Products

Success Stories » Universal Leaf

Industry: Manufacturing
Employees: 3,000
Interface: Custom

Universal Leaf knew their time and attendance tracking system was out-of-date.

Stromberg showed them what was possible.

Universal Corporation is the one if the world’s leading leaf tobacco merchants and processors, based on volumes handled by its subsidiaries and affiliates. Their domestic unit, Universal Leaf North America, is headquartered in Richmond, Virginia, and specializes in selecting, buying, shipping, processing, packing, storing, and financing leaf tobacco in the United States for resale to manufacturers of tobacco products.

Challenge: Obsolete time and attendance tracking.

Universal Leaf used an outdated time and attendance tracking system that was decentralized and inefficient. A turnstile entry system counted the company’s 3,000 employees as they entered processing plants. The system collected no data about workers and was a security risk.

Initially, the company aimed only at tackling their time and attendance needs. “We made a lot of manual timesheet adjustments and it was a very cumbersome process,” says Chris Palmateer, VP of Operations Analysis. “Universal Leaf had bastardized the old system so that none of the facilities really looked the same. We needed standardization and better reporting.”

Solution: Better data collection and improved security.

Universal Leaf chose Stromberg’s Enterprise system to replace their antiquated time tracking method. Stromberg installed new barcode time clock terminals and new, system-wide software.

Universal Leaf noticed the benefits immediately. With Enterprise software, Universal Leaf was able to modernize their time and attendance reporting, increase their accounting efficiencies, and intensify their security features — all with a single Stromberg solution.

The scaleable nature of the Enterprise system enables organizations such as Universal Leaf to cost-effectively manage and optimize time and labor resources. The system can be easily configured to automatically apply payroll and human resource policies and report exceptions. Enterprise provides managers with the real-time and historical labor cost information needed to dramatically reduce labor costs.

Detailed reports and better departmental accounting

The reports generated by the Stromberg’s Enterprise system helped Universal Leaf forecast into the future and reduce employee overlap, which was taking place in all of the labor-intensive processing jobs.

For the first time, Universal Leaf was able to track labor hours by activity codes. “We’ve been able to divide our departments into sections and assign them activity codes,” explains Palmateer. “We’ve assigned certain employees to each activity and have been able to track labor hours down to a departmental level each day. We’re now headed in an activity-based direction.”

Improved security and more detailed data collection

By modifying the existing turnstile entry system, Universal Leaf was able to collect profiling data to control access to certain restricted areas. The Stromberg system provided security for individual employees and detailed, system-wide counts for managers and supervisors.

Copyright 2007 Stromberg. All Rights Reserved.