Parasol
Formally launched in 2000, Parasol has helped some
35,000 contractors and freelancers maximise their income while
minimising the hassles of self-employment. Today, the popular
outsourced employment solutions company maintains impressive
partnerships with 2,500 recruiting agencies such as Hays, Alexander
Mann, Reed and ReThink and continues to expand into new market
sectors across the UK.
The journey
When Jon Cook joined Parasol as a contractor in 2005, his sole
purpose was to investigate solutions to replace the company's back
end system. Parasol was using a bespoke in-house system coupled
with Sage Line 50 and Access Payroll to handle invoicing, cash
matching, debtor management, contract management and CRM.
"We were looking to grow our customers, but keep a tight rein on
our back end office headcount," says Jon. "The key to do this is to
utilise smart solutions that provide a high level of
automation."
With this in mind, Jon, along with the managing director,
financial controller and IT manager, formed project team 'New
World'. The project team was determined to find the best 'fit for
purpose' off-the-shelf packages that could blend to provide a
complete solution.
The discovery
Time was the critical factor in the purchase. Parasol wanted a
new system implemented in time for the 2006 tax Year End to aid a
clean migration of data. "To move the date would have added an
extra level of complexity that we seriously wanted to avoid," says
Jon.
Other key issues were flexibility and integrating with the
in-house website. "The supplier had to deliver an integrated
end-to-end solution within a relatively tight budget," says
Jon.
"SelectPay runs four times a day… it processes
weekly and monthly people by three different payment methods - all
with no interaction from payroll staff!" Jon
Cook
Systems Analyst
As an existing Access Payroll user, it was natural for Parasol
to consider what Access had to offer. The project team
arranged a site visit with their local Access consultant to see the
software in operation. This gave confidence to the financial
controller and managing director.
"Ultimately, we were won over by the enthusiasm shown, and the
demonstration that Access could deliver a solution that met our
needs within our timescale and budget," says Jon.
The solution
Following the site visit, Access recommended GoldMine
CRM Premium Edition to capture consultants' (registered users)
details and to manage agency and sales relationships. Information
collected in GoldMine and timesheets pulled from Parasol's website
are transferred into Access Dimensions for
invoicing. Access Dimensions provides powerful tools to manage
credit control, sales ledger and reconciliation - useful features
as Parasol has a high volume of transactions. To best support the
company's evolving needs, Access suggested upgrading from Access
Payroll to SelectPay, a SQL-based version of
the product that would provide great scalability and flexibility.
SelectPay provides a seamless link to Access Dimensions for faster
processing.
To support the solution, the consultant proposed Access
TaskCentre to give more flexibility with reporting automation, and
Crystal reports for a wide range of reporting and KPI analysis.
The implementation
The project had an ambitious timeline with just four months
before going live. Jon says Access assigned a great deal of
resources to deliver the project on time. "Access brought in
GoldMine experts as well as developers so that they could get a
grasp of our necessary customisations," he comments. "This ensured
we could begin development quite quickly instead of spending a huge
amount of time talking and writing specifications."
The April 2006 deadline was met, but the go-live highlighted
some issues during the initial payrolls. "To Access' credit, they
worked with us tirelessly to resolve them," says Jon. "In
hindsight, the tight deadline had caused pressure on the planning,
development and testing cycles."
The results
Parasol gained benefits almost immediately. "The double handling
of data was gone, and the integration meant that we had faster
processing times," says Jon. Parasol has seen long-term benefits
such as:
Automated payroll
Parasol guarantees its consultants quick turnaround on payments
and SelectPay helps make that happen. "The bit I'm most impressed
with and am proud to have delivered is the payroll automation,"
says Jon. "It's scheduled to run automatically at 07:30, so our
payroll team can come into work in the morning, and the system has
already brought the first run for them to reconcile before
transmitting. This can quite easily be over £1m worth of
gross pay."
SelectPay is scalable between ten to thousands of employees,
making it an ideal solution for Parasol - which processes payroll
for over 8,200 flexible employees. "On average, we do 4,000
individual payroll calculations per week from the imported data,"
says Jon. "SelectPay runs four times a day, and in one swoop, it
processes weekly and monthly people by three different payment
methods - without interaction from payroll staff!"
Improved efficiency
The powerful automation allowed Parasol to control office head
count while growing the business. "Since the system went live in
2006, we've constantly been improving it and making changes," says
Jon. "These have led to a reduction in head count required to
manage our consultants, better cash and debtor management, cost
savings through automation and faster reporting."
Reduced admin
SelectHR is the latest addition to Parasol's solution. The
company was working off multiple spreadsheets for its HR processes
but wanted better management reporting of absence and head count.
Implementing the web-based SelectHR has taken the admin burden off
the management and HR teams. "SelectHR allows for faster and more
accurate reporting," he comments.
Post implementation
With its bespoke end-to-end solution in place, Parasol continues
to make the most of the software's features and functionality
through additional consultancy from Access. "Within an
organisation, if you just have your own people giving internal
training when they are leaving or changing roles, then this can
lead to a diluted knowledge pool," says Jon. "We've found it
beneficial to take additional training just to ensure our people
have a full and rounded knowledge on all aspects of the system that
they use."
The future
Parasol is already working to go-live with the link between SelectHR and SelectPay
for internal employees so staff can access their payslips online
and update their names and addresses, and line managers can send
new starter information to HR. The company is interested in testing
Access' Dashboard and Document Management solutions, and long term
plans may include upgrading to the latest version of GoldMine.
Conclusion
Jon concludes, "Parasol and Access have an excellent
relationship, which has helped to deliver a fantastic bespoke
end-to-end solution. Access has always been able to take our
thoughts and ideas to deliver innovative solutions that reach and
surpass the users' expectations."
Make mistakes when you’re paying staff and you’ll quickly realize you have a real problem on your hands. Compared to other areas of your business, payroll is often seen as a purely back office, operational function, something that’s ‘just there.’ The problem with payroll is people only notice it when it goes wrong.
Find out more »
Blog
RSS
Twitter 
LinkedIn