Buddy Punch vs. UKG Workforce Central (discontinued)

I think that is very convenient as far as tracking your employees when they are punching in or out to ensure they are physically at the location they are supposed to be for that shift. I also think that the option to download this app to your personal phone is amazing, it makes it more convenient to punch in or out when you aren't near a laptop or a residence to use one. The feature of being able to attach a note with your punches explaining possible late punchers or absences is very beneficial to the employee allows show proof if needed.

We use Kronos Workforce Central only for it's timekeeping and scheduling/forecasting capabilities. It absolutely meets our needs for these areas. The reporting functionality also serves us well; exporting reports in excel covers the needs for most teams that use the system. Finally, business leaders and local HR crews are able to run reports on the teams they support.

Incentivized

• Customer service is the best we've seen! Their knowledge base is clear, and when we do have a question it can't answer, we get a quick, informed solution.
• The software allows us to schedule our staff seamlessly for work in more than one department in a day, so tracking how many payroll hours are being used in each department is easy.
• The reporting for Payroll hours is easy and fast.

Incentivized

• As a full service hospital there can be demands of staff to respond to high census or staffing shortages. Kronos has offered great utilization in floating hours between units and departments, identifying direct or indirect patient care hours, and ultimately offering analytics to clinical and operational leaders. This ability to specifically move hours while at work is exceptional for reporting and planning purposes across the organization.
• The self-managed and leader managed options of an employee’s time card is of huge benefit. As a 24/7 hour operation it is critical that each individual is accountable for their own timekeeping. Kronos allows each employee to manage and submit adjustment, updates, and changes while at work without having to have their manager do it for them. The proceeding approval/acceptance process with these changes is well established and easy to authenticate.
• The ability to access and navigate the user interface is very friendly and forgiving. Other systems can be quite cumbersome and hard to navigate, update, and easily change, but Kronos is pretty straight forward both for users and administrators. This ability to easily orient new team members and managers has been a great benefit to the organization.

Incentivized

• the simplicity can go to far in that direction. So it seems a bit sparse at times. Theres a lot of dead space on some page landings.
• update on colors to be more vibrant and fun.
• menu buttons to go to particular specifics like vacation and sick submissions

Incentivized

• Training required to use the product effectively, not simple at first
• Dependent on Java, frequent updates to Java necessary to continue using the Kronos platform
• Reporting tools are extensive and solid, though some reports can only be extracted in PDF, not in the more usable Excel format. How Kronos determines which can be extracted in Excel vs. PDF, I can't tell.

Incentivized

Now that the system is installed and operational, the "pain is gone"...therefore we see no reason to change to a different application. There is no functionality that is missing from the system that would drive us to consider another solution at this time. Maintenance support from Kronos is sufficient and updates occur regularly.

Buddy Punch is really easy to use. It's easy to punch in and out when needed as it's on the home page. It's also easy to track your colleagues who are on leave so you know how to plan for coverage. This makes it easy for us to adjust accordingly.

Incentivized

Kronos Workforce Central's support is amazing! From the support the software alone gives our department to the customer service team, we have never been more thorough as we are now. There are plenty of trainings provided and assistance is always there when you need it. The launching process was very detailed.

Incentivized

I have not reviewed or evaluated any other similar products and this is the first time I am using this type of product. I have been a salaried employee for 25 years and this is my first contract position, but Buddy Punch has made the time tracking very simple and efficient.

Incentivized

We looked this product first and actually started the conversion process before we realized it could not do some essential functions we needed. One of the simple ones was allowing for employees to select to clock in or out and not just assume the direction based on their schedule or last punch. With bus drivers working multiple routes or shifts this was imperative that they be able to select this as while they may forget one punch being able to select the direction helps identify where the missing punches are. I'm hoping this has since been corrected because it absolutely floored me that such a relatively simple thing was not an option.

Incentivized

• Improved Efficiency: Allows us to track time when employees are on site.
• Reduced Costs: Able to avoid unnecessary OT due to employees getting alerts.
• Reduced Costs: No longer paying an employee to tally hours like when we used a regular time clock.

Incentivized

• Kronos is much more expensive than the previous systems we were using, so at this point the ROI is negative. The idea is that it will allow us to scale and grow the company more easily so time will tell if that is the case.

Incentivized