Five Things to Consider When in the Market for a Time and Attendance Solution Pt. 2 (Five More Things)

Looking to replace your obsolete time capture system? Here is a follow up to our last post “Five things to Consider When in the Market for a Time and Attendance Solution.” As stated in the previous post in this series, the idea is that following considerations will help you arrive at a decision, sparing financial and personnel resources in the process.

5. Expected Time in Service

How long do you plan to operate with the software? While it may be easy to just assume that your software and configuration will work indefinitely, setting realistic expectations as to when the software and hardware you intend to purchase will become too impractical for continued reliance is good practice. That stated, now you can go ahead and compare features related to update frequency. Is the data going to be housed in servers in-house, or in the cloud? If self-managed, how frequently will hotfixes and system updates be available for installation? If cloud managed, how often are updates released and installed? While it may be appealing to be on the bleeding edge of technology, adopting a system which has earned a reputation for being in “permanent-beta” could leave you with an unstable system riddled with bugs.

A more targeted question to ask yourself when evaluating software vendors is how many years you would intend to run the current version of the software, before it becomes to unwieldy to manage without a potentially costly upgrade.

4. Flexibility

When analyzing your business to determine prerequisites for a timekeeping system, it is useful to think forward. If you anticipate a major change in corporate structure or policy, your software will need to be flexible enough to accommodate. In cases in which you “own” your software configurations, you will need to understand the implication of making system setup changes. Some cloud software vendors offer to set up your new system after sitting with you to design the solution. In this scenario, consultants come in and assist you with the setup, which is more or less permanent when you go live on the cloud solution. You do not “own” the configurations. You would contact the vendor for changes.

Here are a few useful questions to ask yourself:

• Does this system allow our developers access to its API (and do we need it)?
• What business functions will this time and attendance software need to provide (HRIS, Payroll, Production, Service Management, Retail Cash Register, and Reporting)?
• Can we add additional software capabilities as we become accustomed to using the software?
• Can the software work on any device?

3. Audit Trail

Let’s talk compliance. In the USA, the Fair Labor Standards Act requires an employer to keep specific labor related records for employees classified as “nonexempt.” States may have more stringent laws on labor standards for which your system will need to be configured, and if you operate in multiple countries, your software should be capable of at least the basic requirements. Check with prospective vendors to see if breaks, leave and time off, daily timesheets, and pay types are accurately captured, timestamped, and stored in an accessible file location. If this is not possible, look elsewhere.

2. Reporting Requirements

On the topic of regulatory compliance, you as an employer should consider how this new system will be ready for reports required by the government. Frequently updated software should provide the reports in the exact format required for submission or posting. Software that is updated less frequently may not provide these reports, but will generate a “Prep report”, which captures all the data required to fill out the actual reports. Regular upkeep of this data should not be a full-time job.

Link up with your managers and executives to see what snapshots, spreadsheets, and charts they use and how they use them. A good time management software will populate data as you work, so manually assembling data pieces for a report becomes a thing of the past. If you are in a position to do so, advise your managers and execs to keep an open mind on formats, forms, and dashboards – the software will almost certainly not provide reports in a format they are accustomed to using, except for perhaps financial professionals with fairly standard report requirements. Report customizations should be available, and a report builder should be easy to learn. If users require these reports to be pulled at predetermined intervals, make sure that the software is capable of “push reporting.”

1. Vendor

The software vendor is an important piece to the overall purchase decision. How deep is the software vendor in your industry? Can they offer their own insights on how to best use timekeeping software for your specific business? How are they doing financially, and how much capital is plowed back into HR and R&D? More specifically, high service specialist and consultant turnover spells chaos for your upgrade efforts, as the vendor scrambles to replace high-value resources. With regards to a vendor’s research and development, vendors that do not spend resources building fixes and user-friendly improvements eventually find it difficult to respond to your feature requests.

How is the support structure priced? Once you go live on the software, will you be referred to a call-center, or will you have a dedicated specialist on-hand for all your training, troubleshooting, and general assistance? Is additional training complementary or is there an additional charge? You can get a pretty good understanding of the customer service quality of a software vendor by checking out their responsiveness in the presales phase. The company may be stretched thin, relying on a few highly experienced personnel, but with not much time for nuance and attention to details that can snowball out of control and derail your time and attendance implementation.

By Cody Bess, Functional Consultant for Arbela Technologies

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