Item: UKG Ready
Rating: 9
Author: Tony Tucker

Support Rating

In general Kronos customer service is great. The response time is minimal for critical issues. The staff is knowledgeable about the product and can usually resolve the issue quickly.

Use Cases and Deployment Scope

Kronos Workforce Ready is being used across our organization. It is currently used for payroll and HR. We have plans to implement time and attendance, scheduling, applicant tracking and accruals within the next 12 months. It has made ACA tracking and reporting very manageable and this year our benefits open enrollment was completely paperless. Our employees utilize the self service feature and no longer receive paper pay stubs.

Pros and Cons

Payroll processing. Gives you control of the entire process or you can contract out functions like check printing, tax filing, or direct deposit if you do not want to handle about them.
Reporting - most users can create their own custom reports without assistance from IT.
The employee self service features are awesome.
Kronos keeps the product current with quarterly releases of new features and functionality

It is a SAAS product (which has its pros and cons) so you do have to deal with the fact that you do not have complete access to your database as you would with an on-premise system. As an IT guy I like to dig through the database and create some pretty complex reports.
Updates and patches are performed on Kronos' schedule not necessary yours.

Return on Investment

Increased payroll efficiency and reduced payroll errors.
Reduced the use of IT resource in supporting the software, hardware and upgrades.
Utilizing self service for benefit open enrollment has made the process more efficient.

Alternatives Considered

We evaluated Ceridian HCM Dayforce prior to implementing Kronos. In fact we were a Ceridian customer.
The cost of the implementation was almost five times the cost for Kronos. We believed at the time of evaluation and it has proven true that Kronos is more innovative and keeps their product more current than Ceridian. The customer service is superior to anything we experienced with Ceridian.

Key Differentiators

Price
Product Features
Vendor Reputation
Existing Relationship with the Vendor

The professional services hours are charged at a flat fee for the implementation. That alone saved us tens of thousands of dollars. That made our initial investment smaller and our ROI much greater. This fact alone allows smaller companies who otherwise could not afford to invest in the product to purchase it.

Likelihood to Recommend

Workforce ready was well suited for us. We were looking at Kronos Workforce Central but the implementation cost was prohibitive and the time frame was rather long. Workforce Ready can be implemented in about 90 days and the cost is very reasonable. The initial investment is minimal. For small to mid size companies who may not have a dedicated IT staff the product is well suited. It's web based so you can access it from anywhere you have internet access.

It may be less appropriate for larger companies as the product is designed for the small to midsize market.

Products Replaced

Yes - Ceridian Source 500 HR and Payroll. Ceridian's product was dated and scheduled for sunset (no more product updates). We needed a modern software solution that gave us more control of our payroll and more flexibility. Payroll is now processed in-house on our schedule and not the payroll vendor's schedule. It is web based which means it can be accessed almost anywhere.

Evaluation Lessons Learned

If we had to do it again I do not think the selection would be any different. The costs were so different that based on price alone the decision was easy. Add in the fact that our prior experience with Kronos was excellent and it became obvious what the choice should be.

Kronos Workforce Ready is right for small business

Overall Satisfaction with Kronos Workforce Ready