Likelihood to Recommend Personnel Data Systems (PDS)
As Vista HRMS is fully customizable to suit your needs, a company should determine if they have a current employee who can do the work themselves otherwise they will need to consider the additional cost of asking PDS to do the customizations for them. There are additional modules that we aren't currently making use of, but each company should learn about the functionality of each of them as some may be more beneficial than others. When gathering your questions, ask all potential users of the system what they would want to see in an HRMS. We did so before selecting Vista HRMS and we got pages and pages of questions and comments and made sure that each item was addressed beforehand and was something that we would be able to incorporate into the system. You have the option of taking the system in house or being a hosted client. Make sure you figure out what resources your IT department has available. If you have a dedicated administrator who will do all the upgrades and enhancements great, otherwise you may need PDS to help out and having PDS host may be a better option
Read full review It seems Intuit is more interested in generating revenue than taking care of their customers. After only 28 (working) days using it, I've had to call for Help 23 times, and, in my experience, only spoken to 2 people who had an understanding of basic accounting practices and the ramifications of some of their suggested fixes on the General Ledger.
Read full review Pros Personnel Data Systems (PDS)
Vista HRMS is very flexible, it does everything we need for HR, benefits and payroll. It’s user-friendly and intuitive to use, when we roll out new self-service items our employees have no problems and require minimal training or documentation. PDS has excellent customer service and support. We get answers to the majority of our questions and problems quickly, within the day that we call. More complex issues that may require PDS’ technical support are usually addressed within a few days. We were upgrading our production servers to Windows 2012 over a weekend and a key person in our organization was on leave. When we checked with PDS to see what cost would be involved if we needed their help, they said it was included in our regular maintenance, no extra cost. The PDS User’s Conference is an excellent learning opportunity for training on everything Vista does, including using Crystal Reports for custom reporting. You also get to meet and talk to the executive and development staff and have direct input into the future product development. Read full review It enables me to do a P&L for each specific program as requested by the county for the grant money that they give us. It enables me to do [an] organizational budget as well as a budget for each specific program It enables the accountant and the auditor access at any time for transparency Read full review Cons Personnel Data Systems (PDS)
Typical of any system built for the unknown requirements of hundreds or thousands of customers with varying needs, PDS sometimes doesn't fit our processes precisely out of the box. However, this con is far outweighed by the ability to configure and customize the system. The most significant pet peeve of our users is the necessity for so many clicks to navigate between different areas or the system or to review applicants. These items are being addressed based on feedback from the user community in an upcoming release. Read full review The budgets feature leaves a lot be desired - difficult and clunky to populate and maintain. Reporting for Budget vs Actual is available but the ability to reforecast based on updated data is not. The rules function to default common types of expenses isn't perfect and will get confused if like amounts or a number of similar items present. Read full review Likelihood to Renew Personnel Data Systems (PDS)
I feel so invested in Vista HRMS that I don't really want to try other options. I know we as an organization are not using this product to it's full potential and that is just due to us lacking the resources to be able to invest the time into breaking it apart and making it work to the best ability for us. The system works great as is, but there are a lot of implementations we can put into place to help us out even more. For example, we would love to start using Workflow to create more efficiencies. I personally have a very good relationship with our hosted vendor who supports Vista HRMS and can help me with any issues and concerns, this is a big part of the reason that I would renew with this product and continue to be an advocate for Vista HRMS.
Read full review It like the product 'right out of the box' and I trust Intuit will continually improve it over the years based on my experience with their desktop products. The large providers of Apps makes customizing the entire package relatively easy and seamless for a wide variety of business types.
Read full review Usability Personnel Data Systems (PDS)
The interface is intuitive, even if it does require some extra clicks to get to where you are going. The screens are consistently designed and formatted. There is a logical flow and organization to the application layout and menuing systems.
Read full review While QuickBooks Online is generally easy to navigate, there are some features and functions that often require a Google search in order to find out where they are actually hidden. Additionally, there are some simple customization features that are surprisingly not available for an otherwise advanced program (e.g. only having a pool of 4 fonts to choose from, only having 4 very limited templates for invoicing, not color selection, etc). While I would say that about 75% of users shouldn't have a problem finding their way around with basic functions, there is a learning curve if you want to be able to dive into some of the more useful features, almost to the point that you need to have a dedicated account manager in order to use QuickBooks Online most effectively.
Zach Yokum COO (Chief Operating Officer) / Creative Director
Read full review Reliability and Availability Personnel Data Systems (PDS)
We have rarely had outages in the last 10 years. I can only recall 2 times in the last 10 years where we were not able to access our client files.
Read full review Performance Personnel Data Systems (PDS)
There are tab issues. When I tab the field doesn't highlight and I have to backspace or delete what is in the field. Happens on the memo field and sometimes other fields. Very time consuming.
Read full review Support Rating Personnel Data Systems (PDS)
PDS has excellent customer service and support. We get answers to the majority of our questions and problems quickly, within the day that we call. More complex issues that may require PDS’ technical support are usually addressed within a few days
Read full review Support is great, all incidents been resolved. Quickbooks Online forum is very well organized and helpful. I like the fact that they let the community contribute in resolving issues. Most or many of your answers can be found online. You can also get help on YouTube, but the easiest way to get assistance is through their chat system.
Read full review Online Training Personnel Data Systems (PDS)
The resources and online tools that PDS provide are extremely thorough and helpful in our training and learning.
Read full review Implementation Rating Personnel Data Systems (PDS)
Ask lots of questions, ensure you fully understand the functionality (particularly history records) and train, train, train the users for correct and complete utilization of the system.
Read full review The person in charge of QB needs to be very accurate with record keeping and is recommended to stay on top of tasks. The biggest issue we have is reconciliation, and those issues occur only when too much time has occurred between reconciliations
Read full review Alternatives Considered Personnel Data Systems (PDS)
I've used Peoplesoft HCM in the past. The products have some similarities, but they are marketed to different sized companies, so it's a bit of apples to oranges. Peoplesoft was very complex and challenging to manage and support. Vista HRMS should require fewer technical resources and still provide robust features for HR and Payroll. We selected Vista HRMS because it met the majority of our requirements and was priced to enable us to purchase and implement it within our budget. Also, it's an integrated system (although not truly one system when you count Vista Time) which is an improvement over our current state.
Read full review I have used Wave Accounting for another business. I selected QuickBooks Online over Wave because of the features available from QuickBooks. Wave is great since it is free, but I feel that paying for QuickBooks Online is worth it for the features. In addition there is such a robust support network and training available for QuickBooks.
Read full review Scalability Personnel Data Systems (PDS)
As we have grown along our professional path, we have also expanded our use of QB. The scalability is easy and features seem to be waiting for you until you need them. We have increased profits by over 10x from our first year in business to the current and have yet to find a reason to look elsewhere
Read full review Return on Investment Personnel Data Systems (PDS)
Positive impact would definitely be self-service for both employees and managers to view and update selected data. Through some analytics our managers are able to track turnover for their site/department by many criteria (length of service, reason, etc) and can view a number of other analytical reports such as headcount and demographics which help them to make informed decisions about their department. Read full review It has created a lot of cost and in-efficiency whenever we need to talk to support. I spent a lot of time setting up their automatic reminders for past due invoices and it worked for a couple of months and then it stopped. It's currently being worked on by their tech team but it has been months and it is still not working. It would have saved me a lot of time. Their multi-currency saves time in sending invoices abroad but it's limiting when a customer wants an invoice in USD instead of a foreign currency so I have to set up different customer accounts for different currencies. Read full review ScreenShots