Overview
What is Ascentis (discontinued)?
Ascentis HR uses web-based management programs to help automate complex HR processes. Ascentis’ other services included customizable payroll, time and attendance and recruiting modules. Ascentis was acquired by UKG in March of 2022, and will be discontinued.
Santis offers you everything in the sales call and delivers only a part of it. Implementation and often is unavailable to communicate with you at all for a long time
Ascentis HR is where you want to be with your firms HR offering if you want a local company that cares about what they are selling.
Ascentis HR - It just works!
One and a half years in.
User friendly software in a hard times industry
New User w/ Honest Feedback
Medium Product
HRIS and Payroll System Excellence
Ascentis is great and could be even greater with a few tweaks
Short, Sweet and Simple, Sincere Review
More bang for your buck! And great support to boot!
Technical System View
Ascentis--once you get past the learning curve, it's great
Ascentis - Cost Effective HRIS for Smaller Firms
Awards
Products that are considered exceptional by their customers based on a variety of criteria win TrustRadius awards. Learn more about the types of TrustRadius awards to make the best purchase decision. More about TrustRadius Awards
Popular Features
- Update personal information (151)8.686%
- Pre-built reports (142)7.575%
- Employment history (140)7.373%
- Report builder (144)7.070%
Pricing
What is Ascentis (discontinued)?
Ascentis HR uses web-based management programs to help automate complex HR processes. Ascentis’ other services included customizable payroll, time and attendance and recruiting modules. Ascentis was acquired by UKG in March of 2022, and will be discontinued.
Entry-level set up fee?
- No setup fee
Offerings
- Free Trial
- Free/Freemium Version
- Premium Consulting/Integration Services
Would you like us to let the vendor know that you want pricing?
Alternatives Pricing
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Rippling gives businesses one place to run HR, IT, and Finance. It brings together all of the workforce systems that are normally scattered across a company, like payroll, expenses, benefits, and computers. This enables users to manage and automate every part of the employee lifecycle in a single…
Features
Human Resource Management
Organizing, tracking and providing instant access to critical employee data, job profiles, transfers, promotions, and benefits information.
- 6.7Employee demographic data(137) Ratings
Administrators have the ability to enter detailed demographic data for each employee.
- 7.3Employment history(140) Ratings
Employment history is the ability to track previous positions held.
- 6.9Job profiles and administration(128) Ratings
Job profiles and descriptions can be created and edited.
- 6.7Workflow for transfers, promotions, pay raises, etc.(126) Ratings
Employee move workflow provides the ability to move employees to different positions and apply pay raises.
- 5.2Organizational charting(90) Ratings
Organizational charting is the ability to create hierarchical charts.
- 8Organization and location management(109) Ratings
Organization and location management allows employees to be managed across multiple geographical locations.
- 8.8Compliance data (COBRA, OSHA, etc.)(102) Ratings
Compliance capabilities ensure full compliance with federal workplace regulations by capturing required data in central database.
Payroll Management
Provides for pay calculation and benefit plan administration, in addition to managing direct deposit, salary revisions and payroll tracking.
- 7.1Pay calculation(115) Ratings
Pay calculation provides for computation of employee pay with state and federal deductions.
- 6.1Support for external payroll vendors(62) Ratings
Support for external payroll vendors is the ability to integrate with 3rd-party payroll services.
- 8.3Off-cycle/On-Demand payment(28) Ratings
Provide employees access to wages accrued during the pay period before the end of the pay cycle.
- 6.7Benefit plan administration(108) Ratings
Benefit plan administration is administration of health insurance plans and 401k plans, and other benefits.
- 9.2Direct deposit files(100) Ratings
Direct deposit is the ability to electronically transfer pay to an employee’s personal bank account.
- 8.6Salary revision and increment management(92) Ratings
Salary revision is the ability to modify individual employee pay.
- 8.8Reimbursement management(51) Ratings
Reimbursement management provides cash reimbursement for employee expenses related to business travel or other.
Leave and Attendance Management
Streamlines communication between HR and employees and facilitates efficient management of employee leave including requisitions, approvals, balance calculation, and annual carry-forward.
- 7.9Approval workflow(99) Ratings
Approval workflow is the process for approving employee paid time-off requests.
- 7Balance details(99) Ratings
Balance details is automatic updating of paid time-off balance to reflect time taken.
- 8.4Annual carry-forward and encashment(84) Ratings
Annual carry-forward and encashment enables unused paid time-off days to be carried forward to new year, or paid in cash.
Employee Self Service
Employee portal allowing employees to view and update their personal information.
- 7.8View and generate pay and benefit information(138) Ratings
Employees can view pay and benefit data and print pay stubs.
- 8.6Update personal information(151) Ratings
Employees can update personal profile with change of address, dependents, or other personal data.
- 5.4View company policy documentation(110) Ratings
Employees can review company handbook, and corporate policy documents.
- 6Employee recognition(61) Ratings
thank a team member
- 7.3View job history(108) Ratings
Employees can view all positions held at the company.
Asset Management
Maintaining a record of assets such as laptops, pagers, cell phones, etc. issued to employees. Record typically includes asset type, number, serial number and date of issuance.
- 5.8Tracking of all physical assets(33) Ratings
Tracking of track laptops, pagers, phones, and other company equipment.
HR Reporting
Pre-built and custom reports, and integration with external data.
- 7Report builder(144) Ratings
Report builder allows custom reports to be created using a GUI.
- 7.5Pre-built reports(142) Ratings
Pre-built reports is the provision of a variety of canned reports on employee retention, and other key metrics.
- 4.6Ability to combine HR data with external data(73) Ratings
Ability to bring data from external systems like CRM and combine with HR data.
Onboarding
Employee onboarding is the process of orienting new hires to the social and performance aspects of their jobs so that they are able to function in their new roles as quickly as possible.
- 5.3New hire portal(98) Ratings
New hire portal eliminates printing and mailing with a personalized portal of all required reading, corporate information, and all forms and other paperwork, online.
- 4.9Manager tracking tools(76) Ratings
Tracking tools allow hiring managers to check status on individual hires for all onboarding activities.
Performance and Goals
Goal alignment is the practice of ensuring that all employees have clearly defined goals in support of the overall corporate strategy.
- 6.7Corporate goal setting(43) Ratings
Corporate goal setting is the ability to define corporate goals, and/or vision statements in the system.
- 7.6Individual goal setting(53) Ratings
Individual goal setting is the ability to define individual goals that align to organizational and subordinate goals.
- 7.1Line-of sight-visibility(38) Ratings
Line-of-sight visibility is the provision of line-of sight visibility for each goal to see how goals support overall corporate objectives.
- 7.2Performance tracking(50) Ratings
Performance tracking allows managers to track individual progress against goals as a component of overall performance.
Performance Management
Performance management is the process of ensuring employees meet pre-determined objectives and goals through regular check-ins and appraisals.
- 5.6Performance plans(59) Ratings
Supervisors have ability to build individual performance plans including, goals, competencies, etc..
- 5.6Performance improvement plans(50) Ratings
Supervisors can track disciplinary actions such as performance improvement plans.
- 5.8Review status tracking(57) Ratings
Supervisors can monitor and track review status completion with dashboard showing milestones and status.
- 6.5Review reminders(55) Ratings
System can generate reminders to ensure review completion timeliness.
- 6.6Multiple review frequency(50) Ratings
System supports multiple review types including annual, quarterly mid-year and anniversary reviews.
Succession Planning
Succession planning is the identification and development of internal employees with the potential to fill key business leadership positions in the company.
- 6.4Create succession plans/pools(21) Ratings
Managers can create and manage pools of potentially high-performing individuals.
- 6.4Candidate ranking(21) Ratings
Candidate readiness for key business positions can be ranked and assessed.
- 5Candidate search(27) Ratings
Candidate search provides search capabilities for potential candidates based on attribute or other profile data.
- 5.8Candidate development(23) Ratings
Candidate development is the ability to assign learning and development goals.
Recruiting / ATS
Recruiting or Applicant Tracking Software is software used to manage the recruitment process electronically by handling job postings, applicant status, resume management, etc.
- 5.5Job Requisition Management(85) Ratings
Job Requisition Management – Job requisition management is the ability to create jobs quickly and easily
- 5.2Company Website Posting(79) Ratings
Software allows postings to be displayed on the company website
- 5.7Publish to Social Media(59) Ratings
Software provides ability to publish postings to social media sites
- 5.8Job Search Site Posting(71) Ratings
Software provides ability to publish postings to top job search sites
- 5.6Duplicate Candidate Prevention(57) Ratings
Duplicate candidate prevention prevents candidates already in the system from being added
- 5.7Applicant Tracking(83) Ratings
Applicant tracking allows recruiters to assign applicants to various stages so others can see status at a glance
- 5.3Notifications and Alerts(69) Ratings
Notifications and reminders inform you of tasks to be completed
Product Details
- About
- Competitors
- Tech Details
- FAQs
What is Ascentis (discontinued)?
Ascentis was acquired by UKG in March of 2022. The service will be discontinued.
Ascentis (discontinued) Screenshots
Ascentis (discontinued) Technical Details
Operating Systems | Unspecified |
---|---|
Mobile Application | No |
Frequently Asked Questions
Comparisons
Compare with
Reviews and Ratings
(323)Attribute Ratings
- 6.3Likelihood to Renew12 ratings
- 6.7Availability5 ratings
- 7.1Performance4 ratings
- 7.6Usability44 ratings
- 8.2Support Rating150 ratings
- 8.3Online Training4 ratings
- 8In-Person Training1 rating
- 8.3Implementation Rating5 ratings
- 9Configurability1 rating
- 6.7Product Scalability4 ratings
- 3Ease of integration1 rating
- 9.6Vendor pre-sale3 ratings
- 9.6Vendor post-sale3 ratings
Reviews
(1-25 of 164)The Good and the Bad!
- Ascentis HR allows you to attach anything to the EE's records, so you can be quite paperless.
- Benefits Open Enrollment went pretty smoothly! Much better than the manual way we'd been handling things.
- Setting up users (ex: managers, supervisors, etc) is pretty decent, but we are still learning how to work with all of that to have things work correctly.
- Ascentis HR needs to flow over to Ascentis Payroll with a little more fluidity. Most are OK, but it does need to work on certain issues better. Some could be an administrative error as we are all still "learning" things.
- I believe Ascentis HR should not have to "use" Ascentis Support as much for certain things: Alert setups (why can't we set these up ourselves without sending notices to Support to set up), any remote desktop set up or password reset has to go thru Ascentis Support - why can "administrators" on our "user" end set it up?
- There is no "flow over" of things like bonuses, car allowance, phone allowances, etc from HR to payroll. There should be. HR training needs to be handled a little smoother.
- There is still so much to learn on the HR side after more than a year of having it. And, that's not including the separate "modules" that companies can utilize. That's just the basic stuff.
- Somewhat of a "choppy" learning experience.
- Report tool can be enhanced/modified to work better!!! Whether a custom report or a canned report, sometimes the selection criteria that one has chosen DOES NOT work the way it should (this is very noticeable when reporting on certain benefits that one has selected, yet ALL benefits (STD, LTD, Med, etc) still come out on the report, and then one has to sort and remove them THEMSELVES from the reports. Also, on the HR reporting, you have to create a TXT report first, and then make it into an EXCEL (or whatever type of report you want), you can't just create the EXCEL report first. The REPORTING feature DEFINITELY needs some enhancements/modifications to work MUCH better in many ways!!!
- Making an extremely wide variety of reports available
- Clearly and concisely relaying what their product can do for the company
- Different tools were laid out in an intuitive manner on the interface
- They have not been very responsive when we have had problems in fact sometimes it takes several weeks to get back to them
- They promised us the moon and then we’re not able to deliver and everything they promised we had a specific need for some of the data which they said would be available and then they said it wasn’t available when we need it
Ascentis HR is where you want to be with your firms HR offering if you want a local company that cares about what they are selling.
- Ascentis HR Offices Self Service piece is done very nicely and most employees find the interface intuitive and easy to use.
- The product is backed by a passionate group employees, many of which have been with Ascentis for decades, making the support and communication with them seem quite fulfilling and and always personal and to the point of an issue.
- The back end piece of Ascentis HR is as easy to use as the employee facing side. Our HR team has no issue entering information or getting reports out of the system. Ascentis made this softeware to make the lives easier of HR people and in my opinion it succeeds at that.
- Ascentis offers many hooks into different insurance/benefit companies online systems making publishing benefits a fairly easy process.
- While this is technically a cloud based system it is actually running on RDS hosts so accessing and using the back end piece is much more cumbersome that having it installed locally or using a web based version of the same.
- I think their costs are a bit high compared to some other online offerings. Large companies would probably find using Ascentis to not be an economical choice.
- While their Self Service piece works well for an employee and is made to be simple for HR Staff it does not offer much functionality or changeability for someone in IT that might want troubleshoot or add some "off the beaten path" information to the portal. It is basically a CMS made for non IT folks.
Ascentis HR - It just works!
- Employee Self Service is excellent
- Notes, attachments to employee records are easy to use
- Management self service is also well thought out, although we would like to see managers included in their own team calendar views.
- We looked at the scheduling system available from Ascentis - in depth - it was almost what we needed for our paramedics, but not quite (NovaTime) - it would be great to move in that direction in the future.
- A way to connect leave calendars to MS Outlook would be a wonderful tool.
- The need to use remote desktop to get to Employee Manager and Setup Manager is cumbersome - people forget their passwords frequently - it would be nice to see Ascentis move toward web-based functionality for the entire thing.
We do not find the payroll function to be well suited to our needs - and as mentioned previously, the NovaTime scheduling system could not be customized to work for us without spending upwards of $20K US.
One and a half years in.
- Tracking time and attendance
- Setting accruals with limits
- Tracking accrual approvals
- Mobile app could be more user friendly
- Accrual visibility for employees could be better
User friendly software in a hard times industry
- Ascentis welcomes feedback and challenges. If we have a need to better our company and feel we can do this process in Ascentis, they are willing to help us find a way so we can keep everything in one central location.
- The support is extremely helpful, and you get to talk to an actual person every time.
- Constant information of updates and how to use the new features are wonderful. You do not have to go searching for answers when there is a new option or feature.
- Though we have found very few things not customizable, there are a few items in Recruiting that we could use the ability to customize in the application process.
- The app needs to be able to see widgets from the company page so we can ensure our employees are up to date on everything going on, even if on their phone.
- Emergency contacts needs to be able to be seen on the app by supervisors and others designated to see this information.
New User w/ Honest Feedback
- Streamline HR changes.
- 2 step approval process between HR and Payroll for those changes.
- Support for those items you need assistance with and a payroll specialist that can walk you through those items step by step.
- When submitting changes, an effective date is entered. It would be great, even if approved, those changes do not affect anything until the actual entered effective date.
- Sometimes the 2 step process of reaching a payroll specialist when you call in seems a little overboard. I understand that payroll specialists are probably very busy, but using the person that answers the phone as just a middle man is sometimes very inconvenient.
- I am looking forward to when the Instawriter process updates and you are able to create forms and such. Simplifying the reporting process and making it more user-friendly would be great.
Medium Product
- The help section is good in some areas
- Communication between CSM and clients
- More detailed and streamlined ways to get support
- Updates that actually work instead of cause new issues
HRIS and Payroll System Excellence
- Customer service.
- Continuous product improvements
- Knowledgeable staff—product specific
- Implementation thoroughness
Ascentis is great and could be even greater with a few tweaks
- I love the report generator in Novatime.
- the way you can add as many journals to a payroll is especially helpful.
- I like being able to generate a new temp password for an EE in HR.
- I wish the system would automatically prorate mid-period pay changes for hourly EEs the same way it does for Salary EEs.
- I'm trying to learn the Instawriter for custom reports and wish it was less complicated.
- It would be helpful if there was a popup that told managers approving timesheets when an ee has close to or more than 24 hours for one day because they have forgotten to put PM instead of AM or vice versa.
Short, Sweet and Simple, Sincere Review
- Self service portal-allowing for one stop information sharing.
- Benefit enrollment platform and vendor file feeds.
- I was bothered by the fees charged to setup a new carrier connection.
- I wish the ESS portal was APP friendly.
More bang for your buck! And great support to boot!
- Captures unclaimed punches.
- Give us the ability to see the history of leave used.
- Very user friendly
- Can generate automatic warnings in regards to attendance or tardies.
- Be able to change the name label if needed.
- Be able to see the accrual history on one page instead of the need to keep scrolling.
Technical System View
- Provides a single platform where employees can enroll in benefits, update personal information, complete online training and performance reviews.
- Provides leadership a platform to process employment related items, review all team data in one location and receive leadership training.
- Updating the system so it is one platform and not two.
- Create changes to the benefit enrollment process and upgrade the system so hire dates do not need to be changed to trigger benefits for status changes.
- Focus updates on HR Admin, mobile application, ATS and transitioning to one platform. Larger areas of focus have been on the payroll portion of the system with a few updates to other areas.
- When something is broken, quicker turn time on fixing the issue.
- System needs updates to support AAP reporting.
Ascentis--once you get past the learning curve, it's great
- Ascentis helps out when I don't understand something with the system and need help figuring it out.
- They are good at responding back.
- I like the Ascentis community. It has a lot of useful information for its users.
- I think the time responding back could be a lot quicker than it has been.
Ascentis - Cost Effective HRIS for Smaller Firms
- User intuitive
- Able to modify fields and create screens fairly easy
- System does not maintain some historical information that would be helpful - i.e. prior supervisor/manager. It makes it difficult when computing turnover especially when employees move throughout the organization.
- Handling service for East Coast clients is poor in this day and age. If they are to provide a product nationwide they should have better support in the call centers.
- The benefits module is a challenge.
- Training could be improved for new users. A lot of it seems to be trial and error and having to reach out to their call center for help. Better upfront user training could reduce the number of calls.
- We were sold a completely integrated system yet the payroll and hr still reside on different platforms.
Ascentis works for mid-sized manufacturing HR needs
- Product flow, robust system--linked to all-in-one HR network
- Customer service availability is good, although slow at the beginning of the year
- Reporting improvements with online-based option recently
- Recruiting--poor applicant experience ratings
- Reporting option too robust--needs simplification in HRIS
- Support often needs to forward my questions to a specialist--consider directing more easily to a specialist so I don't have to wait (option for "do you need a specialist?")
Ascentis was very difficult for me to use at first. I came from a similar sized company of 118 people, which used Bamboo HR for HRIS and recruiting and outsourced timekeeping and payroll to other, less robust platforms. The company had just purchased Ascentis a few months earlier and the owner/decision maker for the purchase had left before the system was fully established. This caused me a large amount of pain and it took a while for me to be sold on the product. I was convinced for months that we had over-bought for our company needs. Once I was able to fully integrate all the pieces of the system, I was overjoyed with it. Perhaps when you have a client going through this type of turnover issue in HR, it might be good to have a team member specifically assigned to contact them weekly. I appreciate the online forum and training options, but because of the background of the role and how many people I was expected to hire at the time, I really had to learn by making mistakes on the fly. It was a struggle getting started for me.
Great value for money
- Responses to queries are very quick and efficient.
- The process of transitioning to Ascentis was very smooth.
- Everyone I have dealt with is very friendly and willing to help.
- We did have some issues with delivery with FedEx and Ascentis was unable to assist
- Crossover from one department to another (HR & Payroll) sometimes can be challenging.
- There are so many reports to choose from in the time and attendance system (Novatime) and it is sometimes hard to know which is the correct one to use.
The dedicated user
- The customer service is exceptional; I rely heavily on their expertise.
- The automated/roll-over features are easy to setup.
- The way the systems talk to each other is helpful and easy.
- The tax portion could be a little more smooth. I find that I have to do more work than I would expect to have to do with no explanation/understanding of what to do.
- I would prefer more reminders of upcoming dates and deadlines.
- There seem to be issues within payroll when trying to end/change certain benefits and I feel the need to double-check everything with payroll and that adds considerable time to the process.
Ascentis--Adequate
- The platform is fairly straightforward for users
- The platform is pretty comprehensive in its functionality
- The dashboards are convenient for managers and admins
- Their platform seems to integrate multiple sub-packages (e.g., NovaTime), which can be confusing and frustrating for admins, requiring multiple passwords and log-ins to access things like payroll and the back-end administration
- There are gaps between the actual functionality versus what we were told the system was capable of doing when we purchased it
My Ascentis Review
- Electronic EE filing system
- Functionality
- Support is always self directed to Ascentis Community
- Constant outages and no accountability across the board
- Not able to keep up with CA compliance in terms of meal-break penalties and final pay requirements.
- Ad Hoc Reporting feature is extremely antiquated
- Payroll consulting, should add this
Employee Friend HRIS!
- Ascentis is continuously making updates. They listen to the customer's needs and react accordingly.
- The response time when needing customer support is very timely.
- I sometimes struggle to locate help through their Communities. I'm fairly new, so it could be the way I'm entering my searches.
- Customer Service
- Intuitive
- Broad Suite of Products
- Too many steps to get to what you need to get to (Home/My Self/Settings/My Team...) you need a roadmap to figure out where you need to go to get what you need (particularly within ESS)
- The app needs some polishing, but seems to be getting better. I'd like to be able to pick and choose what is on my home page (for example TIME OFF is listed and I don't want it there, I want employees to go and see their PTO balance using the menu, so it confuses employees when TIME OFF shows on the home page)
- Password resets and really difficult when you can't sign in to the app.
Also, PLEASE improve the process to post company documents on the home page of ESS.
A product that helps manage time efficiently
- Ease of use
- Cost
Ascentis has helped us help ourselves!
- Easy to use software. I have had several new HR employees comment on how easy the system is to learn!
- Problem Solving- Ascentis is always problem solving! When we were in the process of selecting a new payroll company, we needed unemployment claims management assistance for our locations, something Ascentis did not currently offer. The sales rep went out of his way to find a unemployment claims management company that would work with Ascentis and us. That company has helped us keep an 80% win rate for our claims!
- User conference- Engage is an awesome way to learn more about the products Ascentis has available as well and meet up with the staff you work with every day!
- Web access- while web access is great for companies that have one parent location and many sub-locations, or for my HR staff that only has access to one location, but for me, as a manager of all locations, using the web just isn't useful. I have to log in to each location separately, which I can use the old java version to access them all at once. I can't wait for the web version to be used with one logon!
- HR system- multiple locations. I have to run reports one location at a time when I need them. The ability to pull a report or even copy a report into all HR databases would be helpful. Currently, I have to create the report in all databases when I need it.
- Support- the past year or so I've noticed longer than normal hold times to get ahold of support. It's frustrating because when I'm able to make a call to support in the afternoon hours of pacific time, I'm on hold for 20-30 minutes sometimes. There needs to be more support reps on for calls until 5pm pacific time.
Some good, some not-so-good.
- Payroll process with direct deposit, taxes, EE withholding
- Self service website, though it's not perfect
- Customer service is usually very helpful and resourceful
- Web based HR is still missing a LOT of functions. No point in going there yet.
- The communication between HR and Payroll systems is bad. Hoping for a resolution of problems once HR is fully online.
- Payroll works well on desktop. But the online system is not very useful yet.