The back office function at Ampersand used a 100% paper-based approach to timesheets which required staff to manually copy-key information into the payroll system. This made the entire payroll process slow and a little unreliable for contractors. The agency felt it needed to simplify the submission and approval steps for contractors and clients.

There were some specific issues with accuracy and untimely payroll. Both of these were directly related to the manual timesheet process. Copy-keying often introduces inaccuracies and manual processing is by nature slow. Growing the business would also grow these problems; Ampersand decided it needed a solution that would allow it to increase the number of contractors with ease.

The requirement was for a dedicated timesheet solution unbundled from any extras such as a payroll package. The agency already possessed excellent payroll capability through use of the Xero accounting package. It simply needed an online timesheet solution with the ability to integrate with the company’s existing front and back end systems.

Ampersand identified ETZ as a possible solution after locating it on the partners section of the Xero website. ETZ demonstrated a perfect understanding of Ampersand’s needs and was able to convincingly show how ETZ meets them.

ETZ fully integrates with the systems that Ampersand already has in place without competing or conflicting. It proved competitive on price and quick to set up and was the only true timesheet system evaluated that was efficient and effective.

With ETZ the workflow now sees all timesheets electronically submitted. Once the approval process is complete payroll information is uploaded directly into Xero payroll as a draft. This means payroll now takes minutes rather than hours. Also contractor invoicing is now done through ETZ directly from the system, and the sales information sent to Xero.

ETZ was selected because it was the best solution for Ampersand. ETZ helps streamline Ampersand’s operations. The software supplements and strengthens the other systems allowing the business to bring together the best solutions in the marketplace to support back office operations.

The use of ETZ results in a much faster and reliable payroll process. Contractors and clients now have a much easier way of submitting and approving timesheets. One of the key outcomes of using ETZ is that the time allocated for payroll has reduced from approximately one day to one hour.

The agency’s staff have adapted to ETZ extremely well and make extensive use of the full ETZ feature set, including reporting. All clients have adapted well to ETZ, except where clients have an existing timesheet system in place that Ampersand is obliged to use.

One of the great strengths Ampersand identifies is that once set up and fully integrated with other systems, ETZ is very user friendly. The learning curve is not steep as the application is simple to master. Ampersand has found it to be very scalable, in the sense that one person is able to run a significant number of contractors.

Ampersand reports 100% satisfaction with ETZ. It perceives ETZ as the online timesheets solution leader and it allows customers to work with all the best SaaS recruitment platforms in the marketplace.

It also believes ETZ provides SME recruiters with the opportunity to have the best in back office systems. Ampersand finds the solution enables the contractor payroll to be managed with ease and provides a source of competitive advantage.