How NightOwl Streamlined Award Interpretation & Payroll

Are you an early bird or a night owl? No matter the time of day, NightOwl has you covered.

NightOwl is a franchised system of retail convenience stores, with 76 locations right across Australia. Originally founded by Don Halliwell and Rod Craig in 1975, the business first began as a single-store in Auchenflower, Brisbane. Known as The NightOwl, the store traded 24/7 and offered an extensive range of traditional grocery items, as well as fresh fruit, vegetables and BBQ chickens. Proving popular, the business was franchised in 1987 and has since grown to be the iconic retail business Australians know and love. 

Before foundU, award interpretation was a manual process that caused a lot of stress for the two employees that managed payroll. Payroll was also inefficient, requiring regular cross-checks to ensure it was accurate and compliant. There was also no visibility of labour costs - which often resulted in unnecessary shifts being rostered.

NightOwl knew they needed a solution that would help them save time on payroll processing, get visibility of their labour costs and enable their business scale. That's where we come in.

Emma Wu, Financial Manager at NightOwl, reports that foundU has been invaluable in helping them track and review costs, while saving them hours each week on processing payroll.

Manual award interpretation and payroll

NightOwl manages a complex payroll of over 500 employees across Australia. Of these, 280 are Queensland-based and managed in the foundU platform.

Before foundU, award interpretation was a manual process that caused a lot of stress for the two employees that managed payroll. Payroll was also inefficient, requiring regular cross-checks to ensure it was accurate and compliant. There was also no visibility of labour costs - which often resulted in unnecessary shifts being rostered.

"Each year, we would obviously have to update our pay rates to ensure they complied with retail award updates," Emma said.

"This was quite a time-consuming process, and was often challenging given the amount of time we typically had to complete it.

"That said, award interpretation was not as regular as the challenges we had with payroll. It was so manual that it required two people to regularly cross-check it to ensure there were no mistakes. This obviously resulted in a lot of time wasted, especially when there were errors that needed to be fixed.

"We also had zero visibility of our labour costs, which meant that we were never as efficient with our rostering as we could have been."

NightOwl knew they needed a solution that would reduce their payroll processing time, while giving them real-time visibility of their labour costs and helping their business scale.

"A previous employee was charged with finding a solution - in the end, we chose foundU because we knew it would help us save time on payroll, set labour budgets and help our business grow."

Optimising costs, streamlining payroll

Since implementing the foundU platform, Emma reports that NightOwl has been able to significantly reduce payroll processing time by increasing accuracy and reducing errors.

"The foundU platform has really given us confidence that our payroll is accurate, and as a business it has enabled us to be much more effective than we have ever been," Emma said.

"Once the awards and agreements were set-up in the foundU system, payroll became automatic and error-free. Data from rosters and staff timesheets flow seamlessly onto payroll, which is great. If we were ever to be audited, we're very confident that we could easily get all the information we need and it would be accurate."

Emma confirms the platform has also enabled them to optimise their costs, especially one of their biggest expenses - labour.

"Being able to set budgets and see labour costs for each store has meant we're able to better track and optimise how much we spend on wages," Emma said.

Emma also says the foundU Clock app has made compliance easy for the business.

"With multiple stores and locations, it can be difficult to clock-in/out times, breaks and hours worked," Emma said.

"With the foundU Clock app in every store, we can ensure that we are accurately tracking time and attendance, paying staff correctly for the hours they've worked and keep our payroll compliant."

Emma also says that the support from the customer success team has enhanced their success with the foundU platform.

"foundU support and the customer success team have been invaluable to us getting the most out of the platform," Emma said.

"Because they are local, we can call or email with the assurance that we'll get a fast response. They always answer our questions in a timely and effective manner." 

Overall, Emma reports that NightOwl are enjoying using the foundU platform, and would happily recommend it to anyone needing a better way to manage their workforce.

"The real advantage of the foundU platform is that it's truly all-in-one, which most providers can't say they offer," said Emma.

"It does everything that we need it to do, from employee onboarding and rostering, right through to payroll. It makes our jobs easier, which is why we'd be willing to recommend it to anyone looking for an all-in-one, workforce management solution."

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