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| Payroll Outsourcing |
| Author: | Rich |
| Date: | Thursday, 29th Jan 2009 18:46 |
| Views: | 545 (excluding Digests and RSS feeds) |
| Category: | Other | | URL: | http://web.ukrecruiter.co.uk/forum/Forum/read.php?i=172802 |
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Hi
I would be interested in hearing your views about payroll outsourcing and the good/bad experiences you have encountered.
We started our temps business last Easter and as we were with Lloyds TBS for our permanent factoring, we thought we would try their payroll facility - Cash Friday.
Would now avoid them like the plague, how this, one of the longest payroll facilities is still around I don't know.
The staff are unprofessional, their communication skills are an absolute joke, their credit control is appalling with only chasing invoices once a month, their payroll to temps also needs consideration and all in all, the worse service I have encountered in my 12 years recruitment experience to our business.
At least 70% of our debtor is disapproved as it has gone over 90 days and quite a few invoices have now gone into 120 days, in fact we still have some invoices outstanding since July/ August. My Temps Manager has also recently been involved in assisting in credit control to get the account cleared, we have been trying to close it for the last two months believe it or not. Why should we have to get involved in chasing debts when you pay these companies 4.5% + of your invoice sales.
They only guarantee up to £1000 and do not even chase those debts, we have intervened and sent solicitors letters ourselves but we get a slap on the wrist for doing this but we just want our margin that is due, rather than having the account in red due to poor credit control.
Clients complain that they don't receive copy of timesheets or even invoices.
Andre, Client Manager needs to be retrained in his job or at least in customer service, as his manner is a joke.
Overall rating 2/10
Credit control 1/10
Flexibility 2/10
Customer service 1/10
We then decided to use New Millennia, what a breath of fresh air (and no I don't work for them).
Customer service is great, they insure against all invoices so no surprise to your margin or any bad debts, the credit control is second to none, our clients have paid their invoices to these before Cash Friday, even though these are newer invoices and they are flexible, well in most situations. We have had a few matters to resolve but they always do their best.
One downside is there is more paperwork involved for the Client and Temp, and clients don't always pass the credit checks etc but then they are here to protect their business and ours against bad debt, no nasty surprises in your margin and margin is paid on time every week. They can accept credit cards if clients fail credit checks.
They operate very different, you invoice NM for your margin and pay VAT that way, CF you don't invoice and they keep your VAT reserve until its due, nasty shock today as was expecting our VAT reserve, told by CF - its gone into your availability but thats already a shocking minus due to lack of credit control, so you can't win.
NM provides timesheets in your logo, CF don't so another cost saving there.
Overall rating 9/10
Credit control 9/10
Flexibility 8/10
Customer service 9/10
We approached Cash SImply (Tom is bound to comment here :) ), they were friendly enough and would consider their services in the future, we were going to meet them to discuss the perms facility with them but decided to continue with Lloyds TSB for perms, as they actually hadn't done anything wrong and this side of the service was fine.
Cash SImply offer similar product to Lloyds, or so I believe (up to £1000 limit etc) and am sure Tom will have his input on this, while we were keen to take it further, we were also hesitant about this limit due to the experience with CF and not collecting payments up to this amount, bearing in mind they can disapprove at any time.
Are there any others out there, you may wish to comment on, perhaps you have had good experience with CF but its important to share our experience with others, especially if you are looking at a facility in this current climate.
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| Reply To This Thread |
| Re: Payroll Outsourcing |
| Author: | Tom Atkinson |
| Date: | Friday, 30th Jan 2009 10:14 |
| Views: | 38 (excluding Digests and RSS feeds) |
| Category: | Other | | URL: | http://web.ukrecruiter.co.uk/forum/Forum/read.php?i=172802 |
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Hi Rich,
Delighted to learn that you are happy with the service you are getting and I hope it stays that way.
Sorry to learn you were unhappy with Lloyds. I confess I could not push them in the direction I wanted to go but of course they are relatively finacially stable.
Glad you are not with NEW MILLENNIA CONTRACTS LIMITED which went bust a couple of years ago.
If you are happy to give your clients to a company that invoices them in its name, effectively making you their sales agent, then I can do no more than wish you well. You will need to explain this if and when you want to sell your business in the future.
You are correct that the product we offer is simliar to CashFriday in that we work for the agency rather than them working for us. There I like to think similarities diverge.
From your info it seems that things have improved at NM since Sue Little did battle with them . I hope it stays that way for you. If it doesn't then please don't hesitate to give me a call.
Have a great 2009. Tom.
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| Reply To This Thread |
| Re: Payroll Outsourcing |
| Author: | Rich |
| Date: | Friday, 30th Jan 2009 10:37 |
| Views: | 33 (excluding Digests and RSS feeds) |
| Category: | Other | | URL: | http://web.ukrecruiter.co.uk/forum/Forum/read.php?i=172802 |
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Thanks for the comment Tom.
I understand NM do invoice in their name but its still part of our turnover at the end of the day and we can account for this on reporting.
I am open to give Cash Simply a go in the future but with the bad experience we encountered with Lloyds for the limit of £1000, in this current climate we are best having the whole payroll guaranteed, which I am sure you will agree.
Imagine if we had 10 clients all less than £1,000, that could mount up to £10,000 not guaranteed and it just seems CF were not interested in chasing anything under this amount. |
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| Reply To This Thread |
| Re: Payroll Outsourcing |
| Author: | Factoring Solutions |
| Date: | Friday, 30th Jan 2009 13:37 |
| Views: | 37 (excluding Digests and RSS feeds) |
| Category: | Other | | URL: | http://web.ukrecruiter.co.uk/forum/Forum/read.php?i=172802 |
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<<<<< Glad you are not with NEW MILLENNIA CONTRACTS LIMITED which went bust a couple of years ago >>>>>
I never recommend using payroll companies like New Millenia for the simple reason that they obtain their funding by factoring the invoices and if the factoring company starts withholding too much of their funding due perhaps to problems with another of their clients it could reflect adversely on you who are an innocent party.
A company search on New Millenia will probably reveal that there is a debenture over their assets in favour of Bibby who are their factoring company and therefore indirectly yours too and it never ceases to amaze me why people don't just cut out the middleman and go straight to Bibby for the funding as it's far more secure |
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| Reply To This Thread |
| Re: Payroll Outsourcing |
| Author: | Rich |
| Date: | Friday, 30th Jan 2009 13:44 |
| Views: | 30 (excluding Digests and RSS feeds) |
| Category: | Other | | URL: | http://web.ukrecruiter.co.uk/forum/Forum/read.php?i=172802 |
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Well I didn't realise BIbby did payroll outsourcing, for one they would probably want all of our factoring, rather than just one part and the other well I wouldn't touch them for permanent as we encountered a very bad service with them a few years ago and it resulted in terminating our agreement before it even started. |
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| Reply To This Thread |
| Re: Payroll Outsourcing |
| Author: | MarkByrne |
| Date: | Friday, 30th Jan 2009 17:14 |
| Views: | 37 (excluding Digests and RSS feeds) |
| Category: | Other | | URL: | http://web.ukrecruiter.co.uk/forum/Forum/read.php?i=172802 |
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Hi all
I would like to point out that there are others in the market apart from the names mentioned here so far. I run an independent factoring company (Calverton Factors) and we have set up a specialist recruitment division which manages payrolls as well as providing ’standard’ factoring facilities. It is a market that we looking to grow and are keen for new clients. We set up because there are so few players in the market and it is dominated by CashFriday who seem to regularly get fairly bad press. We pride ourselves on our high services levels and can hopefully add to the few quality players out there.
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| Reply To This Thread |
| Re: Payroll Outsourcing |
| Author: | Rich |
| Date: | Friday, 30th Jan 2009 17:22 |
| Views: | 28 (excluding Digests and RSS feeds) |
| Category: | Other | | URL: | http://web.ukrecruiter.co.uk/forum/Forum/read.php?i=172802 |
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Thanks for the reply Mark, will check out your website.
It's quite funny actually, as the Sales Manager from CF tried to keep us with the account, in fact we wanted to split our company in to two companies for Temps and Perms, but keep our same agreements. CF told us we could only do this providing we stayed with them, we declined and have put our split on hold due to the current market and finding a suitable all round service provider.
He praised himself on being the market leader and if I took an hour out of my time to meet him, he could show me how good they are, surely I know already after using them for 9 months, what difference would a meeting make, when proof is already in the pudding!!
Needless to say, after this his communicaton became a joke afterwards, few voicemails and emails never returned my calls, so decided to terminate it after all.
If things were different, say 12 months ago, they would be knocking down my door to keep the business but now the banks really don't care about good service, after all they can ask Gordon Brown if they need more cash. |
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| Reply To This Thread |
| Re: Payroll Outsourcing |
| Author: | Jean |
| Date: | Thursday, 5th Feb 2009 08:56 |
| Views: | 35 (excluding Digests and RSS feeds) |
| Category: | Other | | URL: | http://web.ukrecruiter.co.uk/forum/Forum/read.php?i=172802 |
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I launched our temp service last month and have been working with Cash Simply (on recommendation) for the last three weeks and I am absolutley delighted thus far.
The admin processes are superb, invoices go out with our logo and we are promptly paid weekly by BACS for our margin. Payroll is smooth and accurate.
The level of customer care is superb - never have I dealt with a company that has offered a high standard of customer care - nothing is too much trouble.
To date they're my 'Supplier of the Year' - highly recommended.
If anyone wishes to discuss further please feel free to call me on 07946417930
Jean Fenwick
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| Reply To This Thread |
| Re: Payroll Outsourcing |
| Author: | Rich |
| Date: | Saturday, 7th Feb 2009 11:11 |
| Views: | 42 (excluding Digests and RSS feeds) |
| Category: | Other | | URL: | http://web.ukrecruiter.co.uk/forum/Forum/read.php?i=172802 |
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Thanks for the recommendation Jean.
An update, so contacted Bibby Factors on Monday, received their brochure via email the same day, replied with my estimated turnover, current providers etc etc.
Didn't hear anything, prompted them again on thursday, informing the sender - that was anyone going to contact me to discuss further. Received an email back saying someone will be in touch, still not heard anything......
Not very proactive in my opinion, in the past you register on a factors website or broker, and they contact you the same day to discuss possible deals. 5 days later, I still haven't had contact with anyone except an Admin person who sent the brochure.
So not another good start with them, think I will probably pass......
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| Reply To This Thread |
| Re: Payroll Outsourcing |
| Author: | Factoring Solutions |
| Date: | Monday, 9th Feb 2009 14:33 |
| Views: | 40 (excluding Digests and RSS feeds) |
| Category: | Other | | URL: | http://web.ukrecruiter.co.uk/forum/Forum/read.php?i=172802 |
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Bibby have a centralised marketing department that covers all of their branches ( not very well by the sound of it )
Recruitment companies tend to be handled out of their Leicester office and if you contact David Webb their head of sales on 07768 318523 I can assure you that he will return your call as he is as efficient as the sales desk is dopey |
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