If you're into Logistics you might find some good stuff presented by Malysa O'Connor from Kronos in this live webinar Wednesday Sept 22 at 2pm EDT on this topic. Looks pretty good. Check out the announcement I found and sign up.
There is an old joke about a salesperson, an engineer, and a factory worker all showing up at a photocopier at the same time. Each argues that since their job is the most important that they should be allowed to go first. The salesperson argues "Nothing happens until someone sells something and no one gets paid if there are no sales". The factory worker responds with his own argument "But you would have nothing to sell if I didn't build it so no one gets paid unless I can get my work done". The engineer then jumps in "But you would have nothing to build unless I designed it so I should go first". At this point, a clerk from payroll walks up to the copier and says "Excuse me... I need to make copies so you all can get paid" and the three immediately step aside and clear a path to the copier.
Regardless of one's business model or employee type, it seems everyone maintains a healthy respect for the machinery and people that actually turn hours logged into paychecks (Okay, direct deposits). When employees earn shift and other premium pay it can take a lot of people or a lot of complex machinery (or both) to get everyone paid on time and correctly. Nowhere is this more evident as when a shop with FLSA, State, local and union pay rules goes from manual time keeping and payroll preparation to a completely automated system.
Although many people talk about their timekeeping and payroll systems as being ‘FLSA and multi-state compliant' what software vendors like Kronos or PeopleSoft really claim to do is help you "minimize the risks... and the administrative overhead associated with regulatory compliance".[i] It can be quite impressive to sit down with payroll staff whilst they go thru time cards and watch them apply all the rules that can possibly apply for a non-exempt, union employee during a pay week/pay period... with PTO... and Detail Pay... and Call-In... on a weekend. It is always equally impressive to me to see one of our configuration gurus develop a combination of shift periods, pay codes and rules in Kronos TimeKeeper that consistently duplicate all this human thinking. Quite often, the attempt at doing all this via a rule based electronic system exposes errors or at least inconsistencies in the existing manual process. More noteworthy, however, is the fact that cleaning up and automating your timekeeping processes more often than not can still leave you exposed to FLSA overtime pay rule violations. This is the classic ‘regular rate' vs ‘base rate' definition that every labor attorney loves to cash in on and most time keeping systems love to ignore as ‘not my problem'.
Manually or electronically-if you are merely sending hours and pay codes over to your payroll system you are relying on THEM to calculate the emps regular rate for FLSA mandated overtime pay (1.5x and 2x the FLSA definition of ‘regular rate'). Didn't know there was a difference between FLSA ‘regular rate' and what we typically call ‘base rate'? In simple cases without many pay rate differentials there isn't any effective difference but in the multi-shift, multi-rate, union and public service world it can take an army of people to figure out what rate should be used in overtime calculations. (The army, of course, as with all military personnel have no provision under law for overtime.)
If you are in the process of automating or updating your time keeping and payroll processes I urge you to find out how and where ‘regular rate' is being calculated for FLSA overtime purposes. Quite often I see people on the time keeping side simply throw the hours and the ‘time and a half' pay code over the fence and hope payroll gets it right. It may be, however, more advantageous if not downright necessary to do this rate calculation as part of the time keeping solution and/or the interface depending on payroll's capability. Yes-you very well may find that they have not been calculating overtime properly...for years. You, me, and Hilda both know that doesn't make it right.[ii] It may be painful to fix-requiring a lot more HR and legal involvement-- but I guarantee you will always have a clear path to the photocopier if you make it right!
[i] http://www.kronos.com/AssetInfo.aspx?id=1482
[ii]Hilda Solis is the current Labor Secretary
OK. Per our Kronos Totalizer advisor and occasional blog poster DG, as of 5.2 there is no longer any such thing as a Callable Totalizer Engine. The so-called Callable Totalizer (CT) was an artifact of the Smalltalk implementation of the totalizer in 5.1 and earlier. From 5.2 onwards, all on-the-fly totalization goes through the same (multithreaded) totalizer servlet stuff.
The CT still exists, in the sense that it wraps core totalization with accruals and other secondary computations. That's why it's used by the accruals package as well as WAT. It's a focal point in the logic, rather than a throttling point for performance.
There are also a few errors that appear to be attributed to the CT such a:
- "WTK-032554 Callable Totalizer system error: Could not find item to delete", but this seems to be an Audit trail error rather than the fault of the remnants of the CT.
- In WFC.log "TotalizerProcessingException: Your connection to the Callable Totalizer has been lost. Please refresh your timecard." But this is a time zone error that the totalizer is freaking out about.
I KNOW there is more to say about this stuff. I'd love for you to add your 2 cents to the comments on this one.
Would you like Dramatic Response Time Improvements?
WFC v5.1 and below:
Most Kronites know that this is the routine Workforce Central Timekeeper uses to calculate totals interactively when viewing employees. It invokes the Totalizer just for those employees whose totals have not yet been computed by the Background Processor (not up to date.) It doesn’t do anything with these results except display them on the screen. They are tossed out when done. They don’t update the database. They are just for the users viewing pleasure. Did you know that it’s used also by Group Edits to calculate totals and by Accruals to calculate accrual balances? It’s an important little process.
There are several settings available but the most important one to understand is site.totalizer.number_of_engines. Yep, you read that correctly. One can have multiple Callable Totalizers. Imagine the power! I’ve had success with up to four. To quote the brilliant Kronos docs:
"After the system is running, multiple Callable Totalizers can provide fast totalization requests throughput than a single Callable Totalizer can. Four Callable Totalizers may produce totalization request throughput that is four times as fast!" (emphasis mine)
Give it a try. If you have over 1000 emps I expect your users will notice a significant response time improvement with as few as two, more than 3-4000 emps and I suggest four. Of course your mileage may vary. It depends mostly on how many users are actually working on the system at the same time, not the employee population.”
Watch for some thoughts on the totalizers from 5.2 and newer in a later post!
Reprinted from Improv's TNT written 12/11/08
When you install your Kronos system and launch it for the first time, you may notice the pretty company logo in the upper left area of the logon screen. Whose logo is it? Surprise surprise… it belongs to Kronos! And it probably looks a little like this:
Now, we all love Kronos, that’s why we bought it. But we may want to have our corporate identity and logo (which we happen to think looks pretty sharp!) to be associated with the timekeeping application, rather than that of our beloved vendor. Luckily, swapping the Kronos logo for yours is a simple procedure.
First, find your logo, either from your corporate communications department, or from your corporate website. Edit it so that it is reasonably close to the pixel dimensions 326 x 50. It will help if there is some blue in it, so that it does not clash too much with the blue-toned Kronos sign-on screen. Hey, just because you are a timekeeping system administrator does not mean that you have no sense of aesthetics!
Second, replace the Kronos logo with your own. To do so, follow these steps:
- Copy your desired logo (from step 1 above) to that folder. It can be in GIF, JPG, or even
PNG
format
- Within that folder, locate the file logo64.gif, and rename it to Logo64Kronos.gif
- Rename the file copied in step ‘c’ to logo64.gif. Note: This file does NOT need to be an actual gif-formatted file. Name it logo64.gif anyway. Trust us on this one – the browser will not care.
- Click View-Refresh from your browser, and Voila! Your company logo, or project logo, or timekeeping system branding, or whatever graphic you wish to appear, will appear to your employees when they launch the application.
So what about the tiny Kronos logo in the upper left, after you have logged on and you see the actual application? It looks like this:
The file name is Cornergraphic164*124-2.jpg, and it is in the same folder (see ‘b’ above). It is trickier to manipulate, since it is so small, but the idea is still the same. Replace Cornergraphic164*124-2.jpg with the desired file, and you are good to go.
Article contributed by Myron Oakes. Thank you!
Kronos WFC v6.1 introduced the concept of "Cascading Pay Codes." And actually the logic of cascading pay codes was introduced a few versions back as a part of the Leave module -- the idea had so many possibilities that Kronos incorporated it into the main module of WTK.
What is a cascading pay code?
It is a "dummy" pay code that can be put on a schedule or a timecard that does not make it to the totals. Instead, it will default in an assigned pay code that will drain an accrual balance (like vacation or PTO) before "cascading" to a different pay code to drain a different accrual balance.
Convoluted description, I know. What do you do with it? Well here are two neat ideas that I have talked about with fellow customers who are just starting to creative with them.
1. Use it to schedule PTO.OK, that may not sound like a very creative idea -- kind of what it was built for -- but let me tell you WHY it solves so many problems for you!
If you have earned/accrued time off based on hours worked, like so many healthcare systems do (think "PTO"), you have always struggled in the past on how to let employees schedule PTO out into the future when they haven't worked enough yet to build up their PTO balance. Of course you don't want their PTO balance to go negative, but you also don't want to keep them from scheduling next year's two week long Memorial Day vacation just because they only have 40 hours of PTO right now. So what to do?
In the past, you had two primary choices: Schedule a non-paying pay code that was not associated with their PTO balance as an indicator to your managers to put PTO on their timecard/schedule when the pay period with the vacation finally rolled around, assuming the employee had enough PTO. I like to call that method "double entry." Alternatively, you let them schedule PTO way out in the future, but had to turn off the system check that kept them going negative in their PTO bucket and hope your process checks & balances caught it before it got paid. The "hope & pray" method.
So now with a cascading pay code, you can schedule that cascading pay code out into the future and be confident that when the vacation week rolls around, the employee will either get PTO or not, whichever is appropriate, as the cascading pay code figures out which pay code to apply to the timecard.
2. Encourage exempt swiping policy.
Let's say that you, like many other Kronos customers, have a policy that requires your exempt employees to punch once a day to indicate that they worked that day. Odds are, you generate their daily pay with a shift guarantee or some other similar configuration. And, odds also are, your managers do lots of timecard edits to fix exempt timecards because your exempts don't always remember to punch.
So, one possible solution to encourage compliance is to use cascading pay codes. Here's how:
Create a new cascading pay code called "Exempt Hours" and put it on exempt employee's schedules with 8 hours a day, or whatever is appropriate for that employee. Configure the exempt pay rule such that it will pay from schedule and apply the pay code when the employee doesn't swipe. Configure the new cascading pay code to take hours out of the vacation/PTO bucket. Schedule the new cascading pay code for all exempts.
Now, if an exempt employee "forgets" to swipe, the Kronos system automatically assumes that it must be a vacation day and decrements the vacation balance appropriately. The employee still gets paid consistently (thus helping with DOL compliance for exempts) and they have a little extra motivation to remember to punch. Of course it can always be corrected and changed Regular time, but by defaulting the system to assume vacation, it helps make corrections truly be the exception!
So there are a couple of creative suggestions for using cascading pay codes. I'm sure there are more out there. Have a good one? Put in the comments below!
I'm in a meeting with a local organization the other day and in response to some questions about this topic I say "Check the blog! I'm sure something is there..." So I check this morning and after pulling my foot out of my mouth I realize I have to get something up here. I said, so it has to be!
These configuration options in Kronos Timekeeper / ADP eTime determine how people get PAID and how ATTENDANCE is tracked.
Exceptions are flags that alert Supervisors when
employees work outside of their assigned shifts. Exceptions serve no other function
and they only work with accurate schedules in the system. They appear in the
Timecard Editor, outlined in red. and also on reports. They indicate missed
punches, absences, late punches, and so on.
Rounding rules ensure that pay rules are applied consistently
to a group of employees. (Some think that rounding also makes payroll
processing more efficient because rounded punches are easier to interpret than real-time 
punches. Others believe in not using rounding and pay minute to
minute.)
Rounding is defined using a round and a grace. The round divides an
hour into equal increments of time. The grace is the increment after which
the punch is rounded forward to the next round increment. You can use interval
rounding or punch rounding. Interval rounding rounds the time between an
in-punch and an out-punch. Punch rounding rounds the in-punch and the
out-punch.
One needs to decide how to handle this and it's often buried using different terms in the policy manuals. Don't be stuck by those though, implementation of Kronos is a great time to review what's really best for the organization. So often I find that the lack of understanding of this simple topic leads to inaccurate configuration and sometimes pay. With this in mind, please consider separating, first in your mind,
Pay from Attendance...
Chris Flanders adds a helpful note from a scheduling perspective...
"If you use rounding rules but do not keep your advanced scheduler start & end times on quarter hour increments, the schedule start/end times will OVERRIDE the rounding at the timecard. For example, if an employee is scheduled to start at 7:00am and punches in at 6:55am, the punch will be rounded to 7:00am. But if the scheduled start time is 6:55am just like the punch, the punch won't be rounded! The scheduled start time overrides the rounding rule."
When you are building a schedule for an employee, it is often common that an employee will do multiple things during that period of time while they are working. For example (using hospital schedules), a nurse may spend the morning precepting another employee and the afternoon floating to another unit. Both of those are schedule transfers.
Or a nurse may work a 12-hour shift and then spend the next 12 hours on call. All of these are important to put on the schedule for coverage and tracking purposes.
But when you have a schedule-centric approach, where all the schedule data should also feed Timekeeper to drive payroll, you want to make sure those shifts and segments go in correctly to pay correctly as well as show coverage, etc. correctly.
Kronos Schedules module has shifts and shift segments (which are, intuitively, partial segments of a single shift). What's the best way to put in schedules? Always use separate shifts? Always use a single shift with multiple segments? A mix - and if so, how do you know which to use?
A good rule of thumb is to use a single shift with multiple shift segments when the employee could punch in once at the beginning of the shift and once out at the end.
Use a separate shift if there is some worked time that the employee does not record punches for.
So, in the examples above:
When an employee is precepting (i.e. work rule) for one period of time and then floating for the rest of the shift (i.e. job transfer), then PUT IT ALL IN A SINGLE SHIFT. Employee clocks in at the beginning of the day and out at the end of day and all the transfers are applied for both the schedule and the timecard.
When an employee is working a shift and then goes on call (which implies going home - not punched in), then PUT IT IN TWO SEPARATE SHIFTS. Employee clocks out and goes home and the schedule still shows coverage without trying to link the on call shift back to the first worked shift.
Of course you always want to test every scenario in your test environment to make sure it pays the way you expect, but thinking of it in terms of the simple rule of thumb will help your schedulers know when to use a single shift with multiple segments and when to use multiple shifts.
The introduction of schedules and the org map into Kronos Workforce Central Timekeeper provides an area of opportunity for your time transfers to be handle in a whole new way. (And you all read the previous blog entry on WHY you should do all transfers via the org map with schedules, especially in Kronos Healthcare, right?!)
But just because you want all transfers to happen in a certain way doesn't mean that they always turn out that way. In fact, when it comes to troubleshooting just exactly how employee XYZ ended up with 3.33 hours transferred into cost center 123 can be a challenge.
So here is a quick primer on WHICH TRANSFER WINS when you are looking at schedules and timecards. Let's start with some general guidelines:
- Data flows from the employee's default info to the schedules, to the timecard, and finally to totals.
- Labor Level transfers override Org Map transfers when made in the same location.
- The last transfer in is the one that applies to the totals.
- Percentage Allocation Rules override everything!
Simple enough, right?
Here's another way to look at it. If you have multiple entries below applying to an employee in a pay period, the LAST ONE ON THE LIST is the one that will be reflected in the totals:
- Employee default - Primary job
- Employee default - Home labor account
- Schedule transfer - Job (org map)
- Schedule transfer - Labor Level
- Timecard transfer - Job (org map)
- Timecard transfer - Labor Level
- Percentage Allocation Rule
So if you have your org map mapped to a particular labor level (like a cost center), your managers have multiple places that they can transfer the employee's time into that cost center to affect how those totals look. Troubleshooting that is YOUR PROBLEM, of course, but what YOU CAN DO is set a good process in place so every timecard you look at is not a mishmash of random transfers but one that falls into your standardized approach. Then when you do have to troubleshoot totals and figure out where that transfer came from, it is just an outlier and the exceptions are a little easier to get your hands around and find!
What is the most immediately noticeable feature of a harmonious implementation of Kronos WFC in healthcare?A single point of entry for employee transactional data.
In a perfect world, that single point of entry would have all the functionality of the entire WFC suite and all modules accessible at your fingertips, so you could see whatever you need to see and update whatever needs to be updated. Unfortunately, we don't live in a perfect world and Kronos does not have that cross-modular single point of entry developed (yet!).
Dreaming for a moment of a perfect world, wouldn't it be great if the system had a "screen" (or "view" or "grid" or "Genie" or whatever you want to call it) where you could put in all schedules and manage your staffing AND IN THE SAME PLACE put in all transfers and pay codes AND IN THE SAME PLACE manage punches and exceptions AND IN THE SAME PLACE see totals and accrual balances and attendance events and leave cases? That would be AWESOME!! But of course we all know that "screen" does not exist.
So, in lieu of perfection, we work with what we have. And what Kronos has that provides the most and best selection of functionality is the location schedules in the form of the Schedule Planner. This is the place that you should configure your system and design your business processes to perform most of your system interaction. (It's a "schedule-centric" configuration approach!) In the Schedule Planner, you can manage employee and location schedules, deal with staffing, put in all the transfers and pay codes, see some accruals, and even drive attendance events or see some of the output of the leave module. That's actually quite a bit of the "perfect world" we dreamed above - and probably a lot closer to perfect than you thought was possible.
Next week we are going to look at what you can and should put on the schedule specifically and what functions are best left elsewhere.