Item: UKG Workforce Central (discontinued)
Rating: 8
Author: Gretchen Taylor

Use Cases and Deployment Scope

It is being used across the entire organization for HR and payroll. We've also started using it for hiring and talent tracking. All new hires and employees are in the system whether just for their personal timekeeping, HR and payroll or as a manager over one of more of those areas, and hiring managers are in there approving new hires and starting that process as well.

Pros and Cons

Flow between HR onboarding and payroll.
Ease of use and access by employees for their own information.
Keeps payroll processing up to date for changing laws.

Timekeeping while detailed can be clunky and approval processes are somewhat limited.
Support is very hit and miss where sometimes you get an answer and a knowledgeable person and sometimes not.
Actually submitting ACA reporting to the IRS like other payroll providers do instead of requiring clients to upload it themselves directly.

Most Important Features

One product with one login (not separate for HR, timekeeping and payroll nor manager and employee log-ins).
Ease of use for our employees to access and update their own information - eliminating paper.
Allocation of payroll expenses among multiple categories automatically within the system.

Return on Investment

Freed up HR and Payroll with less manual work.
Better reporting overall.
Some loss on control over approvals and timesheets where the system is somewhat limited in approvals with multiple managers - still working to resolve this.

Alternatives Considered

ADP Workforce Now

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.

Key Insights

Do you think UKG Workforce Central (discontinued) delivers good value for the price?

Not sure

Are you happy with UKG Workforce Central (discontinued)'s feature set?

Yes

Did UKG Workforce Central (discontinued) live up to sales and marketing promises?

Did implementation of UKG Workforce Central (discontinued) go as expected?

Would you buy UKG Workforce Central (discontinued) again?

Yes

Other Software Used

Sage Intacct

Likelihood to Recommend

This product was marketed to us as a school and several schools in our area use the program. However, the implementation team we were set-up with had limited school experience and we are still working on the best way to do some of the timekeeping issues where I know that could have been handled better. That being said from a payroll and reporting side it has been great to capture so much data (at times almost too much) and have the system do automatic allocations of salaries and general ledger reports. The reporting takes some getting used to, but overall I've been able to run reports to see and track just about anything I want. Our employees also love the self service compared to our previous products where they can make W4, direct deposit and other updates on their own without having to get HR involved.

Support Rating

Because it is hit or miss. Occasionally I'll have an issue that my implementation team couldn't resolve that support resolves very quickly and then I'll have some support cases that stay open for days with minimal communication and get assigned to people that have to keep looking and looking and eventually transfer the case to get an answer.

UKG Workforce Central (discontinued) Customer Support Pros and Cons

Pros	Cons
Good followup Problems get solved Support understands my problem	Not kept informed Escalation required Difficult to get immediate help Support doesn't seem to care Slow Initial Response

Premium Support

We did not. I actually have not heard of premium support to know that was even an option. Based on the cost we may or may not have gone with it. Especially for the first year while still working out the kinks it would have been great to know there even was such a thing.

Bug Resolution

Yes - Issues like bugs where the system starts working improperly have generally been handled pretty quickly and the message boards allow you to know they have been reported so you don't always have to report (though the message board notifications can get overwhelming at times). I am surprised my the number of small issues that crop up where there is system latency and servers or things in the background need to be rebooted or something.

Exceptional Examples of UKG Workforce Central (discontinued) Support

Other than support being able to answer questions that my implementation team couldn't on more than one occasion there has not been any exceptional support. To me that is more a reflection on the inadequacy of the implementation team rather than a highlight on support. Now I've definitely seen worse support with other products, but I've also seen better.

UKG for Education - implementation warning

Overall Satisfaction with UKG Workforce Central (formerly Kronos Workforce Central)