Rocky Mountain Electric of Utah focuses on standalone brick-and-mortar franchise locations and some commercial build-outs. The owner is a master electrician and travels between sites throughout each day. The company is a lean organization, with limited time available for HR and administrative overhead.
Small Business Administrative Headaches
As a service provider, Rocky Mountain Electric of Utah business owner Scott Snowden must track costs in detail. Every hour of work must be tied to a job, or it is not billable. Tracking time, materials, and expenses is critically important and yet was difficult to accomplish routinely and accurately.
As an employer, Snowden also has the obligation to pay employees the proper wage for their time worked, and provide on-demand access to paystubs and time-off balances. This created a significant burden for his sole administrative officer, Sandi Snowden.
As a licensed business, Rocky Mountain Electric of Utah must document policies, compliance, and certifications. Even with a small staff, it was difficult to track and document continuing education, benefits selection, and company manual review. Even bringing new employees up to speed and gathering their new employee details was a chore.
Adopting an Online HR & Time Solution
Mobility is critical. Scott Snowden is always on the road, moving between sites. Employees are assigned to sites based on building schedules and may also find themselves traveling from one to another.
By adopting a web-based HR application that includes time tracking capabilities, employees clock-in from the device of their choice, which is often a mobile app but can also be any web-enabled device or a physical clock. With intelligent clock features, users are prompted for job codes and reminded to take breaks. It can even tell Snowden when employees clock in/out from an unapproved location, using geofences as their guide.
The combination of job codes and geofenced punches create a powerful record that Snowden can use in his job costing. It can also help him identify ways to maximize the time his employees are on job sites versus in transit between them.
Accurate Time Cards and Payroll
With time detail captured so intelligently, time card review becomes a faster and more accurate process. Every punch is available for review on a digital time card. Once approved, time data is sent to payroll for processing. This streamlined and completely digital process from punch to review to payroll eliminates opportunities for fraud, miscalculation and error. Snowden can be sure that employees receive their proper pay.
An online HR and time tracking solution offers real advantage to companies like Rocky Mountain Electric of Utah that cannot afford lengthy installation, implementation, and training. As a cloud-based system, such a system requires no hardware, no installation, and no maintenance. Users can be up and running in virtually no time.
Onboarding New Hires
Onboarding new employees is paperless and can be completed at the new hire’s convenience. Everything is online and streamlined so that tax forms, direct deposit, emergency contacts, and other necessary documentation is collected most efficiently. Copies of electronically signed documents are securely stored online and available to the both the employee and the HR administrator.
Workflows built with with the HR system simplify processes. Benefits enrollment, for example, begins with an email to a qualified employee, who follows a link to a guided online interview that records their selections. The HR administrator can track completion and forward required details to the benefits provider.
Similarly, when new policies or other important documents are published, the system can notify affected employees that they need to read and sign electronically. These workflows can be directed to a subset of employees or to everyone, and can include a questionnaire that tests for understanding. This helps ensure that all parties involved have quick access to new information—much faster than if the documents had to be hand delivered to a mobile workforce by a mobile boss.
Certifications and Continuing Education
Electricians must have certifications to work. To keep their certifications, the journeymen have to attend 16 hours of continuing education every other year. Owner Scott Snowden must attend 16 hours to maintain his master electrician certification, plus another 16 hours as the business owner.
Tracking these certifications and continuing education is greatly simplified. As HR administrator, Sandi Snowden can create a certification workflow that sends a reminder to employees who have continuing education obligations and track their fulfillment.
Employee Self Service and Engagement
With 24/7 mobile access to schedules, time- off balance, and paystubs, the portal empowers employees while removing the HR administrator as middleman for commonly asked questions. Employees can submit time off requests, update direct deposit or make other changes directly.
Learn More from Zamp HR
If you have questions about streamlining your HR processes and time tracking, speak with a specialist from Zamp HR to learn more. We hope you'll experience the Zamp HR difference for yourself. For additional questions, please contact us online or by phone.
