Agri Supply Cultivates Increased Control, Better Decision-Making with Kronos Solution
Agri Supply is an agricultural supply company headquartered in Garner, North Carolina. The company operates seven retail stores in North Carolina, South Carolina, Virginia, and Georgia, in addition to its mail order business and wholesale division. Serving commercial farming operations, small weekend farmers, and homeowners, Agri Supply offers "Something for Everyone" from among more than 23,000 items for the farm, shop, and home, including products for agriculture, landscaping, and lawn and garden.
For years Agri Supply had been using a combination of in-house and outsourced systems for human resources, payroll, and time and labor, a cumbersome arrangement that made it difficult for the company to share accurate information between systems, and even resulted in delayed delivery of employee paychecks. The cost of outsourcing payroll was a significant expense, and was coupled with poor customer service that often led to errors and additional work for Agri Supply's staff.
In 2003, Agri Supply turned to Kronos for a comprehensive solution for its human resources, payroll, and time and labor needs. Following a speedy implementation, Agri Supply has a newly integrated and streamlined process for managing its workforce that has helped the company save time and money, improve decision making, and gain increased control over labor budgeting and overtime.
Struggling with a costly, unreliable system
Prior to moving to Kronos' Workforce Central® suite, Agri Supply outsourced its payroll process. The company experienced a number of problems and many members of the staff were frustrated with the arrangement. "We had no control," says Carol Wagoner, director of human resources for Direct Distributors, Agri Supply's parent company. "If we missed a deadline, we just missed it-there was nothing we could do. And more than once our checks weren't delivered on time because of factors outside our control, such as the weather."
"Another problem was the cost of outsourcing. We found that we could do anything we wanted-for a fee. And we weren't getting the level of customer service we needed. We would call three times with the same question and get three different answers. It even caused us to process things incorrectly."
With its employee information in a separate human resources system, Agri Supply was also faced with the challenge of sharing data across disparate technologies, a process that often proved time-consuming and unreliable.
Looking for a one-vendor solution
Agri Supply selected the Workforce Central suite — including the Workforce HR™, Workforce Payroll™, and Workforce Timekeeper™ applications — to manage human resources, payroll, and time and labor. A six-month implementation was carried out by just two employees. Wagoner notes, "Because we're a small company, we're used to getting things done aggressively and making the most of our resources." Wagoner also credits their Kronos application consultant with helping them implement the solution so quickly.
"With Kronos, I like that there are different features I can add," says Wagoner. "As our company grows, and our needs change and evolve, I can go in and add features like compensation management or performance management. Whatever the need may be, with Kronos, it's flexible and cost-effective to add to our existing solution."
A ringing endorsement
The response from Agri Supply's managers has been overwhelmingly positive, according to Wagoner. "The store managers love Kronos-it has completely changed how they go about budgeting." Today, Agri Supply store managers can get a daily, even hourly, look at how stores are performing against budgets. Before the Kronos solution was in place, this information wasn't available until the following month, when it was too late to do anything about it. All managers could hope for was to try and make up lost ground in the next month.
With a clearer, real-time picture of labor costs, Agri Supply has been able to reduce its overtime to almost zero. Now that managers can quickly access labor data, they can see which employees are clocking in early, and take appropriate steps to stay on budget. Kronos has also helped the company deal with market fluctuations. "We had a period of slow sales, and one of our store managers was able to cut $10,000 off his payroll one month to compensate for the lower revenue," says Wagoner. "Without Kronos at his fingertips, he would have been in the red."
The Kronos system gives Agri Supply a better look at employee attendance, helping the company control absenteeism. "You don't have to sift through time cards or six months of calendar notes to see how many days an employee has missed," says Wagoner. "Kronos clearly shows us tardies and unexcused absences." The information has also come in handy in controlling unemployment costs, says Wagoner. "If we have to terminate someone because of their attendance and they file for unemployment, I can prove our case by simply running a report that shows how many times they were late. It's safe to say that we've saved thousands of dollars this way."
Plans for the future
Agri Supply is upgrading to Workforce Central 5.1, and has plans to implement a number of enhancements to its Kronos solution. Wagoner is looking forward to increased integration with the version 5.1 upgrade, as the company eliminates its last two imports. Other improvements will include employee and manager self-service, allowing employees to access their benefits, print forms, and request time off. Agri Supply also plans to implement applicant tracking, using an in-store kiosk to manage recruitment.
Saving money and gaining control with Kronos
Customer service was an important consideration for Agri Supply, and the company was diligent in communicating its expectations to the Kronos team. According to Wagoner, the expectations have been met. "The customer service at Kronos is great. We get a quick response whenever we call. Someone is always ready to help us and they really know what they're doing. We have a lot of trust in Kronos."
In evaluating the Kronos solution, Wagoner found that by switching to Kronos and bringing the payroll process in house, Agri Supply would save $100,000 over five years. While this impressive cost savings convinced the company's president to approve the purchase, Wagoner has found that the increased control over labor costs has convinced managers of the solution's value. "The biggest positive impact has been the control the Kronos solution puts in our managers' hands. It allows them to make better decisions with more information. As a management tool, it's phenomenal."
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