The Arc saves hours on payroll and thousands on labor with Deputy

The Arc, Oneida-Lewis Chapter is a non-profit human services organization supporting 1400 people with developmental disabilities. Since it was founded in 1954, the agency has worked to carry out its mission that all persons with disabilities live as fully included members of their community.

Arc, Oneida-Lewis CFO Vin Vetere has been with the organization his whole career. For the past 38 years, he’s watched the agency grow to 50 sites and evolve to add departments and services like HR, Finance, Transportation, Care, and Clinical Support.

Their largest department, Residential Services, offers 24/7 residential support in all areas of daily living, including staffing for 35 residences. The Arc also provides habilitation/training programs and employment services in their community, allowing people to find and maintain competitive employment or get support with daily living skills.

With a consistently growing team across all the resources they offer, it became difficult to manage payroll and scheduling. And each department having unique schedules, payroll, and compliance operations made it even more challenging.

First, one of their former payroll systems couldn’t help them control payroll costs. “Payroll is our number one expense as a human services organization. So it's imperative for any manager to be able to manage their payroll and employees,” says Vin.

In addition, the older system couldn’t support the complexity of how The Arc’s organization runs. For example, the volume of programs, cost centers, and payroll codes needed to be incorporated into their payroll system.

“The old system wasn’t the answer for us. In short, it wasn’t flexible enough to meet our needs,” says Vin. Adding to the complexity, The Arc receives funding from various sources, which made it more complicated to manage payroll with their previous system.

On top of that, they used a separate system to manage scheduling that required a lot of time and manual effort.

Vin shares what the process used to be like: “First, we were on a manual system with Excel. It added up our hours and paid time leave but that was the extent of it. Then, we would have to download the hours from Excel then upload it into our previous system. So, it was a very cumbersome process.”

Around four years ago, The Arc began looking for a new system and drafted an RFP. They put it out to five different vendors, but they all didn’t fit the bill. Then, a rep from ADP recommended Deputy.

“ADP brought Deputy to the table and from day one, we were very impressed with the flexibility of the system. Number one was the ease of use. Number two was the flexibility to support what we have to accommodate in terms of financial reporting and costing out of hours depending upon the job you have in this agency.” says Vin.

Saved time and controlled labor costs

Vin shares that for the first time in 30 years, his team can control labor costs by comparing scheduled hours to actual hours worked. “We can tell the manager: ‘the data tells us your schedule calls for 300 hours, but you’re staffing for 330 hours. A difference of 10% is significant, so having that real-time information increases accuracy and accountability across the board.”

Due to staffing obstacles in the labor market, The Arc has been short a clerk on their payroll team. However, because Deputy allows the payroll manager to save time and increase efficiency, it has been vital to keeping the operation running smoothly.

“It’s been a time saver for our payroll manager and allows her to do other essential functions. Meanwhile, we’re saving on one-half of a full-time payroll employee. That is about an $18,000 annual savings, which is a nice benefit while we work to become fully staffed.”

Since using Deputy, the Payroll Manager has time to check on items before the processing deadline rather than after the fact. This helps reduce the number of paychecks their team has to issue outside the payroll process – which saves them 2 hours a week and sums up to $3,000 on saved time annually.

Flexible scheduling for every department and team

Each of The Arc’s 35 residences has its own schedule based on the specific support residents need. For example, some people need 24/7 supervision while others don’t. So, they accommodate separate staffing plans as needed. With Deputy, they can easily create 35 different schedules for each residence.

“We were able to mimic exactly what our staffing plans are.” Now, their team can go in, download the schedules, and copy them week after week to be able to schedule people according to their staffing plan. “It’s very efficient and very accommodating to our needs,” says Vin.

The Arc, Oneida-Lewis Chapter also owns businesses that operate as social enterprises to provide employment opportunities for the people they support. One partner is a local brewery they contract with to package a variety of beverages throughout the year.

“We market ourselves as a labor force in the community. We provide 25 employment opportunities for people and monitor hours of labor and sales in Deputy.”

Seamless integrations, efficient payroll, and easy reporting

Since Deputy has an integration with ADP, The Arc’s team can easily manage payroll with a couple of keystrokes. This enables their payroll manager to not only save time, but make better use of her hours.

“She’s checking and analyzing and while making sure everybody’s timesheet is accounted for and in our system. So, the time is not only saved but better spent.”

The Arc does most of its reporting through Deputy. Vin shares that the reporting function has been very user-friendly. “I’m able to teach myself to an extent because it’s so easy. It’s always very intuitive to figure out what fields you’re pulling from, what fields you need, and how to report on that.”

Stronger morale and accountability

One of the biggest impacts The Arc has experienced from using Deputy is stronger morale and accountability.

“The Deputy payoff is we have more efficient workflows, and better-equipped managers, leading to a more accountable team.”

Payroll is also more accurate, which has decreased the number of employees needing assistance with paychecks and helped keep morale up.

Deputy’s app allows their team to solve issues and have stronger communication. “In Deputy, managers are dealing with every situation directly and communicate better, which ultimately leads to better trust. If employees know what to expect sooner rather than later, they’re more apt to buy into your agency,” says Vin.

Overall, Vin and his team have been very pleased with their experience. And Vin can see that carrying over in the years to come.