Crime Reduction Initiatives (CRI)

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Crime Reduction Initiatives (CRI) is a health and social care charity working with individuals, families and communities across England and Wales that are affected by drugs, alcohol, crime, homelessness, domestic abuse, and antisocial behaviour. They were previously using Sage 50 Payroll but due to the expansion of the organisation and the growing number of employees this solution was no longer able to meet their business needs. They successfully upgraded to Sage’s SnowdropKCS integrated HR and Payroll solution.

Key benefits:

• Providing a better service to the organisation and employees
• Sophisticated tracking and reporting to enable informed decision making
• Reduction in errors due to no more paper trails

“The SnowdropKCS solution has made our payroll team more efficient, more productive and more accurate. We can now spend time concentrating on the important functions of our jobs.”

Jon Loughlin, Payroll Manager

“The SnowdropKCS solution has meant we are now able to record, track and maintain our HR data effectively. The sophisticated reporting means we can intelligently use this information to understand the business and make informed decisions.”

Sarah James, Regional HR Manager

The challenge

CRI previously used Sage 50 Payroll however as the organisation and number of employees grew they found they were outgrowing the system. They were spending too much time uploading information into the system and they had no way of recording, tracking and maintaining information about their employees. The HR team could not access the data easily and were not able to report on the information they held. This meant they were unable to provide the level of service to the organisation they would have liked. Information and data was manually transferred involving a lot of paper pushing which not only meant a lot of wasted time but it was also open to errors.

The solution

CRI decided to upgrade to Sage’s SnowdropKCS integrated HR and payroll solution to enable them to meet their growing organisation’s needs. During their implementation they had two Sage Project Managers, working with them. In addition they had training consultants on-site to deliver bespoke training on the system. They had, and continue to have, access to the Sage in-house support desk who are on hand to help with any queries they may have.

“The Help Desk are fantastic and 90% of the time are able to resolve our queries there and then”

Sarah James, Regional HR Manager.

CRI will also shortly be implementing the Self-Service module which will enable employees and managers to interact with their own data reducing the amount of time taken to input data.

The Impact

The SnowdropKCS solution means that the HR department are now able to record, track and analyse the information effectively. They can now produce a vast number of standard reports, as well as create their own. This has enabled them to provide Managers with the information they need to make informed decisions about the business and employees. Going forward HR will be looking to further utilise the system by automating some processes through the workflows by setting predefined scenarios so that the system notifies them of dates or highlights trends, meaning they can address any issues sooner and deliver a better service.

The HR function are now able to better manage and monitor absence which will mean they can identity and address issues to drive down absence levels, saving the organisation money as well as being able to provide support when their employees need it.

As a result of implementing SnowdropKCS the payroll function is more productive and efficient. With processes being automated there is no longer a lengthy paper trail or heavy admin burden which has also meant a reduction in errors. As a result of the integrated system there is now no duplication of data which has streamlined many processes saving time and enabling them to concentrate on the more important parts of their job.