Checking employees' comings and goings with a time and attendance system wouldn't seem likely to win a staff popularity contest.
However, the system - and other related capabilities - has proven to be a winner for both managers and rank-and-file staff at St. Mary's Medical Center in Huntington, W.Va.
Integrating the time and attendence system with other administrative systems has helped managers better predict staffing needs and cut the time it takes to do scheduling and time and attendance.
Dave Imhoff, associate director of information services, said the system has also increased employee satisfaction. He said the system, provided by Kronos, Inc. of Chelmsford, Mass., gives them an added sense of security in that they're being accurately paid for their time.
It's the side benefits of the system, though, that have garnered the most positive responses from employees, Imhoff said.
For example, the Quickcharge module enables employees to use their Kronos badges to make purchases at the hospital's gift shop, pharmacy and cafeteria. Those purchases are automatically deducted from employees' paychecks.
"That was an easy install and a huge pleaser for employees," Imhoff said.
While increasing employee satisfaction has been a plus, the system has also significantly reduced payroll errors. The hospital has saved $350,000 a year by eliminating payroll errors and saved more than $923,000 since implementing the system in 2003.
Additionally, the Kronos system is integrated with human resource and payroll systems from Minneapolis-based Lawson Software. Employee records are now automatically entered in Kronos from the Lawson application, and work hours are sent from Kronos to Lawson's payroll module.
Managers have recently started using Visionware, a module within the Kronos system, to track productivity and make changes to reflect demand for services.
Before implementing the software, managers had no way to look at staffing and make adjustments based on census, said Jane Jackson, director of decision support at St. Mary's. Visionware enables that, as well as helping managers keep track of staff hours for each pay period.
"Managers look at it daily and they know how many hours they need to cut," she said. "If there's any variance from the target, they have to explain it to their VP."
As with any new system, Jackson said, some adjustments have to be made.
"Some liked it, but I'd have to tell you that there was some trouble with some managers. They didn't like being told that if they have no volume, then they didn't need that FTE there," she said. "This comes from the board down, that we needed a productivity monitoring system."
"Flexing our schedule has been one of our biggest hurdles, and it's the one that creates the biggest dollar impact," she said. "Now, overtime is a variance, and everyone can see how much overtime resulted from increased activity."