Member Article

Aura Graphics praises new workforce management system  

An established company specialising in supplying high quality digital and screen-printed graphics to corporate clients has transformed its HR department by implementing a state of the art biometric workforce management system. The system has helped by speeding up the payroll system, which in turn has improved the overall efficiency of its HR department.

Aura Graphics, has 2 sites where it is installed, one in Suffolk and one in Staffordshire, it also has a satellite office in Bracknell, and employs more than 180 individuals. The company has over 80 years’ experience in producing signage and graphics and its client base ranges from SMEs, (small and medium sized enterprises), to major multinational organisations across the UK and globally.

The head office of Aura Graphics is situated in Lowestoft in Suffolk. The company first came across timeware, a workforce and time management solutions company based in Manchester, while searching for ways to modernise its payroll system. It wanted to make the transition from using a manual system to an electronic one, and required an updated system that could keep track of attendance records and the monthly payroll.

Neil Morton, Assistant Management Accountant at Aura Graphics based at their head office in Suffolk, said: “With over 80 members of staff at the head office alone, organising employees’ attendance records and sorting out the payroll manually was quite challenging and extremely time consuming. However, since timeware’s software has been introduced we have noticed a vast improvement in the efficiency of our procedures.

“A comprehensive package was offered to us by timeware, and was completely tailored towards our needs and requirements. Within a matter of weeks we were operating with the new system in place. As is expected with any new technology it took a little while to get used to, but timeware were really supportive and gave us the help we needed to ensure the transition was as pain free as possible.”

Aura Graphics was able to pick and choose the features it wanted from the timeware Professional Package, which covers areas such as personnel, absence management, biometric attendance, access control, cost centre analysis, reports and ESS (employee self service). The initial installation was overseen by timeware, while the business also ran the training and ongoing support package.

Aura Graphics adopted a variety of systems to help renovate its outdated processes. For starters, the employee attendance module was implemented to manage an individual’s working hours, as well as ensuring staff were in the right place at the right time.

Payroll Link and Report and Export modules were also implemented. With these two systems in place it was possible to export all employees’ payroll information onto a spreadsheet, making the information digestible and more easily available to managers and the HR team.

In addition to this, Aura Graphics also installed the Fire Alarm Roll Call module, which could collect information gathered from the attendance records and provide an accurate roll call report if needed. This module was installed to improve overall safety at the site, as in the event of an emergency a report could be put together within a matter of minutes of all the staff present in the building at that time.

“Moving from a manual to an electronic system has really benefitted us, and the Attendance, Payroll Link, and Fire Alarm Roll-Call modules have proved incredibly useful,” continued Neil. “Before the advent of the new electronic system we used out-dated clocking in cards. At the end of the week the clocking in cards had to be manually counted up, which was very time consuming and human error sometimes led to mistakes in the payroll.”

“Implementing the timeware modules has massively simplified the payroll process, as now the supervisors and I can see all employee attendance records at a press of a button. Having all employee data visible in one place has dramatically reduced error and massively decreased the time taken to complete the job.”

“Installing the timeware software has helped us enormously. Adopting the software has enabled us to become more efficient with our everyday business processes. It makes my job a lot easier, not to mention that of other managers and staff members.”

Simon Birchall, managing director at timeware, said: ’When we were first introduced to Aura Graphics, it was evident that it was necessary for the business to update its processes and needed to make the transition from a manual system to an electronic one.

“Our solutions have enabled Neil and his colleagues to be more efficient with everyday tasks so that they can concentrate on other areas of the business. We’re delighted that Aura Graphics has benefitted so much from using our management systems.”

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