Time and Attendance Blog, Workforce Management Software

It’s Summertime And You Are Still Trying To Find Ways To Streamline Payroll?

It’s the time of the year when most people in North America head off to some exotic locale, family road trip or to the cottage for a vacation. Your company talked about automating its time tracking process but, that’s all-you did was talked about it. The warm summer months will soon be replaced by fall and then dreaded winter. And soon you will be back to the manual time tracking processes.

If your company has looked at replacing your current time sheets in the past, here are some undeniable benefits to automation:

ATS TimeWork streamlines manual time tracking and provides a simple, set of processes for managing your company’s work rules, payroll and time and attendance requirements. Your company will benefit from ATS deep industry knowledge and have access to local and regional resources. By using ATS time and attendance solution you can focus on running your company, while leaving mission critical workforce management aspects so us.

ATS cloud-based time and attendance solution eliminates duplicate entries that can occur when keying employee hours manually-thus, payroll costs will be reduced. In addition, the head scratching complexities caused by using excel spreadsheets and manually keying employee hours into payroll will be replaced by ATS smooth data integration tool. You will have access to business intelligence and business analytic tools all designed to enhance workforce compliance and to provide you with an accurate overview of your payroll and time and attendance data.

Not sure if a cloud-based time and attendance is right for you? Download a demonstration or attend one of our live webinars.

Business Intelligence, Payroll, Spreadsheets, Time Tracking, Workforce Management Solution

Is The Personal Computer Really On The Decline?

July 29th, 2014 | Posted by Apex Time Solutions in Time and Attendance Blog, Workforce Management Software | Time and Attendance System | Workforce Management Solutions - (Comments Off)

In the last 5 years many have predicted the demise of the PC, in part, due to the increase in sales of tablets and other mobile devices. Now it appears, some of those very pundits are either reversing their earlier statements, or being cautious in predicting what the future holds for the PC. It’s easy to understand why some would sit up and take notice at the latest report by the well respected companies IDC and Gartner. In fact, when these industry leaders, issue reports, even wall street listens.

In yet in another report, written by Rob Enderle on CIO.com and commenting on Dell’s most recent success with a surge in PC sales he says “reports of the personal computer’s death have been greatly exaggerated. In fact, the company’s seeing good growth from its PC and thin client lines. Credit new designs, higher screen resolutions, a program for helping users migrate from Windows XP — and a steadfast refusal to believe the hype about the death of the PC.”

It is fair to say that several industries still uses a workstation in their environment and let’s face it, while tablets are very cool, accomplishing most tasks in a work place is just easier with a laptop. As for predicting the fate of the personal computer, we will leave that to research companies and other leading IT authoritative mediums.

Is The Personal Computer Really On The Decline?

CIO, Dell, Gartner, IDC, Windows XP

Having Trouble Tracking Employee Attendance? Bring It On

Tracking time and attendance is a fundamental part of a workforce management solution. Analyzing, tracking and managing time and attendance within an organization, is by and large, a critical component and many companies still struggle with. Today’s companies need the right tools to help them understand what time an employee came in and left on any given day. The process of collecting employee data and integrating it to payroll, HR or other third-party applications is at the heart of ATS time and attendance solution.

One of the most effective ways to save valuable time within any organization is to maximize employee productivity by automating common administrative tasks. For example; could your managers be more productive if they were using a time tracking solution that’s has embedded alerts for each time an employee was late or forgot to punch in? Of course they could. ATS time and attendance solution eradicates time-consuming tasks and replaces them with real-time data analytics that gives operational managers greater visibility over attendance patterns including, overtime, missing punches, time-off requests and will help reduce the administrative burden, and optimize your compliance efforts.

ATS time and attendance is a flexible and robust solution designed, to adapt to your current requirements, scalable enough to align with your growth and accessible anywhere, anytime. ATS time and attendance enables customers to accurately pay their employees in compliance with Provincial, Federal and State labour rules, while also management more robust requirements, such as union rules, premium pay, shift differentials, and grace rules.

ATS TimeWork will minimize your involvement with mundane tasks by providing with you a best-of-breed solution that you can count on. You can then you now focus your resources on your core business with the goal of achieving business results.

Want to know how you can achieve business results? Join us for one of our live webinars or download a pre-recorded demonstration from our website.

Having Trouble Tracking Employee Attendance? Bring It On

Data Analytics, Overtime, Premium Pay, Shift Differentials, Time Tracking

3 Simple Steps That Can Help Businesses Automate Effectively

July 23rd, 2014 | Posted by Apex Time Solutions in Employee Self Service | Hosted Time and Attendance Solution | Time and Attendance Blog, Workforce Management Software - (Comments Off)

Implementing a time and attendance solution can at times be fraught with hesitation for some companies because of the unknown and investment costs. Sometimes, the hesitation is borne out of not understanding the benefits of the solution and as such, the deployment is deferred until a later date. The digital revolution has permeated every country and industry and thus, implementation of a time and attendance system no longer requires dedicated servers, IT experts and other infrastructure costs to realize its return on investment. In fact, companies are deploying cloud-based solutions in record numbers, because, they have come to realize that the absence of a system to manage employee attendance their growth aspirations and increase in profits are being held back. Why? Because while they have resisted deploying a time and attendance solution, their competitors, studied its advantages, when ahead and deployed it and are now reaping the very benefits.

Listed below are three steps businesses should ponder prior to the deployment of a time and attendance system:

Objectives
Stakeholders get excited, and with good reason, about the prospect of a system that’s going to streamline business operations, stop buddy punching and help them achieve operational excellence. Who wouldn’t be excited about this? However, its important to focus on the robustness of the solution and how it will blend in with your company’s objective to reduce the amount of time your HR Specialist spends each week processing payroll.

Implementation
Implementation of a time and attendance system should not take on a made dash to the finish line. View your implementation a marathon and not a sprint. Once you have determined your work-rules and pay policies which will be incorporated into the system go through a couple of trial runs. It’s better to implement your time and attendance right the first time. That being said, companies should have a realistic and flexible plan during implementation. Sure expectations can be set in advance but it’s also realistic to expect some slight hiccups in any software deployment. And, when these happen, if you are getting appropriate response from your vendor, that’s when you will know you have selected the right vendor.

Create a Business Strategy
Now that you have invested time and resources in deploying your time and attendance system, you should explore the solution and its other features. Make use of; employee-self-service for time-off requests, opt for job costing if your company bills by projects or utilize the benefits of business intelligence to give you up-to-the-minute updates, that’s valuable to your business operations. Last but not least, make full use of your time and attendance system and its many benefits including, access anywhere, anytime. Use its agility and integrate into your other systems and create a business process flow chart that provides data and information on demand.

To learn about more about ATS time and attendance system register for one of our live webinars. You can also contact us at 1.866.294.2467.

Business Intelligence, Employee Self Service, Job Costing, Overtime, Payroll

$76 Billion And Counting…

July 22nd, 2014 | Posted by Apex Time Solutions in Biometric Time Clock | Payroll | Software-as-a-Service (saas) Workforce Management Software | Time and Attendance On-Demand - (Comments Off)

Rupert Murdoch’s bid for Time Warner sent shockwaves throughout the media business landscape. This bit of news dominated the airwaves and online forums, this past week and while there have been a lot of chatter, permeated with questions its clear one of the reasons has to do with the shifting landscape of how consumers watch their favorite shows. TV has been the dominate force for many years with weekly series, when all of a sudden, it appears that the tide is turning in favor of on-demand shows.

In the last several years, On-Demand Internet streaming companies like Netflix, HBO and Hulu have had cable TV companies screaming in frustration at the success of popular shows like; Game of Thrones, Breaking Bad, Weeds and countless others that are being watched online by the very customers that were loyal to watching weekly TV series. Why bother waiting for next week when you can watch three episodes in one night? Many analysts and industry executives are predicting, Rupert Murdoch’s 21st Century Fox conglomerate will not give up in its pursuit of Time Warner for a host of profitable reasons among others.

The world of time and attendance has gone through a similar transformation. Many of today’s companies are now choosing to utilize cloud-based time tracking over an on-premises solution. And with ATS TimeWork On-Demand software scalability, faster ROI and quick implementation, its no wonder many companies are embracing the many advantages that cloud computing affords.

ATS TimeWork On-Demand provides the next generation workforce management solution that includes, large screen display time clocks, an easy-to-use software interface, with HR capabilities, business intelligence and host of other features that will make your spreadsheets and the 23 year and antiquated punch clocks obsolete.

To see a live demonstration of ATS time and attendance, go to our website or you can join the conversation on our business group through LinkedIn, Twitter or Google Plus.

Game of Thrones, Hulu, NetFlix, Time Tracking Software, Time Warner

Should Your Company Have A Policy For BYOD?

The debate about how should companies deal with employees that bring their own device to work is ongoing. With the explosion of mobile devices in the last several years, this was bound to happen. Depending on the industry, some companies are lenient towards it and in some cases, see as a way for them to save money, by not having to hand our smart phones to every employee. Meanwhile, other companies have a set policy in place that does not allow for employees to use their personal phone for company business.

A recent study by Forrester states in part, “More than half of North American and European companies are developing BYOD programs in response to workforce demand. While enabling employees to use their own mobile devices and computers for work presents challenges in terms of security, risk, infrastructure, and operations, the potential upside is impressive. A successful program can increase overall revenue by boosting IT and help desk productivity, improving line-of-business process efficiencies, reducing expenses for corporate-liable device and data services, facilitating employee collaboration, and enhancing customer support. BYOD programs that successfully address security concerns can unlock competitive advantage and build a solid base for future business tech innovation.” Forrester has host of studies on this very topic that includes many industries in several countries around the world.

So, will Bring Your Own Device (BYOD) work for every company? Every organization is different and has a corporate culture that’s distinctive to their way of operating. For example, some of ATS account executives use their own smart phones, while others use company-issued ones. As mobile technology began to transform both lifestyles and work styles, ATS executives wanted to increase workplace use of mobile devices to improve business productivity-hence; the desire to offer employees a choice.

BYOD, Forrester, North America

Why Keeping It Simple Works Best

July 16th, 2014 | Posted by Apex Time Solutions in Time and Attendance Blog, Workforce Management Software | Workforce Analytics | Workforce Management Solutions - (Comments Off)

At first glance some time and attendance business requirements appear to be difficult. In reality most are simple and in fact, the appearance of it being difficult might have to do with its interpretation by the vendor, the customer or both parties. We have waxed exponentially about the benefits of keeping your time management solution requirements simple and with good reason. Now, we are not suggesting that a company with 3000 employees with locations in Brampton, Quebec, Windsor, Edmonton and Toronto, comprising of three different collective agreements and multiple work policies and statutory holidays is simple. As a matter of fact, when ATS engages companies with multi-sites and different work rules, we typically suggest, at the outset, that we flush out all of the requirements. This method allows all stakeholders to discuss the requirements in detail and it also gives an insight into how ATS time and attendance can be deployed while reflecting these business rules.

ATS time and attendance helps companies improve productivity- from the simple to more complex business set of requirements, with a comprehensive time tracking solution that covers all aspects of your business.

Here are 3 ways the ATS keeps it simple, yet allows you to get the most out of your time and attendance solution:

Visibility that helps the decision making process
ATS time and attendance provides a clear view of your business operations, allowing business managers to focus on exceptions, accurately evaluate risks, and make faster decisions. Today’s companies want on-the-spot information and greater insight into their payroll costs and how best to streamline it. Disparate systems including, spreadsheets, old punch clock systems and outdated databases simply exacerbate the challenges that some companies face when trying to get the right information on time. ATS time and attendance solves these business challenges with real-time analytic reporting, user-friendly manager screens and automated workflows that drive effective business results.

Simplicity that’s designed to eliminate manual tasks and unnecessary paperwork
ATS time and attendance coverts complexity to simplicity, and paper-based time sheets- to a best-of-breed system, that tracks attendance and increase profits. ATS time and attendance delivers more insight, alleviates complexity, and high overhead costs.

Grow with your business and keep pace with market demands
ATS time and attendance provides a better way to manage all your pay and work-rule policies and includes workforce analytics, thus enabling you to improve productivity in ways only a 21^st century workforce management solution can. And we do all this by meeting your business requirements and keeping simple.

Want to learn more? Let’s start the conversation today at 866.294.2467. You can also download your free copy of one of our white papers from our website.

Attendance, Payroll, Punch Clock System, Time Tracking, Workforce Management Solution

Are Conscientious Businesses Becoming The Wave Of The Future?

July 15th, 2014 | Posted by Apex Time Solutions in Benefit Accruals | Leave Management | Time and Attendance Solution - (Comments Off)

From time to time we find stories that are a slight departure from time and attendance, explore it and then share it, if we think it will add some value for our readers. The story about a small coffee shop called CSI Coffee Pub and some of the good things that its owners are doing caught our eye. Apparently the owners of this establishment pay their employees above the minimum wage. And, after six months, full time employees are eligible for an ownership stake. Of course this begs the question, why would a coffee shop, that’s not a multimillion dollar operation, choose to do this?

This quote from part co-owner Erin Cluley, gives some insight into the company’s philosophy; “We could use cheaper ingredients and pay the staff less and make more money. We know that this way isn’t going to get us wealthy but we believe in the model,” We believe if we are patient, we can make a big difference. We want to show there’s another way to run a business that’s not just profit for its own sake.”

The obvious questions will come up. Is this a growing movement and does this work? Who in their right minds are going to pay employees $50,000k a year when they can get by with paying them $30,000K? If this is a growing movement, then it’s nothing new. Companies like; Google, Lee Valley Tools, West Jet Airlines, Starbucks, Costco and host of other companies have been doing this for years. Employees who work for these companies enjoy generous benefit packages, lots of paid vacation time, personal time off when needed, part ownership etc.

The intent behind this is good and as time goes on, it will be interesting see if the idea catches on with the small majority of companies whose interest lie solely with the happiness and well being of shareholders as opposed to stakeholders.

Richard G. Wilkinson and Kate Pickett authored “The Spirit Level: why more equal societies almost always do better.” They make the case, that equal societies are much better. And while the book centres on inequality in several countries around the world, several of its passages can be attributed to the world of business. At the very least, it’s a fascination read.

Are Conscientious Businesses Becoming The Wave Of The Future?

Costco, Google, Starbucks, Time and Attendance, Vacation, West Jet Airlines

You Should Be Dancing With Your Time And Attendance Solution

July 10th, 2014 | Posted by Apex Time Solutions in Business Intelligence | Hosted Time and Attendance Solution | Payroll - (Comments Off)

Assuming the time and attendance that your company is using and also assuming its meeting your business requirements, you should be dancing. Accurate data collection should be part of the fundamentals your time and attendance solution and if it’s not, you should be looking elsewhere. The ability to access daily attendance, extrapolate business intelligence and work in concert with your payroll software– is what ATS TimeWork time and attendance provides.

True to its name, ATS time and attendance provides a compelling database engine that shows how each part of the data configuration process relates to the others—and provides up-to-the-minute reports, forecast business activities effectively, automate work rules and calculates employee time accurately.

ATS Time and Attendance core capabilities include:

Workforce Management Visibility— ATS Workforce Management contains comprehensive features that address every aspect of today’s companies—including workforce planning, time and attendance, and absence management—the solution includes a sophisticated workforce analytics tools that helps to comply with labor rules and regulations.

Business intelligence—Allow decision makers to view and analyze key factors and performance trends in the areas of human resources, payroll, production, finance and across company branches. Monitor workforce performance in real- time, and avoid labour violations and non-compliance issues through proactive analytics monitoring.

Labour Allocation—Capture costs as changes occur, ensuring up-to-date and accurate costs. With ATS workforce management solution, you can make sure you have the right people working in the right place at the right time.

Workforce Planning—Allow information to pass from one person or department to another through the automated time and attendance process cycle. ATS Workforce Management eliminates costs and errors from budgeting and planning thus, integrating your company’s forecasting activities.

Time and Attendance—Automate employee attendance processes to reduce payroll costs, comply with collective bargaining rules and government regulations. The solution allows for customized attendance queries, with pre-defined business metrics, all available through an intuitive cloud-based interface.

ATS Workforce Management will have you dancing with its bevy of rich functionality, and cool user experience all designed for long-term workforce planning. With a 21^st century time and attendance solution that addresses every aspect of today’s workforce management requirements —you will also have access to sophisticated business intelligence tools for measuring and analyzing workforce performance today and into the foreseeable future.

To see a live demonstration, go to our website.

You Should Be Dancing With Your Time And Attendance Solution

Business Intelligence, Human Resources, Labour Allocation

The Cost Of Doing Nothing Can Have A Negative Impact On Your Business

July 9th, 2014 | Posted by Apex Time Solutions in Benefit Accruals | Cloud Based Time Management Solution | Software-as-a-Service (saas) Workforce Management Software | Time and Attendance Blog, Workforce Management Software | Workforce Analytics - (Comments Off)

Most payroll and HR managers instinctively know that a time and attendance system is critical for eradicating manual tasks and will decrease the amount of time they spend each calculating employee hours. While it’s no surprise that some of the prospective customers we interact with are still using time sheets, what we find most surprising is even after these companies understand the benefits of automation we still see a lack of urgency to improve those systems?

Cloud-based time and attendance is no longer viewed as a “flash in the pan” and are now being deployed daily, in the market-place, with a high degree of success. Companies who previously did not see the need to automate, and are now using a time and attendance system with a great deal of success, have not only embraced its numerous benefits but are now spreading the word to their business counterparts in droves.

Here are 5 ways that adopting a time and attendance will help improve your business:

Employee Scheduling
ATS Workforce Scheduling helps companies connect qualified employees to the jobs that are aligned with their skill-set. The integrated scheduling module shows managers all relevant information while scheduling employees. Schedules can be changed on-the-fly to match the employee skills needed to each schedule, job or project. It’s an intuitive tool that will improve productivity and track employee availability.

Reduced Payroll Costs
ATS time and attendance integrates to all third-party applications including; Payroll, ERP, Accounting & Financial, Warehouse Management, Job Costing and Human Resources and Customer Relationship Management. One of the key advantages of a time and labour solution is that it can help managers to identify attendance patterns and can significantly reduce the costs involved in administrative errors and providing the real-time labor analytics you need to control payroll costs.

Accurate Collection of Data
ATS time tracking solution automates the time collection process and applies your company’s payroll policies including, premium pay, rounding and overtime. ATS TimeWork provides real-time alerts to instantly calculates hourly totals and with an embedded export facility for payroll processing.

Effective Workforce Analytics
ATS time and attendance software provides plethora of data analytics including, human resources reports, attendance reports timecard reports and payroll reports. This helps decision makers – to monitor key metrics and make informed decisions.

Employee Self-Service
With ATS employee self-service, you can initiate the workflow notification. Supervisors can easily stay on top of time off requests, reporting, attendance notifications, timecard approvals, and exceptions that require timely action.

Now that you are aware of the benefits of automating, wouldn’t it be nice to simply get rid of those spreadsheets? ATS TimeWork automates and facilitates the management of employee time, and since payroll is the single largest controllable expense of any company, it begs the question, why delay the implementation of a solution that can actually save your company money?

To learn more, go to our website. And to speak to an account executive, call us at 866.294.2467.

The Cost Of Doing Nothing Can Have A Negative Impact On Your Business

Cloud Based Time and Attendance, Employee Self Service, ERP, Human Resources, Overtime

It’s Summertime And You Are Still Trying To Find Ways To Streamline Payroll?

Is The Personal Computer Really On The Decline?

Having Trouble Tracking Employee Attendance? Bring It On

3 Simple Steps That Can Help Businesses Automate Effectively

$76 Billion And Counting…

Should Your Company Have A Policy For BYOD?

Why Keeping It Simple Works Best

Are Conscientious Businesses Becoming The Wave Of The Future?

You Should Be Dancing With Your Time And Attendance Solution

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