Stromberg Products

Stromberg Success Stories » Hudson News Group

Industry: Specialty Retail
Employees: 4,500
Interface: Ultimate Software

Hudson knew how to capture an audience. Stromberg helped them capture time and attendance data as well.

Hudson Group, owner and operator of all those Hudson News newsstands, understands what travelers are looking for. That's why their retail division operates more than 500 newsstands, cafés, bookstores, and specialty retail outlets at airports and transportation terminals across North America. These stores also offer books, newspapers, magazines, gifts, beverages, film, batteries, health and beauty aids, plus traveler convenience items such as tobacco products, snacks, candy, and regional apparel.

Formed in 1918 as the Bayonne News Group, the parent company Hudson News is also one of North America's largest wholesalers of periodicals and books. Its expertise in media-based wholesaling and retailing and a diverse product line put Hudson consistently ahead of its competitors. But with 4,500 employees filling out time cards by hand, the company was somewhat behind the times in collecting and managing accurate payroll data.

Challenge: Tracking employee time in a high-security environment

Before Stromberg came on board, Hudson Group tracked employee hours the old-fashioned way: with manual time clocks and paper time sheets. Not only was this inefficient, but the margin for error was unacceptable due to the number of hands that touched time and attendance data.

After paper time cards were submitted, supervisors counted and recorded employee hours and reported them via phone to regional management. "We had no payroll reports," notes Fehmi Malik, Director of Employee Relations at Hudson, "and management sometimes had trouble getting their arms around what the time records were telling us."

"Our old process was time-consuming. We were getting too many payroll processing errors, and we didn't have an adequate audit trail of when employees were clocking in," says Rick Yockelson, VP of People and Administration, Hudson Group. "We wanted an automated system that could report the data we needed to help us make better decisions." Time card abuse, such as buddy-punching, was also a factor in considering an automated time collection system.

In addition to the inefficiencies and inaccuracies of a paper-based system, most of Hudson's retail stores were also impacted by new security measures put in place after 9-11. This became an issue when Stromberg looked into installing an Ethernet-based time and attendance system in Hudson's high-security locations.

Solution: Stromberg biometric time clocks

After assessing three other time and attendance vendors over three months, Hudson Group chose Stromberg because of its economical price and state-of-the-art biometric time clocks.

Biometric clocks are a virtually foolproof way to capture and record employee time. Employees simply log in with a PIN number, place a finger on the glass, and the system verifies the employee's identity while logging the check-in date and time. The device is used to record all employee comings and goings, including lunch breaks and check-out.

For Hudson, the benefits of an automated system included:

  • More accurate payroll data.
  • Less time spent entering, processing, and communicating data.
  • Better management decisions based on reports and trends.
  • No more buddy-punching.
  • Higher security.
  • Reduced time theft.

Stromberg's modem-based system: Ideal for a restricted environment

The biggest obstacle that Hudson faced was finding an automated system that would adhere to the strict security regulations inherent in transportation facilities. As system planning started, Hudson and Stromberg discovered that getting Ethernet lines into such facilities was an extremely difficult task.

Fortunately, Stromberg offered a modem-based time and attendance system that could solve the problem. With a modem-based system, data is not transmitted in real-time as it would be with an Ethernet-based solution. Rather, Stromberg polls Hudson's modem clocks three times a day during the week, and Hudson's Technical Support team polls them on the weekends.

Airport administrators and Port Authority security can impose lengthy approval cycles and different requirements for any implementation. "If Stromberg can work for us in this restricted environment, they can work for anyone," claims Yockelson. "Stromberg went above and beyond to support us and test the system at various locations before going live company-wide."

To accommodate security workarounds, the Hudson implementation took longer than usual. But today, Hudson Group is Stromberg's largest and most successful modem-based biometric client nationwide.

For the first time ever: Management reports

With the old manual system, Hudson management could work with only one piece of information: total hours. With Stromberg's new automated system, managers can now run a host of reports that enable them to determine how and where labor dollars are being spent.

"It used to be that the regional manager had to collect hours from store supervisors," notes Malik. "Now regional managers can just run a report. It's a much easier process and saves a lot of time."

Hudson is making good use of Stromberg's reporting capabilities to help them make better decisions. The company most often uses reports that provide total hours, approaching overtime, time card history, and exception history. "We're also using the attendance calendar to view trends and plan ahead," adds Malik.

A notable Return On Investment (ROI)

The Operations staff at Hudson Group has measured productivity gains rather than dollar savings with the Stromberg system. However, Stromberg's estimates of ROI for Hudson are impressive.* Based on an estimated staff of 4,500 employees:

  • Clerical and supervisory time: 90% time reduction.
  • Elimination of human errors in calculation and transposition (1 to 8 percent per payroll period): $15,000 per week.
  • Recovery of lost time due to inaccurate time sheet accounting: $6,375 per week.

The true savings become clearer when annual numbers are examined. Stromberg estimates that Hudson Group could save nearly $1.5 million per year by using Stromberg's automated time and attendance system.

* For a detailed cost justification worksheet, contact Stromberg.

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