FinancialForce HCM (Discontinued) vs. Paychex Flex

FinancialForce HCM gives HR admins the full Hire to Retire experience while also meeting the needs of the worker/end user. Additionally, the application is well suited for talent management, shift scheduling, electronic benefits transmissions and connecting to payroll providers. Integration of HCM with other FinancialForce offerings, such as PSA and Accounting, completes the connection of front to back office.

Incentivized

In my experience, Paychex Flex is well suited for small to medium sized businesses. It has been helpful in streamlining the onboarding process and it is easy to update and maintain employee profiles and records. It has worked will in a non-profit environment where there is clergy pay and housing, which can get quite complicated. I cannot think of a scenario where it would be less appropriate.

Incentivized

• It's customizable for every department.
• The "back-end" is easy to use. You do not always need to contact support to tweak items.
• Once a process flow is created, it is VERY user-friendly.
• We can integrate other platforms such as Formstack into FF.

Incentivized

• I like I can enter payroll and if I need to leave the program, I can resume at a later time and my information is saved.
• I like the analytics & reports features.
• I like how all my employees have easy access to their portal.

Incentivized

• Dashboards need updating
• Difficult to customise reports
• Salesforce is not always as quick to respond with service issues as they could be

Incentivized

• Reporting writing is difficult to figure out
• Employee turnover inside Paychex was a problem, until we were assigned to Neil Williams - since that time it has settled down
• Pressure to convert personal connection with payroll advisor to using automated service

Incentivized

Overall I like the features that Paychex Flex offers. I am sure that there are other features that I am unaware of, so I am excited to see if there is more that Flex is capable of to make my job easier. The basic features are really user friendly and easy to access. If there ever is an issue customer service is great

Incentivized

Some things could be streamlined. For example, we could do custom options for the "add items" tab which has so many options that we never use. "Medical Pay" could be something that the system remembers for the applicable employees. Salaried employees' salaries should definitely be auto-filled. Overall the system works well but I think it could be improved to be easier to use and read.

Incentivized

We have not experienced any difficulties with unplanned outages. Notifications are always made for outages, and they do not effect normal business operations.

Incentivized

Unless there is lag time within the internet, the Paychex Flex website loads exceptional fast, pages load quickly and reports that I need to print or download load quickly. If I need to create a specialized report, once I complete it I receive an e-mail telling me my report is ready to be downloaded. Changing between web pages is fast as well.

Incentivized

Our dedicated representative is one of the main reasons we are sticking with Paychex Flex. If it were not for this person, other platforms could provide the same/similar functionality. It is the ability to speak with someone that understands our business and is willing to get questions answered in a timely fashion that keeps us with Paychex Flex.

Incentivized

We did online training only

Incentivized

It was easy to understand and follow along. I do like the informational videos that we can utilize before we opt to call in for customer service support. It has made a difference since sometimes that resolves the issue I may have had and saved myself a phone call to Paychex support.

Incentivized

Implementation was very smooth. The most cumbersome task was entering the current employees into the system during initial set up, but Paychex staff handled most of that and verified against prior system reports as well as internal reports provided to ensure 100% accuracy.

Incentivized

From a pricing perspective, FinancialForce HCM is very competitive in both licensing and implementation costs. Ultimately having an application that was native to Salesforce drove our final decision. While we were hoping to find an application that included the ability to process payroll internally we settled on the process of linking to a 3rd party vendor. The other options were either too pricey or lacked some of the key functionality we required.

Incentivized

We still use QB Desktop Pro to maintain a Check Register / Overall Balance for the company, but once having tried QB Payroll Online for about 3 months prior to finding Paychex Flex I can tell you that there's just no comparison. QB online is VERY EXPENSIVE and not so user-friendly. I hated every minute of those 6 payrolls we ran through QB online.

Incentivized

Employees can log in at home and get up to date information on their FSA balance and any medical bill reimbursements they may have uploaded. At renewal time they have the ability to make changes to their FSA or for new employees star the enrollment.

Incentivized

• It improved self service capabilities - saving significant HR time.

Incentivized

• I do not believe we have saved anything additionally. The time we've had to spend to get things to hopefully work is sad. This is the reason we've had to turn off all extra "products" of Paychex Flex. Time and Attendance is horrible. Benefits management is horrible. The user experience is horrible.
• One thing I do not understand is why are updates for states, cities, counties, school districts, etc. not automatically updated? Should we not get a big red flag if we have an employee living/working, being paid in CA, but they aren't set up for CA sick time? If it is required to be on the paycheck stub to show the balance of the sick time, why would we not be notified that we are out of compliance?

Incentivized