Case Study
Fanello Industries
Fanello Industries opened in 1998 in Lavonia, Georgia, a small town in the northeast region of the state. For 10 years, the company—which makes stamped blanks and component assemblies for the automotive, lawn and garden, HVAC, and other metal industries— has built a solid reputation and experienced healthy growth.
Fanello’s employees work hard, and are reliable and good at their jobs. The last thing they want to worry about is getting paid on time, and for the right amount. But that’s exactly what happened when the company first made the decision to switch from a paper-based, to an electronic time, attendance and payroll system.
With an expanding workforce, multiple shifts, and paid and unpaid break periods, Fanello’s Human Resources Manager Brandy Langenwalter knew it was time to look to technology to keep time and attendance tasks from overwhelming staff.
Langenwalter first looked to one of the largest, most well known time and attendance and payroll vendors to fill the need, hoping their experience and size would ensure the best possible products and service. She was wrong.
“Everything about our encounter with this vendor was horrendous—from the implementation, to the time tracking, to payment” she said. “It was so difficult, we cancelled our contract after just the first payroll.” =
Despite their unpleasant first experience, Langenwalter knew an automated system was the only answer to the company’s constantly growing needs. But after the first failure, she had a difficult time convincing both management and staff to try again.
“Before our first attempt, people were skeptical about changing the way things had always been done. After it failed, I’d say 99 percent of our company had a very strong aversion to trying again.”
Langenwalter spent several months researching another time and attendance solution. She wanted a package that offered biometric clocks, was flexible, and did not require the company to outsource payroll. The last requirement was designated as an absolute must by the owner, who insisted the company maintain complete control over at least that portion of the process.
“Months after we cancelled our service with this national vendor, we’re still having issues with them debiting tax payments from our account,” she said. “Maintaining control over the back end of the time-attendance-payroll process was understandably non-negotiable.”
Langenwalter was also looking for a smaller company that could offer Fanello more personalized technical and customer service. And yet, she also wanted a group that had a proven track record of success with its customers.
“ I was looking for a solution that would help move our company to the next level, not just a Band-Aid for the next five years.”She came across Qqest on the internet and sent them an email. “Someone from Qqest called me the day after I sent that first message.”
From that point, things moved quickly. “My boss was pretty skeptical,” she said. “But after the first presentation, that changed. Between the user-friendly nature of the software, the straight-forward bid, and the salesperson’s attitude, most of his concerns evaporated right away.”
The implementation process was challenging because Fanello has unique needs that were not addressed by the existing software design. For example, the company has a third shift, where workers start at 11 p.m. and work through to the morning the following day. They wanted the time worked to count from the second day. Both the first product and Qqest’s solutions counted the time on the day the workers started their shift.
“Instead of bending to what we needed, the first vendor was constantly asking us to change the way we did things,” said Langenwalter. “They wanted us to adjust pay policies, shift times, and modify the way we reported hours. The first two months we were with that vendor, I felt like I was working for them.”
Qqest’s implementation team took a much different approach. “Once I started working with Qqest, I barely did a thing. They asked me how we worked and what we wanted the outcome to be, and then made it happen.”Qqest also accommodated Fanello’s desire to keep payroll in-house. With TimeForce, the company was able to use a Quickbooks interface to handle that end of the process. But first they had to overcome a few hiccups. ”When we ran the first test, the multi-day shifts did not calculate properly,” Langenwalter said. “But thanks to Qqest’s Implementation Services staff, we were able to make adjustments and eliminate the problem completely—and quickly.”
After using TimeForce for a few months, Fanello added the human resources package, and is now looking at adding the job costing feature. “Qqest has made our company more efficient, and the reports are helping us track information in ways we never could before,” said Langenwalter. “And after just a week of using the software, everyone stopped complaining and got on board. Now everyone loves TimeForce.”
