Automating the Time Collection Process Saves Time and Money

Wilmington Trust, located in Wilmington, Delaware, is a relationship management company that, together with its affiliates, offers diversified financial services through regional banking services, wealth advisory services, and corporate client services to clients in 92 countries. Founded in 1903, Wilmington Trust is a highly regarded provider of corporate fiduciary and administration services. Additionally, it is one of the largest personal trust providers in the United States and the leading full service bank in Delaware. WorkForce Software’s EmpCenter solution supports and automates workforce management processes for approximately 2,500 staff members.

WorkForce Challenges & Issues

Weekly time collection processes for staff members were manual and difficult to manage. The time collection process for staff members included the following steps:

1. Printing timecards
2. Distributing timecards to staff members in various states
3. Staff members manually entered hours on paper timecards
4. Managers physically signed timecards for approval
5. Timecards forwarded to an attendance clerk
6. Employee time was forwarded to a third party vendor
7. Third party vendor keyed the information into a file
8. Staff member time was imported into an external third party payroll provider
9. Then, payroll was generated using an external third party payroll software provider

Exempt staff members were required to have timecards in by noon every Friday, while non-exempt employee timecards were due by noon every Thursday. Two payroll clerks entered attendance data received via fax from out of state locations. Since time collection was captured before the week ending, staff members and managers would project the week’s remaining hours. Changes were manually tracked and adjusted in the next pay period. In addition to time collection, vacation and sick time were manually tracked and accruals were performed manually.

Selecting WorkForce Software

Wilmington Trust needed a powerful system for a big job. Its staff studied the organization’s current processes and evaluated a variety of solutions before selecting EmpCenter.
“We needed to collect time, manage timesheet approvals, and track accrual balances more efficiently,” said Sr. Operations Officer Ken Allwoerden, Wilmington Trust. “We chose WorkForce Software’s EmpCenter to automate these processes because it was easier for staff members to use.”

Wilmington Trust wanted a system that would meet its workforce management needs for staff members, including management, Human Resources, and payroll personnel. Payroll personnel went through a long, manual process capturing employee time to generate paychecks. Payroll personnel frequently spent time re-keying data, re-calculating timesheets, tracking missing timesheets, and securing manager signatures for approval.

EmpCenter is a data-configurable system that can be completely optimized for any organization. Wilmington Trust has automated its business processes by defining HR, pay, and accrual policies, to significantly reduce manual steps. The system reminds staff members to submit timesheets. And, in the event a staff member’s time is amended, EmpCenter automatically adjusts vacation and sick accrual balances.

Implementation

Wilmington Trust faced some additional challenges during the implementation as new staff members came onto the project. Geddes Marcano, a senior HRIS analyst, became responsible for the project in the middle of the implementation, requiring him to quickly become familiar with the system and implementation.

“There were a lot of good people on both sides of this software implementation project, so that helped with the transition,” said Marcano. “WorkForce led training sessions and provided the knowledge transfer we needed to be successful.”

Wilmington Trust also created its own intranet-based training video with screen shots and voice over to provide training to every employee and help ensure consistent use of the system The Employee Self-Service module provided secure access to authorized staff members, so they could enter vacation in advance, view time taken, and time-off balances, without contacting Human Resources or payroll.

Data Collection

Now staff members use online timesheets to enter time worked and exceptions, assign time to pay codes for second and third shifts, and more. The Employee Self-Service module not only supports entering an employee’s own time, but also lets the employee view accruals.

EmpCenter interfaces with a variety of HR and payroll systems, so employee information is up-to-date and paychecks are accurate. For example, EmpCenter automatically synchronizes with Wilmington Trust’s employee data, managed by the organization’s HR system, and pay codes from its payroll system, so important information is correct.

Customer Service & Support

“We value WorkForce Software as a business partner,” said Marcano. “The customer service and support has been excellent. The consultants we’ve had have been very experienced in time collection processes, so we’ve received excellent response and issue resolution.”

“EmpCenter is user friendly, intuitive, and easily supports our pay policies” said Ken Allwoerden, senior operations officer at Wilmington Trust

“EmpCenter is user friendly, intuitive, and easily supports our pay policies, so non-technical users are productive using it,” said Allwoerden. “We needed a solution that would provide an easy transition from our manual process, and EmpCenter provided that.”

Results

Wilmington Trust has eliminated paper from their time collection process as well as automated accrual tracking, which enabled them to re-allocate resources to other business tasks.

“Staff members cannot submit timesheets with errors and the manager approval process is streamlined, which has been a huge benefit for us,” said Marcano. “The system keeps an audit trail of all transactions for as long as it is required to help us in our compliance efforts related to Sarbanes Oxley and FLSA.”

Using WorkForce Software has eliminated many manual processes, saving in payroll costs and time while allowing the organization to better use or allocate its resources.