Thanks for the question. You're probably right. We don't talk about a double-digit growing business as much as we should. But the 401(k) business is doing well.

是的。謝謝你的提問。你可能是對的。我們對兩位數成長的業務的談論還不夠多。但401（k）業務表現良好。

I think you've got assets that -- that's one of the things. The asset part of that business was a little bit of a headwind in the third quarter and probably will be in the fourth quarter given where the market is right now. But overall, the underpinnings are strong. As you said, there's a lot of regulatory environment.

我認為你擁有資產——這是其中之一。該業務的資產部分在第三季遇到了一些阻力，考慮到目前的市場狀況，第四季可能仍會如此。但總體而言，其基礎仍是強勁的。正如您所說，監管環境非常嚴格。

I continue to explain to people, though, particularly given the -- where the consumer is, you have to still convince clients and the employees to participate in savings for their retirement. I'm not going to go off of my bandwagon on this, I think, is a big systemic issue that the country faces.

不過，我會繼續向人們解釋，特別是考慮到消費者的現狀，你仍然必須說服客戶和員工參與退休儲蓄。我不會在這個問題上不合時宜，我認為，這是國家面臨的重大系統性問題。

And I'm proud that Paychex has been part of the solution of introducing clients to it. But we're going to need more regulatory action. Hopefully, when the federal government gets done with all the tariff talk, we can turn to some closing of some of the loopholes that are in the SECURE Act that need to be closed, particularly for micro businesses, and we're continuing to work in Washington for that. So I feel good about where the 401(k) business is, and I feel good about what the future holds as well there.

我很自豪 Paychex 能夠成為向客戶介紹解決方案的一部分。但我們需要更多的監管行動。希望當聯邦政府完成所有關稅談判後，我們可以著手彌補《安全法案》中一些需要彌補的漏洞，特別是對於微型企業而言，我們正在華盛頓繼續為此而努力。因此，我對 401(k) 業務的現狀感到很滿意，並且我對它的未來發展也充滿信心。

So should we think of the attach rate kind of closer -- higher for some of your larger clients versus some of your smaller employee clients? And how do you -- how would you extrapolate that to the degree that you can discuss today? What that means for potential with Paycor clients?

那麼，我們是否應該認為，您的一些較大客戶的附加率比您的一些較小員工客戶的附加率更接近—更高？那麼您如何——您如何推斷這一點以便達到今天可以討論的程度？這對 Paycor 的潛在客戶意味著什麼？

Yes. Look, we think that there's an opportunity in the Paycor base for us to be able to go in and offer the 401(k) program. And I would say that regardless of the size, Paycor has some smaller client sizes as well, which are right in our sweet spot, and we have experience with larger clients as well.

是的。看，我們認為 Paycor 基地為我們提供了一個進入並提供 401（k）計劃的機會。我想說的是，無論規模如何，Paycor 也有一些規模較小的客戶，這正好是我們的優勢，而且我們也有與較大客戶打交道的經驗。

So we're going to introduce the concept and think that we have the chance to have similar attach rates in our base that they have in their base based on the client size. And as I said earlier on, we're just getting to that level of execution in our integration planning because we've been focused on customers, partners, people and that's where we've been focused at this point in time.

因此，我們將引入這個概念，並認為我們有機會在我們的基礎上獲得與他們基於客戶規模的基礎上相似的附加率。正如我之前所說，我們的整合規劃才剛達到執行水平，因為我們一直專注於客戶、合作夥伴和員工，而這正是我們目前的重點。

Bryan Bergin, TD Cowen.

布萊恩·伯金（Bryan Bergin），TD Cowen 公司。

It's actually Jared Levine on for Bryan Bergin today. Can you discuss how you currently partner with benefits brokers across both the Flex and PEO business and how that might evolve over time with Paycor part of your business?

今天實際上是賈里德·萊文 (Jared Levine) 代替布萊恩·伯金 (Bryan Bergin)。您能否討論一下您目前如何與 Flex 和 PEO 業務中的福利經紀人合作，以及隨著 Paycor 作為您業務的一部分逐漸發展，這種合作將如何發展？

Yes. Well, it's funny you should ask that question. I'm actually going to -- that is something we've been talking a lot about. We're committing to really fostering strong relationships with all the strategic partners, including brokers, we have a very vibrant broker program. Matter of fact, our broker program, referral program was up double digits year-over-year, both in our PEO and our HCM business, so we have a long-standing history.

是的。嗯，你問這個問題很有趣。我實際上會——這是我們經常討論的事情。我們致力於與所有策略合作夥伴（包括經紀人）建立牢固的關係，我們有一個非常活躍的經紀人計劃。事實上，我們的經紀人計劃和推薦計劃在 PEO 和 HCM 業務中都同比增長了兩位數，因此我們擁有悠久的歷史。

We've been partnering with brokers for over a decade at Paychex. Paycor certainly has a focus on that. And we have been working on a joint program. Again, as you can imagine, a lot of this is a small group, given where we're at, but we will be launching a major strategic partner program refresh in the coming weeks.

在 Paychex，我們與經紀人合作已有十多年。Paycor 確實重點關注這一點。我們一直在進行一個聯合計畫。再次，正如你所想像的，考慮到我們目前的狀況，其中很多都是小群體，但我們將在未來幾週內啟動一項重大的戰略合作夥伴計劃更新。

This is going to involve not only the broker channel, but the CPA channel, banks, and strategic advisers. It's going to be a combination of investments we've made in technology, improved support programs, and also new marketing programs that we think that all of our strategic partners are going to like.

這不僅涉及經紀人管道，還涉及 CPA 管道、銀行和策略顧問。這將是我們在技術方面的投資、改進的支援計劃以及新的行銷計劃的組合，我們認為我們所有的策略合作夥伴都會喜歡它。

So this is an area of focus for us, and certainly, Paycor, this is a big part of their go-to-market, and we've learned a lot of how they're approaching it and we're taking some of their best practices and some of our best practices and we are looking forward to introducing Paycor to our CPA and our banks and our other financial adviser partners, and we look forward to partnering with their strategic partners as well.

所以這是我們關注的一個領域，當然，對於 Paycor 來說，這是他們進入市場的一個重要部分，我們已經學到了很多關於他們如何處理這個問題的知識，我們正在藉鑑他們的一些最佳實踐和我們的一些最佳實踐，我們期待著將 Paycor 介紹給我們的註冊會計師、我們的銀行和我們的其他財務顧問合作夥伴，我們也期待著將 Paycor 介紹給我們的註冊會計師、我們的銀行和我們的其他財務顧問合作夥伴，我們也期待著與他們的戰略顧問合作夥伴。

Great. And then the follow-up here, ignoring the at-risk health insurance, has there been any change in the demand environment relative to last quarter? Or even if you kind of look at the past few weeks there with more of the, call it, tariff-related noise, anything different you're seeing in terms of I guess, the demand environment in recent weeks?

偉大的。然後這裡的後續問題是，忽略風險健康保險，需求環境相對於上一季有沒有什麼變化？或者，即使您回顧過去幾週的情況，發現更多與關稅相關的噪音，您認為最近幾週的需求環境有什麼不同嗎？

No, Look, on the PEO side, as I said, our bookings are double digits, a good pipeline going into Q4. So the underlying demand there is good. I would say that demand has remained consistent to our historical levels. I think when you look at Q3 in particularly January, February, it was a little softer than the prior year. But if you remember right, the first half of the year, we actually had a higher demand, higher proposal activity.

不，你看，在 PEO 方面，正如我所說，我們的預訂量是兩位數，這是進入第四季度的良好管道。因此那裡的潛在需求是良好的。我想說需求一直與我們的歷史水準一致。我認為，當你看第三季度，特別是一月和二月的時候，它比去年同期稍微疲軟一些。但如果您沒記錯的話，今年上半年我們的需求實際上更高，提案活動也更多。

So when you look on a year-to-date basis. Look, the -- it's an interesting macro environment because there's a lot of optimism and uncertainty, all at the same time. So whenever I hear how people are feeling and you're feeling optimistic and they're feeling uncertain, I look at the data.

因此，當您從年初至今的基礎來看。看，這是一個有趣的宏觀環境，因為同時存在著許多樂觀情緒和不確定性。因此，每當我聽到人們的感受，你感到樂觀而他們感到不確定時，我就會查看數據。

And so when I look at the data from a hiring perspective, I look at the data from an out-of-business, I look at data of the increase we've seen our clients add additional sites. So additional locations is up double digits. Those are not indicators of a pending recession or a macro employment problems.

因此，當我從招募的角度查看數據時，我會查看來自業務暫停的數據，查看客戶增加額外站點的數據。因此，新增地點數量增加了兩位數。這些並不是即將出現經濟衰退或宏觀就業問題的指標。

I think the other thing I would add to that is just the retention performance has been strong all year, and it was actually better in Q3, as you know, that's an important time of the year for us getting through year-end. In our retention, our client losses are actually down year-over-year. And I think most everyone knows that the largest portion of our losses come from out-of-business and our out-of-business losses were down double digits in the quarter. So as it relates to kind of the stability from a macro standpoint, things seem to be pretty stable, and we're seeing strong improvements in retention year-over-year as well.

我想補充的另一件事是，全年的留存表現一直很強勁，而且第三季的表現實際上更好，如你所知，這是我們度過年底的重要時刻。在我們的保留方面，我們的客戶損失實際上比去年同期有所下降。我想大多數人都知道，我們的損失最大部分來自於業務停擺，而本季我們的業務停擺損失下降了兩位數。因此，從宏觀角度來看，就穩定性而言，情況似乎相當穩定，我們也看到保留率逐年大幅提升。

Yes. On that point, I would say hats off to the team, too, because not only were uncontrollables down, but also all of our controllable metrics were down as well. So just good solid execution. I think it's a testament of the strength of our value proposition.

是的。在這一點上，我也要向團隊表示敬意，因為不僅不可控指標下降了，而且我們所有可控指標也都下降了。所以只是良好而紮實的執行。我認為這是我們價值主張力量的證明。

Bryan Keane, Deutsche Bank.

德意志銀行的布萊恩·基恩。

Congrats on the results here. Just wanted to ask on the Paycor acquisition, the additional cost synergies, exactly where might those be coming from which is giving you some confidence to now talk about some accretion and curious about how much accretion now for fiscal year '26.

祝賀所取得的成果。只是想問一下關於 Paycor 收購案的額外成本協同效應，這些效應究竟來自哪裡，這讓您有信心現在談論一些增值，並且好奇 26 財年現在增值了多少。

Yes. Bryan, I would say this, that you've got 2 public companies coming together. There's obviously redundancies. I don't want to go into a high level of detail, rest assured that both in terms of vendor spend where we have redundancy, where we have best practices, and where we have scale, where that can be leveraged quickly, those are the areas that we were able to very quickly go and validate, and then quite frankly, I think there were some additional things that we found from each other. Some things that Paycor was doing that I don't know why we weren't doing it, and why we hadn't thought of it, and we're going to take those ideas and apply it really day 2, and we think those are going to drive additional synergies out of the gate.

是的。布萊恩，我想說的是，你們讓兩家上市公司合併在一起了。顯然存在冗餘。我不想講得太詳細，請放心，無論是在供應商支出方面，我們在哪些方面有冗餘，在哪些方面有最佳實踐，在哪些方面有規模，在哪些方面可以快速利用，這些都是我們能夠非常快速地進行驗證的領域，然後坦率地說，我認為我們從彼此身上發現了一些額外的東西。Paycor 正在做的一些事情，我不知道為什麼我們不做，為什麼我們沒有想到，我們將採納這些想法並在第二天真正應用它，我們認為這些將會帶來額外的協同效應。

Yes. And Bryan, obviously, as it relates to the size of the accretion, we're not ready to kind of give that guidance yet. I think what we said in early January was that we thought it was going to be neutral to slightly accretive. And so you can see we're a little bit more positive on that. We're fairly confident just based on the work that both teams have been working on over the last several months that this will be accretive to our adjusted EPS next year and will come back in Q4 and size that opportunity for you.

是的。布萊恩，顯然，由於這與累積的大小有關，我們還沒有準備好給出這方面的指導。我認為我們在一月初就說過，我們認為它將是中性的到略微增值的。所以你可以看到我們對此更加積極一些。基於兩個團隊過去幾個月的努力，我們非常有信心，這將增加我們明年的調整後每股收益，並將在第四季度再次為您擴大這一機會。

Yes. We -- as I said, I want to keep going back to the process, what we did, but we've been focused on customers. We've been focused on strategic partners and what we got to do to make sure day 1 they're happy and content, and our employees. These are the 3 things we're now returning to what we can do together because, again, it's only a small group of us that can really talk about this.

是的。正如我所說，我想繼續回顧流程，回顧我們所做的事情，但我們一直專注於客戶。我們一直專注於策略夥伴，並努力確保他們和我們的員工在第一天就感到高興和滿意。這是我們現在要回顧的可以一起做的三件事，因為再說一次，只有我們中的一小部分人可以真正談論這件事。

Until we're closed, we got to get everybody else in the game talking about how we can make the best of this combination. And so one of the things we're thinking about is where do we want to invest?

在結束之前，我們必須讓遊戲中的其他人討論如何充分利用這個組合。因此，我們正在考慮的事情之一是我們想要在哪裡投資？

And I will tell you right now, we made the statement when we told you about the synergies, we still expect it to expand our investment in product and in sales growth and based upon what we found thus far from a cost synergy side, one of the decisions we're going to make as we're going through our budget planning season is how much more we want to invest. So I would also expect to hear us talk about more investments in go-to-market, more investments in product acceleration as well.

我現在就告訴你，我們在告訴你協同效應時做出了聲明，我們仍然希望它能擴大我們在產品和銷售增長方面的投資，並且根據我們迄今為止在成本協同效應方面發現的情況，我們在預算規劃季節要做的決定之一就是我們想要投資多少。因此，我也希望聽到我們談論在市場進入方面的更多投資，在產品加速方面的更多投資。

Got it. And just as a follow-up, thinking about the revenue the -- if you include Paycor, I think you're talking about 10% to 12%. So just trying to think about timing of that. Is that -- is that basically 2/3 of a quarter contribution? And then as we get our model set for next year, how much revenue should we be putting in for our models for Paycor or for fiscal year '26?

知道了。作為後續問題，考慮一下收入——如果包括 Paycor，我認為你說的是 10% 到 12%。所以只是試著思考一下那個時間點。這基本上是四分之一捐款的 2/3 嗎？然後，當我們為明年設定模型時，我們應該為 Paycor 或 26 財年的模型投入多少收入？

I think just in terms of -- I think what we've said is, we expect this to close in April. And then I think in my script, I said in weeks. So you can probably triangulate.

我認為就這一點而言——我認為我們已經說過，我們預計這將在四月完成。然後我想，在我的劇本里，我說的是幾週內。因此您或許可以進行三角測量。

Yes. I mean we don't have an exact date, Bryan. I think as John mentioned, a lot of the closing conditions have been met. We've been focused on and are currently focused on finalizing the permanent financing for the transaction and that process is well underway, and we would expect to finalize that over the next couple of weeks and be in a position to close. So we've obviously given a range because we don't know the exact date, but we will announce it when it closes and then you guys will probably be able to back end the exact impact for Q4 and update your models accordingly.

是的。我的意思是我們沒有確切的日期，布萊恩。我認為正如約翰所提到的，很多成交條件都已經滿足。我們一直專注於並且目前專注於完成交易的永久融資，並且該流程正在順利進行中，我們預計將在接下來的幾週內完成並完成交易。因此，我們顯然給出了一個範圍，因為我們不知道確切的日期，但我們會在結束時宣布，然後你們可能能夠追溯到第四季度的確切影響並相應地更新你們的模型。

Ramsey El-Assal, Barclays.

巴克萊銀行的拉姆齊‧埃爾-阿薩勒 (Ramsey El-Assal)。

In Management Solutions, you flagged higher revenue per client with pricing being a driver. How should we think about pricing as perhaps a lever you might be able to pull if you see any macro deterioration? I guess, what kind of headroom do you see for pricing at this point?

在管理解決方案中，您標記了每位以定價為驅動力的客戶的更高收入。如果您發現宏觀經濟狀況惡化，我們應該如何看待定價作為您可以利用的槓桿？我想，您認為目前定價還有多大空間？

Yes. I mean we feel like we have strong pricing power. I mean, we've always been able to within a range achieve that. And I think we feel -- and we've done that in certainly in downturns as well. If we have a macro downturn, we may not go as high as maybe where we've been in the last couple of years with inflation.

是的。我的意思是我們覺得我們有強大的定價權。我的意思是，我們一直能夠在一定範圍內實現這一目標。我想我們也有這種感覺——而且我們在經濟低迷時期也確實這樣做過。如果我們出現宏觀經濟衰退，通膨率可能不會像過去幾年那麼高。

So we feel comfortable about that part of our growth formula that we've talked about in that 2% to 4% range.

因此，我們對我們討論過的 2% 到 4% 範圍內的成長公式部分感到滿意。

I would say Q3, we did have strong price realization. I mean revenue per client is a big part of our model. We get that both through the pricing and through product attachment and both of those were strong in Q3. And I would say we did have better price realization in Q3 related to discounting that was favorable and some of those types of things.

我想說在第三季度，我們確實實現了強勁的價格。我的意思是每個客戶的收入是我們模型的重要組成部分。我們透過定價和產品附件獲得了這一點，並且這兩項在第三季度都很強勁。我想說的是，我們在第三季的價格實現確實有所改善，這得益於有利的折扣以及諸如此類的事情。

We have our year-end processing and there's discounting that takes place there, and that came in a bit better than certainly what it was last year, and so that was a nice tailwind from a growth standpoint in Q3 for us. But we feel good about where we're at from a pricing standpoint.

我們有年終處理，並且在那裡進行折扣，而且結果肯定比去年要好一些，所以從第三季度的成長角度來看，這對我們來說是一個很好的順風。但從定價的角度來看，我們對目前的狀況感到滿意。

Yes. I think one of the most important disciplines that you can have is being disciplined about how you grow. And so as I always say, I can have as many clients as I want if I want to pay Google more than the lifetime value to attract that customer I want to discount to a point where over the life of that client I am not going to make anything on it. That's not a good thing to do in an uncertain macro environment. So I certainly think just as we are conservative, we mentioned about our conservatism in underwriting in the PEO and we're not going to do anything there to drive revenue.

是的。我認為最重要的紀律之一就是嚴格遵守自己的成長方式。所以就像我常說的，如果我願意向谷歌支付超過終身價值的費用來吸引那個客戶，那麼我可以擁有任意數量的客戶，而我想要的折扣會達到一個程度，即在該客戶的整個生命週期內我不會從中賺到任何錢。在不確定的宏觀環境下，這不是好事。因此，我確實認為，正如我們是保守的一樣，我們在 PEO 中提到了我們在承保方面的保守主義，我們不會在那裡做任何事情來增加收入。

We're also not going to take business.

我們也不會承接生意。

So to me, when you face a degree of uncertainty, you got to make sure you're watching the bottom line. You look at our margin expansion of 180 basis points. I don't think anyone could question that. But you also got to watch what you're bringing into the top, and we were watching that as well.

所以對我來說，當你面臨一定程度的不確定性時，你必須確保你專注的是底線。您看我們的利潤率擴大了 180 個基點。我想沒有人會質疑這一點。但你也要注意你帶入頂部的東西，我們也在註意這一點。

Okay. It's a good segue to my next question, which is basically, you flagged investments in AI and automation in terms of helping drive some of the margin expansion this quarter. What's the runway at this point for further benefits from AI and automation? Is this sort of a new input to your kind of margin algorithm? Will it have a similar impact next year?

好的。這很好地引出了我的下一個問題，基本上，您提到了對人工智慧和自動化的投資有助於推動本季的利潤率擴大。目前人工智慧和自動化進一步獲益的前景如何？這對於你們的保證金演算法來說是一種新的輸入嗎？明年會產生類似的影響嗎？

Or have -- has the lowest hanging fruit been already picked? How would you characterize it?

或者──最下面掛著的果實已經摘走了嗎？您如何描述它？

Well, we've been using -- again, we've been using AI models for almost a decade across the company, hundreds of them to make better decisions in risk, some things we just talked about in discounting is an AI driven. We continue to refine and invest in those models and with the newer technologies around that in terms of the quality of decision-making that the models that can be built. I'm not an expert in this, but we got several around not too far from you. But that's what we're running.

嗯，我們一直在使用——再說一次，我們在整個公司使用人工智慧模型已有近十年了，其中數百個模型用於在風險方面做出更好的決策，我們剛才談到的折扣中的一些事情是由人工智慧驅動的。我們將繼續改進和投資這些模型，並利用圍繞這些模型的新技術來提高所建立模型的決策品質。我不是這方面的專家，但我們在離你不遠的地方有幾個。但這就是我們正在做的事情。

What we're learning is we're applying these models and they're really driving better decisions that we're making at the point of sale at the point of service, good thing on retention. We're intercepting issues using AI and getting in front of them before it becomes a client loss or a client dissatisfier. That's been huge. We've just really started that in the last year, really over the last, I think it's probably now we're into the ninth month of really recording all of the interactions that we're having in any mode of communication between both our service and sales teams.

我們正在學習應用這些模型，它們確實推動我們在銷售點和服務點做出更好的決策，這對保留有好處。我們正在利用人工智慧來攔截問題，並在其導致客戶流失或客戶不滿意之前解決它們。這真是個巨大的進步。我們在去年才真正開始這項工作，實際上在過去，我想現在可能已經進入第九個月了，我們正在真正記錄我們服務和銷售團隊之間在任何溝通模式下進行的所有互動。

We're just getting the volume to really be and just beginning to train those models to their full potential. And then more models and more ideas are coming out. I think we talked about it on the script, we're just piloting this HR copilot that's really a productivity and it's not only a productivity improvement for our HR generalists that are serving the client it's also allowing them to provide better, more robust answers to the client.

我們才剛達到真正的規模，並開始訓練這些模型，發揮其全部潛力。然後更多的模型和想法陸續出現。我想我們在腳本中討論過這個問題，我們只是在試行這個人力資源副駕駛，這確實是一種生產力，它不僅提高了為客戶服務的人力資源通才的生產力，還允許他們為客戶提供更好、更有力的答案。

So it's enhancing the value at the same time. And then we're now beginning to look at AI as a way to make money in terms of what we're doing to provide insights to the clients and products. And then talking to the Paycor team as well from a product road map perspective, I'm impressed with several things that they've got going on. And I really think together under Ryan's leadership of the joint product team, I really think we're going to see a lot of acceleration and exciting things coming out of that in the year ahead.

因此它同時也提升了價值。我們現在開始將人工智慧視為一種賺錢的方式，透過為客戶和產品提供見解。然後從產品路線圖的角度與 Paycor 團隊交談，他們正在進行的幾件事給我留下了深刻的印象。我真的認為，在瑞安的領導下，聯合產品團隊在未來的一年裡將會出現很多加速和令人興奮的事情。

James Faucette, Morgan Stanley.

摩根士丹利的詹姆斯·福塞特（James Faucette）。

I wanted to dig in really quickly on a couple of product-related questions. First, just wondering if you can share any details about early adoption metrics around Flex Engage since its launch? And how should we be thinking about where that will fit in the portfolio?

我想要快速深入探討幾個與產品相關的問題。首先，我只是想知道您是否可以分享有關 Flex Engage 自推出以來的早期採用指標的任何詳細資訊？我們應該怎樣考慮將其放入投資組合中呢？

Yes. So Flex Engage is the adoption of that as well. As you can imagine, that's more of an upmarket product for us. And what I'm really excited about is I think when you look at the talent and workforce management capabilities that Paycor brings to the table in addition to Engage, I think that's one of the areas that I think we've got some tremendous opportunities. I would say that they actually have a little better attachment than we do.

是的。Flex Engage 也是對此的採用。你可以想像，對我們來說，這更像是高檔產品。而讓我真正興奮的是，我認為當你看到 Paycor 除了 Engage 之外所帶來的人才和勞動力管理能力時，我認為這是我們擁有巨大機會的領域之一。我想說他們的感情其實比我們好一點。

And so I think it gives us an aspiration of what's possible in terms of engaging our upmarket clients to adopt these capabilities.

因此，我認為這讓我們對吸引高端客戶採用這些功能的可能性有了明確的認識。

Got it. Got it. Got it. And second question I wanted to ask was also a product-related question. On the recruiting Copilot, it's kind of an interesting extension of some of the things you've been developing over time.

知道了。知道了。知道了。我想問的第二個問題也是與產品相關的問題。在招募 Copilot 時，它是你長期以來一直在開發的一些東西的有趣延伸。

What are the specific metrics you're using to measure its effectiveness in helping clients find qualified candidates? And can you maybe describe where that fits within the sales cycle wheel for you right now and where you'd like it to get to be eventually?

您使用哪些具體指標來衡量其幫助客戶找到合格候選人的有效性？您能否描述一下目前它在銷售週期輪中的位置以及您希望它最終達到的位置？

Yes. So the Copilot that we've launched is a tool that has this database of over 20 million workers that you basically say what you're looking for and it tells you, here's the people, whether they're active or not actively in a job search so that you're not just looking for job seekers, you're looking at the entire job market to do that. And so we're using that across all of our sales teams as part of our entire sales play.

是的。因此，我們推出的 Copilot 是一個擁有超過 2000 萬名工作者資料庫的工具，只要你說出你在尋找什麼，它就會告訴你，這裡有這些人，無論他們是否積極地尋找工作，這樣你就不只是在尋找求職者，而是在查看整個就業市場來做到這一點。因此，我們將它應用於我們所有銷售團隊，作為我們整個銷售活動的一部分。

We're also having our customer success individuals who manage account relationships upmarket. We also have our HR journalists talking to our clients who are trying to find qualified employees about using the product. What I would say we've seen earlier, we're looking at the adoption. We're looking at reuse of the product, how many times are they using and how many placements are being done there.

我們還有專門負責管理高端客戶關係的客戶成功人員。我們的人力資源記者也與正在嘗試使用該產品的合格員工的客戶進行交談。我想說的是，我們之前已經看到，我們正在研究採用情況。我們正在關注產品的重複使用情況、它們使用了多少次以及在那裡進行了多少次放置。

What I would tell you there's an interesting learning on that is we still have work to do to adopt whether or not an AI technology tool is what the entire market is looking for. If I have a recruiter in a large company or if I have an HR person who's the one active recruiter, they love this tool.

我想告訴你的是，我們還有一個有趣的學習過程，那就是我們還有很多工作要做，以確定人工智慧技術工具是否是整個市場所需要的。如果我在一家大公司有一個招募人員，或者我有一個作為活躍招募人員的人力資源人員，他們會喜歡這個工具。

But if you're an owner, you may not want to do the tool and do the work. So you're almost now saying, I've almost got to put a solution together. What's great about that is we do that all the time. This concept of being able to take service and technology and put together a solution, that is something we're continuing to work on, and we're going to have to continue to look at.

但如果你是業主，你可能不想使用該工具並進行該工作。所以你現在幾乎是在說，我幾乎必須找到一個解決方案。最棒的是，我們一直都在做這件事。將服務和技術結合起來並提出解決方案的理念是我們正在繼續努力實現的，我們將不得不繼續研究。

So what I would say is the adoption and the usage of it is going well upmarket. I would have expected given the demand and the challenges that smaller businesses have that we would have seen a bigger adoption of it at this stage. And so I think we just got more to do on the product there.

所以我想說的是，它的採用和使用在高端市場上進展順利。考慮到小型企業的需求和挑戰，我原本預計我們會在這個階段看到更廣泛的採用。因此我認為我們在產品方面還有很多工作要做。

Ashish Sabadra, RBC Capital Markets.

加拿大皇家銀行資本市場 (RBC Capital Markets) 的 Ashish Sabadra。

This is Will Chi on for Ashish Sabadra. Maybe a bit of a follow-up question there on competitive landscape, if you guys could comment on that. And really curious on those comments about product adoption, if that's been kind of a benefit from your standpoint there as well. And then just as a quick follow-up, maybe if you have any updates on your capital allocation strategy.

這是 Will Chi 為 Ashish Sabadra 表演的。也許關於競爭格局的後續問題還有待解決，如果你們能對此發表評論的話。我真的很好奇那些關於產品採用的評論，從您的角度來看這是否也是一種好處。然後，作為快速的跟進，也許您對您的資本配置策略有任何更新。

Well, I'll let Bob take the capital allocation but I would probably say in both the topics, not much has changed. The competitive market is a competitive market. I've not seen any major shifts in the competitive market at all at this point in time. So when I look at the balance of trade, I look at all the indicators, it's a competitive market. That's what I would say.

好吧，我會讓鮑伯負責資本配置，但我可能會說，在這兩個主題中，並沒有太大的變化。競爭的市場就是競爭的市場。到目前為止，我還沒有看到競爭市場有任何重大轉變。因此，當我觀察貿易平衡時，我會觀察所有指標，發現這是一個競爭激烈的市場。這就是我要說的。

Bob?

鮑伯？

Yes. I mean, certainly no change to our capital allocation strategy, continuing to look to invest in the business. I think we're very clear when we announced the transaction, we're committed to the dividend and our payout ratio. The other part of it is M&A.

是的。我的意思是，我們的資本配置策略肯定不會改變，繼續尋求對業務的投資。我認為我們在宣布交易時就非常清楚，我們致力於股息和派息率。另一部分是併購。

We're currently executing on that part of the capital allocation strategy. I would say I wouldn't expect anything of significance. We're going forward in the near term, we're certainly focused on integrating Paycor and making this a successful transaction and really getting the synergies out of it that we expect to. And so that's really our area of focus. And overall, no change in philosophy around capital allocation.

我們目前正在執行資本配置策略的這一部分。我想說我不會期待任何重要的事情。在短期內，我們將繼續專注於整合 Paycor，使交易成功，並真正獲得我們期望的協同效應。所以這確實是我們關注的領域。整體而言，資本配置理念並沒有改變。

Kartik Mehta, Northcoast Research.

Kartik Mehta，Northcoast Research。

I just wanted to get your perspective on the PEO business. I know you've talked a lot about it, and I understand maybe the reason for reducing your guidance. But just if you look at the business holistically, do you think there's been any change -- a fundamental change in the business that would affect kind of the medium-term growth for this business, either new competition or businesses looking at it differently? Or do you think this is just an anomaly and related to kind of benefits and cost of benefits?

我只是想了解您對 PEO 業務的看法。我知道您已經談論了很多，我也許知道您減少指導的原因。但是，如果從整體上看這項業務，您是否認為業務中發生了任何變化——一種會影響該業務中期增長的根本性變化，無論是新的競爭還是企業的不同看法？或者您認為這只是一種異常現象並且與福利和福利成本有關？

Kartik, good to talk to you. I think this is a very unique situation to a specific program we have in Florida. That's really what it is. I don't -- actually, when I look at from a demand perspective in terms of the number of people that are shopping for health, I think it's actually an improvement in the environment.

Kartik，很高興與您交談。我認為這是我們在佛羅裡達州的一個特定項目的一個非常獨特的情況。事實確實如此。我不這麼認為——實際上，當我從需求角度來看購買健康產品的人數時，我認為這實際上是一種環境的改善。

Look, there is a health inflation problem. And so what you have now is people -- every time they get the renewal notice, are faced with a situation that they either have to dramatically change their plan design, which a. k. a. can many times mean give less benefits for the same dollar or make trade-offs.

看，有健康通膨問題。所以現在的情況是，人們每次收到續約通知時，都面臨著這樣的情況：他們要么必須大幅改變他們的計劃設計，要么…… k.一個。很多時候意味著用同樣的錢換取更少的利益或做出權衡。

So you're seeing increased shopping there because every time you get a renewal that's higher than you feel like you can afford, you as an employer are beginning to shop that. And the PEO and the nature of the PEO creates an opportunity to scale people together and create a powerful value proposition. So I actually think that the demand -- the macro environment is going to drive increased demand in shopping for competitive health offerings.

因此，您會看到那裡的購物量增加，因為每次您獲得的續約金額高於您認為自己能夠承受的金額時，作為雇主，您就會開始購物。PEO 及其性質創造了一個機會，將人們聚集在一起，創造強大的價值主張。因此我實際上認為需求——宏觀環境將推動購買有競爭力的健康產品的需求增加。

Now the question is, where are you going to put them? And in the case for us in Florida, it's not true for all of our competitors in Florida, right, we have a series of options. One, I can put you on a specialty pass-through program, but I'm going to underwrite you and I'm going to look at that or I can put you on a stand-alone plan through our agency.

現在的問題是，你要把它們放在哪裡？就我們在佛羅裡達州的情況而言，這並不適用於我們在佛羅裡達州的所有競爭對手，對吧，我們有一系列的選擇。第一，我可以為您安排一個專門的直通計劃，但我會為您承保，我會考慮這一點，或者我可以透過我們的代理機構為您安排一個獨立的計劃。

From an experience of an employer perspective or an employee perspective from a technology like an enrollment, it's exactly the same. It doesn't matter. You just know you got insurance from Blue Cross Blue Shield of Florida. It doesn't matter whether it was in the specialty program or it was on your own stand-alone plan.

從雇主的角度或員工的角度（從招生等技術的角度來看）的經驗是完全相同的。沒關係。您只知道您從佛羅裡達州藍十字藍盾獲得了保險。無論它是在專業計劃中還是在您自己的獨立計劃中都沒關係。

So what we saw and what we have seen across the country is we've seen an increase in the attachment of insurance in the PEO. We've seen an increase in participants, what people are selecting, employers are selecting are lower-cost plans, sometimes due to plan design. And then when they're offering a variety of plans to their employees, their employees who may have been on the Premium plan last year are going to the Gold plan, if that makes sense. So that's the dynamic we see going on. It's more of a trade-off inside the client versus a macro change.

因此，我們看到以及在全國各地看到的情況是，PEO 中的保險附加價值有所增加。我們看到參與人數增加，人們和雇主選擇的都是低成本計劃，有時是因為計劃設計。然後，當他們為員工提供各種計劃時，去年可能採用高級計劃的員工將轉向黃金計劃，如果這有意義的話。這就是我們看到的正在發生的動態。這更多的是客戶端內部與宏觀變化的權衡。

Yes, Kartik, I would just add, we're very bullish on the PEO opportunity just in general. I think if you look at the value proposition of the PEO, it checks a lot of boxes. As you've heard us talk about our purpose is to help small businesses succeed. And I think that PEO value proposition really checks a lot of the boxes that small businesses are -- challenges that they're facing.

是的，Kartik，我只想補充一點，我們總體上非常看好 PEO 機會。我認為，如果你看一下 PEO 的價值主張，它會檢查很多方面。正如您所聽到的，我們的目標是幫助小型企業取得成功。我認為 PEO 價值主張確實滿足了小型企業面臨的許多挑戰。

When you look at the performance of that business, John and I and the team, we're focused on worksite employee growth. At the end of the day, we're trying to sell more and lose less and drive worksite employee growth. And that continues to be strong. We see strong demand. We see strong retention.

當你觀察這項業務的表現時，約翰、我和團隊都關注的是工作現場員工的成長。歸根結底，我們的目標是增加銷售量、減少虧損並推動工作場所員工的成長。而且這種勢頭依然強勁。我們看到了強勁的需求。我們看到了強勁的保留率。

If you look at the PEO business alone, if you were to pull that apart, we don't pull it apart for you. But if you were to look at that by itself in the front half of the year, that was a double-digit growing business, and it's still growing strong despite some of the pass-through revenue headwinds that we're going to face as we go forward that have no impact to net service revenue or the bottom line.

如果您單獨看 PEO 業務，如果您要將其分開，我們不會為您將其分開。但如果你單獨看今年上半年的情況，你會發現這是一項兩位數成長的業務，儘管我們未來將面臨一些轉嫁收入方面的阻力，但業務仍然保持強勁增長，但這對淨服務收入或利潤沒有影響。

So I think in general, we're very bullish on the PEO opportunity. There will be some pass-through revenue headwind until we kind of anniversary that as we get more towards the end of this calendar year, but feel good about the opportunity there.

因此我認為總的來說，我們非常看好 PEO 機會。在我們慶祝週年紀念日之前，會有一些轉嫁收入逆風，因為我們將在年底獲得更多收入，但我們對那裡的機會感到樂觀。

I mean, Kartik, look, our growth of worksite employees is outpacing the competitive benchmarks that I see. And we're facing the same headwinds that many of them have reported in terms of not the type of hiring inside the base that you would expect. And we commented a little bit earlier about the decrease in average client size.

我的意思是，卡蒂克，你看，我們現場員工的成長速度超過了我所看到的競爭基準。我們面臨著同樣的阻力，許多人報告說，基地內部的招募類型並不像人們所期望的那樣。我們之前對平均客戶規模的減少做出了一些評論。

So in spite of not having clients hire as many people as you expected and in spite of having slightly smaller clients than you historically have seen, you're still growing at better than competitive rates in terms of worksite employees.

因此，儘管客戶沒有像您預期的那樣僱用那麼多員工，儘管客戶規模比歷史上略小，但就工作現場員工而言，您的成長速度仍然高於競爭對手。

That's helpful, John. Bob, just one clarification. I think on the pass-throughs, they were accretive this quarter, right, Bob, from a revenue standpoint, but not going to be as accretive as you anticipated. Is that a fair way to make sure I understand it.

這很有幫助，約翰。鮑勃，我只想澄清一點。我認為，從收入的角度來看，本季的轉嫁收入是增加的，對吧，鮑勃，但不會像你預期的那樣增加。這是確保我理解它的公平方法嗎？

Yes, there's growth in pass-through revenues and -- but it's been lower than what we anticipated and will be a headwind as we move forward.

是的，轉嫁收入確實有所成長，但低於我們的預期，而且將成為我們前進的阻力。

Tien-Tsin Huang, JPMorgan.

摩根大通的 Tien-Tsin Huang。

As always, it's very complete here. Just thinking about everything you've said, you have Paycor, of course, you've got good retention. We got the update on macro. Has your thinking around sales headcount investment changed at all, whether it's in the aggregate or across the different subunits. Just curious what you're thinking here because you're getting strong productivity, it sounds like in general.

一如既往，這裡非常齊全。只要想想您所說的一切，您有 Paycor，當然，您的保留率就很好。我們獲得了有關宏觀的更新資訊。您對銷售人員投資的想法是否有所改變，無論是總體上還是跨不同子部門的。只是好奇你在這裡想什麼，因為你獲得了強大的生產力，這聽起來總體上是這樣的。

So I think when we announced the acquisition, we made a statement that we would -- that our initial thesis was that we would invest and expand our go-to-market and our sales headcount. And that was part of it. And that you should expect that we would increase the percentage increase in sales headcount out into the future. So when we modeled and thought about this, this was all part of our broader strategy that we believe there was an upmarket opportunity for us to play and looking at investments.

因此，我認為，當我們宣布收購時，我們發表了一份聲明，我們最初的論點是，我們將投資並擴大我們的市場影響力和銷售人員數量。這就是其中的一部分。您應該預料到，未來我們會增加銷售人員數量的百分比增幅。因此，當我們對此進行建模和思考時，這都是我們更廣泛策略的一部分，我們相信這是一個高端市場機會，我們可以參與其中並考慮投資。

So now what we're doing is we're trying to step back and based upon what we've learned and ask ourselves how much investment do we want to make? And given where we now are on the cost synergies, making the trade-off of whether or not we want to even accelerate more than what we originally planned.

所以現在我們要做的就是試著退一步，根據我們所學到的知識問自己，我們想要做多少投資？考慮到我們目前的成本協同狀況，我們需要權衡是否要比原計劃更快加速。

So that will be the topic that once we've closed the acquisition and we've done our budget planning process, which is currently scheduled in the first part of April, I'll leave it at that, that's when we'll make the determination. But I think you should expect to be seeing us increasing our sales coverage model going into fiscal year '26 and beyond.

所以，一旦我們完成收購並完成預算規劃流程（目前計劃在 4 月初），我就會就此打住，到時候我們就會做出決定。但我認為您應該會看到我們在 26 財年及以後會增加我們的銷售覆蓋模式。

Got it. No, I recall those statements. I didn't know if relative to PEO, ASO, I know some of those things were asked. I didn't know if there was any major change there from a 90-day perspective. It sounds like we'll wait and hear back when we get back on the call together again.

知道了。不，我記得這些陳述。我不知道是否與 PEO、ASO 有關，我知道有人問過其中一些問題。我不知道從 90 天的角度來看那裡是否有任何重大變化。聽起來我們要等到我們再次通話時才能得到回應。

I know you're taking a lot of questions, so just thinking about that, I know Ramsey asked about AI and I asked about productivity.

我知道你正在回答很多問題，所以想想看，我知道拉姆齊問的是人工智慧，而我問的是生產力。

But it feels like the productivity in general, better than -- better than you expected. Is there anything here beyond AI that you're getting more productivity here out before thinking about Paycor, it does feel like you're running at a different speed from an operating expense standpoint. Tell me if I'm wrong, though, please.

但整體來說，感覺生產力比你預期的還要好。在考慮 Paycor 之前，除了人工智慧之外，還有什麼可以讓生產力更高嗎？從營運費用的角度來看，確實感覺你們的運行速度不同。如果我錯了，請告訴我。

Well, I think Paychex has always operated at a different speed than our competitors when it comes to margins. So I just think it's part of what's kind of in our DNA to do. And I do think that technology is a big play of that in getting AI or whatever. But I look at our clients and our employees' adoption of technology and their preference to leverage our technology tools to do more things self-service and do it their own way, which reduces your overall service cost.

嗯，我認為，就利潤率而言，Paychex 的營運速度總是與我們的競爭對手不同。所以我認為這是我們的 DNA 的一部分。我確實認為技術在實現人工智慧或其他方面發揮著重要作用。但我關注的是我們的客戶和員工對科技的採用，以及他們傾向於利用我們的技術工具來做更多自助的事情並按照自己的方式去做，從而降低您的整體服務成本。

That certainly is a factor. And that's just -- I look at every interaction we have on a particular transaction by the way in which the client or employee completes that transaction. And when I start seeing more and more people using our AI-driven chat versus a call or versus this, that difference in the mode of the way that client was solved.

這當然是一個因素。這只是——我根據客戶或員工完成交易的方式來審視我們在特定交易中的每一次互動。當我開始看到越來越多的人使用我們的人工智慧聊天而不是電話或其他方式時，我發現客戶解決問題的方式有差異。

And when I look at the transactional survey and see that those clients are happier when they do it that way, we do that. And we've just really just began to scratch the surface, I think, of how we can apply AI into our applications to drive the customer service experience.

當我查看交易調查並發現那些客戶以這種方式行事時會更高興時，我們就會這樣做。我認為，我們才剛開始觸及如何將人工智慧應用到我們的應用程式中以推動客戶服務體驗的表面。

As I mentioned in the HR business right now, our pilots are really around making our HR generalists more productive. But again, you can certainly see a day where a lot of that is AI-based and AI-driven. So...

正如我現在在人力資源業務中提到的，我們的試點實際上是為了讓我們的人力資源通才更有效率。但同樣，你肯定會看到有一天很多都是基於人工智慧並由人工智慧驅動的。所以...

The other thing I would add to that, Tien-Tsin, is we had a major headwind coming into this year with the expiration of ERTC, and it was not only a revenue headwind, it was a huge earnings and margin headwind. And so we talked about this, I think, on the call coming into this year when we gave guidance and the margin expansion. And going back to last fiscal year 2024, we were really working on our cost structure because we knew that we were going to face this headwind.

我想補充的另一件事是，Tien-Tsin，今年我們面臨著巨大的阻力，因為 ERTC 即將到期，這不僅是收入方面的阻力，更是巨大的盈利和利潤方面的阻力。所以我認為，我們在今年的電話會議上討論過這個問題，當時我們給了指引並擴大了利潤率。回顧 2024 財年，我們確實在努力改善成本結構，因為我們知道我們將要面臨這種逆風。

So there's a lot of work around the cost structure last year. And then as you guys know, when we got to the end of Q4, we announced a cost savings plan at the end of Q4 that helped drive margin expansion. And so as John said, it's not just the AI, it's the back-office digital transformation. It's certainly the adoption of digital tools and self-service on the part of our clients and our employees.

去年我們在成本結構方面做了很多工作。然後正如你們所知，當我們進入第四季度末時，我們在第四季度末宣布了一項成本節約計劃，這有助於推動利潤率的擴大。正如約翰所說，這不僅是人工智慧，更是後台的數位轉型。這當然是我們的客戶和員工採用數位工具和自助服務的結果。

There's some globalization opportunities there and so forth. So I know there was a question asked earlier about like what's the opportunity going forward. We still feel that a lot of these technologies and the things that we're working on from a client and employee standpoint will provide us runway to do what we always do which is balancing margin expansion and earnings growth with investment.

那裡有一些全球化機會等等。所以我知道之前有人問過一個問題，那就是未來的機會是什麼。我們仍然覺得，從客戶和員工的角度出發，很多這些技術以及我們正在進行的工作將為我們提供平台，讓我們能夠做我們一直在做的事情，即在利潤率擴大、盈利增長和投資之間取得平衡。

And that's what John and I are going to go through. And I think the great news is, we feel like we have a lot of opportunity in front us to be able to continue to invest in the business to drive that sustainable top line growth and at the same time deliver the strong margin expansion and earnings growth that our investors have gotten used to over many years.

這就是約翰和我將要經歷的。我認為好消息是，我們覺得我們面前有很多機會，能夠繼續投資於業務以推動可持續的營收成長，同時實現投資者多年來已經習慣的強勁利潤率擴張和盈利增長。

Samad Samana, Jefferies.

薩馬納（Samad Samana），傑富瑞（Jefferies）。

Maybe I apologize if I missed this. I know you got asked about the potential Paycor contribution for next year. But Bob, what I wanted to ask was, if I think about the F4Q number, and I know there's a little bit of art involved in it because we don't know the timing of the close yet, but if we think about the implied Management Solutions growth rate for F4Q, excluding Paycor, is that a fair way to think about what the starting point for growth for Management Solutions should be for next year given that F4Q is a quarter that doesn't have ERTC in it against the comp?

如果我錯過了這一點我可能會道歉。我知道您被問及明年 Paycor 的潛在貢獻。但是鮑勃，我想問的是，如果我考慮 F4Q 的數字，我知道這裡面涉及到一些藝術，因為我們還不知道收盤時間，但如果我們考慮 F4Q 隱含的管理解決方案增長率（不包括 Paycor），考慮到 F4Q 是一個沒有 ERTC 的季度，這是否是一個公平的方式來思考明年管理解決方案的增長起點應該是什麼？

Yes. I mean, Samad, I mean, it's a good question. I'm going to have to punt on it because I'm just -- we're not giving guidance on next year, and I'm certainly not ready to go through the splits between the categories for next year. So we'll provide more color around that when we get to the end of next quarter.

是的。我的意思是，薩馬德，這是個好問題。我將不得不放棄這個念頭，因為我只是——我們沒有給出明年的指導，而且我當然還沒有準備好對明年的各個類別進行劃分。因此，我們將在下個季度末提供更多相關細節。

I mean Management Solutions ex ERTC has been strong. We think there's a lot of opportunity there, both from client base, product attachment, pricing, and I think we'll be able to produce a growth number next year ex Paycor that would be in line with what people would be expecting. And I'll leave it at that until we have the chance to get through our plan review and provide you some more details on it.

我的意思是 ERTC 的管理解決方案一直很強大。我們認為這裡面有很多機會，無論是從客戶基礎、產品配件或定價來看，我認為明年我們將能夠實現 Paycor 以外的成長數字，這將符合人們的預期。我將就此打住，直到我們有機會完成計劃審查並向您提供更多詳細資訊。

I I'm going to keep hammering this though, because I think this is important because it's -- quite frankly, I feel like it's almost like not fair to Bob and the team and what I'm asking -- what we're asking them to do from a reporting perspective is because we're looking at integrating the business and integrating parts of Paychex into Paycor and Paycor into Paychex, it's going to be very hard to peel it back because when I take and I say upmarket, whatever I decide to define that as, and I put resources together and I begin to adopt best practices, what is that number going to be?

我會繼續強調這一點，因為我認為這很重要，因為——坦率地說，我覺得這對鮑勃和團隊來說幾乎不公平，而我要求他們從報告的角度做的事情是因為我們正在考慮整合業務，將 Paychex 的部分業務整合到 Paycor 中，將 Paycor 整合到 Paychex 中，這將很難剝離，因為當我接受並說我是這個高端

So I just -- again, just from a perspective of the thing I want to make sure everybody understands is that we are putting a plan together that day 1, this becomes One Paychex. And we're trying to figure out -- certainly to do no harm, we're wanting both stand-alone businesses to grow faster on a stand-alone basis.

所以我只是 — — 再說一次，只是從我想確保每個人都明白的事情的角度來看，我們在第一天就制定了一個計劃，這就是 One Paychex。我們正在努力弄清楚——當然為了不造成傷害，我們希望兩個獨立的業務都能在獨立的基礎上更快地發展。

But the only way we're going to do that is by putting them together, and that's going to create reporting issues that I'm sure we're going to be talking about well into the future. So I just want to give Bob and his team a little bit of air cover just in terms of where we are in the process and the planning process and try to get you guys to appreciate the complexities of how we're wanting to put this together so we maximize the benefit of the acquisition, right?

但我們唯一能做的就是將它們放在一起，而這將產生報告問題，我相信我們將來會繼續討論這個問題。因此，我只想為鮑勃和他的團隊提供一點空中掩護，就我們所處的流程和規劃過程而言，並試圖讓你們理解我們如何將這一切結合在一起的複雜性，以便最大限度地提高收購的效益，對嗎？

Because if I just had it stand-alone and left it alone, that would not be a smart thing to do. There's no way 1 plus 1 equals 3 if you do that. So again, I'm just trying to give Bob and the team a little bit of air cover because I know you have a 1,000 questions about this. So...

因為如果我只是讓它獨立並且不管它，那就不是一個明智的做法。如果你這樣做的話，1 加 1 絕對不可能等於 3。所以，我只是想為鮑勃和團隊提供一點空中掩護，因為我知道你們對此有 1,000 個問題。所以...

Yes, understood. And we fully appreciate and understand there's a lot of complexities and moving parts. And we're getting asked the question by a lot of investors. So this is why we're trying to push it back to Bob. Maybe if I think about just the expenses in the quarter, and maybe this is of a similar vein, but was there anything from a -- if I exclude the acquisition-related expenses, 1% growth is pretty low.

是的，明白了。我們充分認識到並理解其中的許多複雜性和變動性。很多投資人都向我們問了這個問題。所以這就是我們試圖將其推回給鮑勃的原因。如果我只考慮本季的費用，也許這是類似的情況，但如果我排除與收購相關的費用，1% 的成長率就相當低了。

Obviously, it's a big reflection of the productivity of the organization and your own efforts. But anything in terms of timing of operating expenses or any expenses that you may have otherwise avoided in anticipation of closing the deal? And again, with the full appreciation, this is less of a forward-looking element than understanding the specific quarter, if there was anything that impacted expenses outside of the M&A side in terms of timing?

顯然，這很大程度上反映了組織的生產力和您自己的努力。但是，在營運費用的時間安排方面，或在完成交易的過程中您可能已經避免的任何費用方面有什麼問題嗎？再次，在充分了解的情況下，這不再是一個前瞻性的因素，而是了解具體季度，是否存在任何因素在時間方面影響了併購之外的費用？

No, I would just say -- I would say business as usual. I mean the quarter from an expense standpoint was in line with our plans and our forecast. Obviously, you highlighted there's some onetime expenses in there related to the acquisition. Outside of that, there was nothing unusual, nothing that shifted from one quarter to the next, pretty much in line with what we were thinking.

不，我只想說──一切照舊。我的意思是，從費用角度來看本季符合我們的計劃和預測。顯然，您強調了其中有一些與收購相關的一次性費用。除此之外，沒有什麼異常，也沒有什麼從一個季度到下一個季度發生變化的情況，基本上符合我們的想法。

Scott Wurtzel, Wolfe Research.

沃澤爾（Scott Wurtzel），沃爾夫研究公司。

I'll just ask one question, just going back to the PEO segment. And wondering when we think about the trends in the quarters and now your updated guide for fiscal '25, if we can maybe kind of split out the softer trends between the MPP in Florida and the trade-off to lower cost health benefits, how we should think about sort of that split impacting the growth in the business right now?

我只想問一個問題，回到 PEO 部分。並且想知道，當我們考慮各季度的趨勢以及現在您更新的 25 財年指南時，如果我們可以將佛羅裡達州 MPP 之間的較弱趨勢與低成本健康福利之間的權衡分開，我們應該如何看待這種分開對目前業務增長的影響？

I'd say one more time, Scott, I think both of them are affecting the MPP. So it's the lower -- I think there's a few issues. You have the lower attachment. Certainly, from an underwriting standpoint, we're seeing more medical plans in Florida. We've seen a larger increase of those plans going to the agency versus our at-risk plan, and that's just us being conservative in our underwriting.

我再說一遍，斯科特，我認為他們兩個都在影響 MPP。因此，我認為存在一些問題。您有較低的附件。當然，從承保的角度來看，我們看到佛羅裡達州有更多的醫療計劃。我們發現，與我們的風險計劃相比，流向代理機構的計劃數量有了更大的增長，這只是我們在承保方面採取的保守做法。

And then there's the buydown, people buying down to lower cost options, that's almost 2x the number of people buying down than what we've seen historically. So it's a combination of all 3 of those things. I don't have the exact split on each one of them. But all 3 of those combined is what's really leading to lower MPP enrollment and pass-through revenues in the PEO. Did I capture your question?

然後就是買斷，人們買斷以降低成本，幾乎是我們歷史上買斷人數的兩倍。所以它是這三者的結合。我不知道每個人的具體劃分。但這三個因素結合起來才是導致 MPP 入學率和 PEO 轉嫁收入下降的真正原因。我理解到你的問題了嗎？

Yes. Yes. No, I was just wondering about if there was any way to kind of quantify the split between those factors, but that's helpful.

是的。是的。不，我只是想知道是否有任何方法可以量化這些因素之間的分裂，但這很有幫助。

Jason Kupferberg, Bank of America.

美國銀行的傑森‧庫普弗伯格（Jason Kupferberg）。

So I'm just trying to think about Management Solutions growth for Q4. I mean if we look at Q3, I guess we're calculating out about a 1.5% headwind on the segment from ERTC. So that would put you, I think, just a hair above 6%, excluding ERTC. If all that math is right, is that a reasonable number to think about for Q4? And just to confirm, I think you guys said the Q4 guide assumes no change in the macro.

所以我只是試著思考第四季的管理解決方案的成長。我的意思是，如果我們看一下第三季度，我猜我們計算出 ERTC 對該細分市場的逆風約為 1.5%。因此，我認為，不包括 ERTC，這將略高於 6%。如果所有的計算都是正確的，那麼這對第四季來說是一個合理的數字嗎？只是為了確認一下，我認為你們說過第四季指南假設宏觀沒有變化。

I know there's been some data points out there just around declines in small business confidence. So I just wanted to square all that.

我知道有一些數據顯示小型企業信心下降。所以我只是想解決這一切。

Yes. I mean I'm not giving specific guidance on the split for Q4 Jason, I would say your Q3 math seems about right. And as I mentioned, I do think there was a little bit of a tailwind in Q3 from a price realization standpoint. Certainly, we saw a lot better discounting on some of our year-end processing that we have that hits Q3. And so that served as a little bit of a tailwind in Q3 that certainly wouldn't repeat in Q4.

是的。我的意思是，我沒有給出關於第四季度 Jason 的拆分的具體指導，我想說你的第三季的計算似乎是正確的。正如我所提到的，我確實認為從價格實現的角度來看第三季出現了一些順風。當然，我們在第三季的部分年終處理中看到了更好的折扣。所以這在第三季度起到了一點順風的作用，而且在第四季度肯定不會重複出現。

I'd say from a Q4 standpoint, there is a lot of uncertainty right now. John mentioned checks per client, I think, overall have been stable. They were up modestly in the first half of the year. They were down modestly in Q3 and flat on a year-to-date basis. And so we're assuming that some of the trends that we saw in Q3 continue in Q4.

我想說從第四季的角度來看，目前存在著許多不確定性。約翰提到了每個客戶的支票，我認為，總體來說是穩定的。今年上半年，它們略有上漲。第三季略有下降，年初至今持平。因此，我們假設第三季度看到的一些趨勢將在第四季度繼續延續。

And then I think the other potential impact of Management Solutions is asset balances. I mean that's been -- the 401(k) business has been a double-digit grower for us all year. And we've gotten a nice lift from the market performance. And you've all seen what the market has done recently. So we would expect that to be a little bit of a headwind.

然後我認為管理解決方案的另一個潛在影響是資產平衡。我的意思是－401（k）業務全年都為我們帶來兩位數的成長。我們從市場表現中獲得了良好的提升。大家也都看到了市場最近的表現。因此我們預計這會有點不利因素。

So those are kind of things that would balance out some of the farmers math that you're doing there.

所以這些事情可以平衡你在那裡做的一些農民數學計算。

Okay. That's good color. Just as a follow-up, on the Paycor side, any rough sizing you can give us on the expected revenue synergies? I mean I know there's a lot of cross-sell opportunity, but just wanted to see if we're in a position to put any numbers around it? Or will we get that next quarter?

好的。這顏色真好。作為後續問題，就 Paycor 方面而言，您能粗略地估計預期的收入綜效嗎？我的意思是，我知道有很多交叉銷售機會，但我只是想看看我們是否能夠給出一些數字？或者我們會在下個季度獲得它嗎？

That will be next quarter. As I said, that's really the next phase of what we've got to get into. And as you can imagine, trying to -- we've been trying to focus on our clients and the customers, mutual customers, our strategic partners and making sure we got programs to care for them and then take care of the employees and employee impact as we go through the integration, and we're now beginning to pivot and will pivot towards working on the growth side of that in the coming weeks. Okay. I think Madison, are we done with questions?

那將是下個季度。正如我所說，這確實是我們必須進入的下一階段。你可以想像，我們一直在努力關注我們的客戶和顧客、共同的客戶、我們的策略合作夥伴，並確保我們有計劃來關心他們，然後在我們進行整合的過程中照顧員工和員工的影響，我們現在開始轉變方向，並將在未來幾週轉向致力於增長方面。好的。我想麥迪遜，我們的問題問完了嗎？

That concludes our question-and-answer period. I would now like to turn the call back over to John Gibson for closing remarks.

我們的問答環節到此結束。現在我想將電話轉回給約翰·吉布森，請他作最後發言。

Okay. Well, at this point, we'll close the call. As I said at the start of this, these are exciting times at Paychex and appreciate your interest in the company. If you're interested in replaying the webcast of this conference call, it will be archived for approximately 90 days. And again, thank you for your interest in Paychex, and have a great day.

好的。好吧，我們就到此結束通話。正如我在開始時所說，這是 Paychex 激動人心的時刻，感謝您對公司的關注。如果您有興趣重播本次電話會議的網路直播，它將存檔約 90 天。再次感謝您對 Paychex 的關注，並祝您有愉快的一天。

Thank you. That concludes today's third quarter 2025 Paychex Earnings Conference Call. You may now disconnect your lines at this time, and have a wonderful day.

謝謝。這就是今天的 2025 年第三季 Paychex 收益電話會議。現在您可以斷開您的線路，並享受美好的一天。