“I love the flexibility of Platinum Enterprise. And if it can’t do something we need, Addtime will always find a way to make sure that, very quickly, it can.”
– Sandra Humphreys, HR and Health & Safety Manager, Bifold Group
Bifold Group manufacture hydraulic and pneumatic valves and accessories for hazardous, corrosive and subsea environments. They’ve been Addtime customers for years, originally using our punch cards and clocking systems to manage their time, attendance and payroll. Things have changed a bit since then.
“We used to manually add up the times on the cards, then manually carry everything over to payroll,” explains HR and Health & Safety Manager Sandra Humphreys. “We’d never do that now – it just wouldn’t work. It took forever then, and that was when we had 40 or 50 staff. Now we’ve got 190 people in Manchester and 60 at our Taunton office so we need a workforce management system that’s rather more sophisticated.”
Platinum Enterprise is that “rather more sophisticated” system and Sandra is using its capabilities in a range of ways.
“We’re using it for clocking so we can get the wages paid,” she says. The company uses hand scanners at its Taunton site and swipe cards in Manchester. “Both work well, but the swipe cards are particularly good when you’ve got lots of factory workers all coming in and out at the same time. It’s just so fast.”
“We also use the system to monitor lates and absence. And we’ve placed all our disciplinary records on Platinum Enterprise. It can store an unlimited amount of information so we know we’ve got all our records in one place.
“We’re always generating and exporting reports using the system too. We use the data to do things like monitor labour costs vs sales and productivity.”
Eliminating human error from payroll
“Being able to export information straight to Sage payroll has been a godsend because it means you just don’t get the same errors,” says Sandra, enthusiastically. “There are no entries in wrong sections and no double keying. It’s eliminated human error from our payroll at a stroke.”
Programs for people
“We have a lot of different shifts and shift patterns here,” Sandra explains. “I find it really easy to write programs that fit our people and the shifts they work. That’s so much better than trying to match people to set programs.”
Moving with Addtime
“Bifold Group had Platinum Enterprise installed at its previous premises, and when the company moved so did the system. “Addtime came out, helped us move and resolved a few cabling issues. And if you ever have a query they’ll always help you.”
Would you recommend Addtime?
“Yes. Once you get the hang of it you’ll be able to use it however you want. I love its flexibility. And if it can’t do something we need, Addtime will always find a way to make sure that, very quickly, it can.”
