MFI UK Select Kronos Web-Based Biometric System to Reduce Admin and Improve Time and Attendance Tracking

Six man days per week saved by reducing admin workload

MFI UK have purchased Kronos Workforce Central® to manage the time and attendance administration of 720 staff at the kitchen and bedroom manufacturing plant in Stockton-on-Tees. The plant manufactures the doors, profiles, ovens, and hobs for the Hygena and Schreiber kitchen and bedroom ranges. The web-based Kronos system will replace a manual clocking system and will require employees to clock in and out of work using a biometric hand scanner rather than the more traditional swipe card.

MFI UK had been using a manual system for recording the hours worked by employees. A frontline manager would be required to hand write weekly time sheets for each employee in his team. The time sheets would then be passed over to the payroll team where they were manually keyed into the Cyborg payroll system. In addition to this, to comply with fire regulations, frontline managers would be expected to complete a manual attendance register at the start of each shift.

Martin Ball, site analyst, commented "We estimated that manual record keeping was taking each of our 25 managers, around two hours each every week to complete. That’s 2600 hours per annum in unnecessary administration. With the Kronos System, we expect that administration time will be reduced to 15 minutes each week."

The payroll department was also faced with time consuming administrative task of taking the hand written time sheets and manually re-keying the data into the payroll system. Payroll manager Cheryl Murrey, said "The manual system was prone to error. Deciphering hand written sheets and re-keying the data into payroll would inevitably lead to some employees being paid incorrectly. The Kronos System, with its automatic feed into payroll will dramatically reduce the amount of admin handled by the payroll team, freeing us up to provide more data analysis to the frontline managers."

For the Stockton site alone, the time saving is eight hours per week in not having to key in any data.

MFI UK expect to see a number of benefits as a result of automating their Time and Attendance System.

Management reports will be available through the Kronos system, enabling frontline managers to track overtime, holidays, absence and sickness.
Management reports will be also available to Site Management to monitor actual hours worked per shift/day/week/ period by machine/department/factory/site.
Managers will no longer need to take a manual register on each shift to comply with fire safety regulations. The attendance data will be available in real time via the company Intranet just as soon as each employee has clocked in for work.
Reduced administration time for both shop floor managers and payroll staff.
Fewer payroll queries as a result of automatic data collection and electronic interface with the payroll system.
There will be a reduction in the number of employees querying their pay - hours worked and overtime worked are more transparent now that the employees are required to clock in and out of their shifts.
Employee self-service: employees will be able to view their remaining holiday hours at the hand scanner.
Biometric hand scanners used for clocking in mean that employees can never forget their swipe card. Nor can they be tempted to clock in an out for another employee.

Keith Statham, managing director of Kronos UK commented, "All industry sectors, including manufacturing are aware that profitability levels are affected by staff productivity. Any measure a company takes to free its staff from mundane and time consuming tasks will affect the bottom line. I’m delighted that MFI UK have chosen a Kronos system to automate their time and attendance administration."