20 Things You Didn’t Know About Homebase
Homebase is a cloud-based time-tracking and communications tool for businesses and their employees within industries such as retail, hospitality, and health. It is a scheduling solution that helps human resources personnel organize and manage employee schedules timesheets and payroll. The following are 20 things you didn’t know about the Homebase businesses App that can monitor employee work hours while integrating with payroll modules for wage calculation.
1. Homebase will enable you to do less work
With Homebase, it makes your schedule easy since it is always online and up to date for your team. The App allows for the employer and the employee to participate in the scheduling process which creates the synergy of the team making the administrative issue less allowing the team to concentrate on the core business thereby enhancing productivity.
2. Homebase Helps in Budgeting
Homebase can be combined together with other widespread payroll solutions such as Gusto to ensure that workers are paid wages accurately for all the hours worked without omission, especially where labor is intensive and also involving shifts, rescheduling of work, and such labor-related activities. However, what makes Homebase attractive to organizations is that this process does not have to wait until the end of the operations but the cost of labor can be calculated immediately after the work is rescheduled. According to Fits Small Business, this can help the firms to assess their profitability by using the projected sales, cost of sales, and labor cost. This in turn results in better utilization of resources, controlling of expenditures, and better decision making by the organizations.
3. Homebase is useful in Streamlining scheduling
Scheduling work and employees are daunting tasks that can determine the successes of an organization as well as its ability to offer excellent and timely services or products. However, according to Join Homebase, these tasks can be streamlined by the use of the Homebase App to perform daily labor forecast, shift scheduling, scheduling off-days, and such related tasks. This ensures orderliness in the performance of work and creating a cohesive workforce.
4. Homebase Is Cloud-Based
The functions of Homebase are cloud-based in that the data is handled and stored on remote servers that are hosted on the internet making these functions paperless. This presents your organization with benefits such as cost efficiency, cloud storage, ability to be expanded to hold more data, enhanced security of data, accessibility at any place and all the time. This is important as most industries go global and embrace an all-around clock economy.
5. Timeclock
Homebase time clock works by allowing your team to clock in and out from wherever they are. The App tracks hourly break overtime and paid time off. It helps you to put your time clock on Android tablets and smartphones iPhone and iPad computers and POS devices therefore your workers are not limited as to where they can click on or out. When the team clocks in and out in Homebase you can instantly calculate hour’s breaks and overtimes.
6. Homebase Helps In Generations Of Reports
The most notable report generated by Homebase is the data during the COVID19 pandemic and which has become useful in highlighting the impacts of the pandemic on the economy with the hope that the data can be used by the US government to develop necessary policies to avert the economic crisis. According to Business Insider, in the wake of the pandemic the company decided to share the internal information it held with different stakeholders such as the academicians, the Fourth Estate, and the government officials, which was later to prove very crucial in tracking the effects of the pandemic on the economy and how the economy was recovering. A good example is by Maximiliano Dvorkin who is a senior economist at the Federal Reserve Bank of St. Louis who had a different opinion from many who predicted more job losses due to the outcomes of the previous month. However, he forecasted the addition of jobs in the market relying on the data from the Homebase. When the report was released, many economists were surprised to find that instead of job losses there were additional jobs as per the prediction of Dvorkin with the economy adding 2.5 million jobs.
7. Homebase Helps in Payroll
Homebase makes the preparation of payroll easier by providing for the payroll of your team to be on a built hourly basis. The App automates your payroll process so you can pay your team in a matter of few minutes. You can instantly convert your timesheets into hours and wages in the payroll. Homebase calculates wages and taxes and sends the correct payments to employees, the state, and the IRS. The app also automatically processes your tax filings and issues and handles the tax calculations sending the direct deposits and filing taxes for you.
8. Homebase Provides for Free Mobile GPS Time Clock
Homebase app provides the employer with the ability to track the employee and enable them to clock in at the place they are working even if it is a remote location. This is facilitated by a GPS clock that provides for workers to clock in or out remotely at their job location. The employee can also be tracked using a GPS tracker which enables the employer to establish whether the worker is at the right location. Another important aspect is that the employer can also establish whether the worker is also in the right place using the mobile time clock to avoid situations where the team member has clocked in within the locality but not the job site. This is very crucial especially during this time of pandemic when employers are encouraged to allow employees to work remotely.
9. Hiring and Onboarding
Homebase takes care of hiring hassles by offering job descriptions to post vacant positions on leading job boards. You can reach for your applicants faster with paid boots while collecting referrals and walk-ins. This helps monitor all applicants in one location while identifying the best candidates with screening questions. This makes recruitment fast, efficient, and less costly enhancing your margin while getting the right employees for the job.
10. Homebase Provides for Employee Support
The App provides also step-by-step guidelines on how employees can use it. The employees are able to create and sign in to the App on PC or mobile phones, have several requests such as messaging the team, claiming open shifts or trading the shifts, or asking for time off. The other features include employees doing self-boarding, giving shift feedback, or even adding a new qualification or certification.
11. Team Communication
Homebase helps to message individual employees groups or entire team while creating instant groups. It, therefore, becomes possible to create bulk messages which can be sent to the team at once. The employee can also give feedback instantly ensuring effective communication. There are therefore no hassles of searching which employee needed leave or related requests as the Homebase do that for you. One of the major causes of conflicts at the place of work is ineffective communication is hence the important role played by Homecare App.
12. Homebase Provides for Flexible Pricing
The App provides different packages depending on the customer’s needs. There is the basic package for the company who want to test the services of the company where they can be provided with basic features for just one location where they are can do activities like basic work scheduling, basic payroll preparation, simple hiring procedures and basic employee viewing of work schedule. The next is the essential package which besides having the features for the basic package there are additional components such as better communication tools, enhanced scheduling tools, and better support which comes at a charge of $19.95 per month, or $192 per year per location. The third package is the plus which applies to those organizations requiring extensive features. The price is $49.95 per month or $480 per year, per location. It provides among other features ability to monitor and control labor cost and compliance and can also be customized to suit your needs hence the most popular. The last is the Enterprise and this is mainly meant for huge enterprises. It provides every feature and service offered by the App. However important to note the price is a customer on a customer basis as enterprises differ and therefore for pricing, you have to discuss and agree with the company.
13. Homebase ensures HR and compliance
Homebase helps you to manage employee information which includes contacts emergency and payroll details. You are able to get and track employee certifications and get notified the moment they expire. This ensures that your organization complies with government and labor regulations avoiding unnecessary penalties. It also ensures your employee are not inconvenienced or work affected as employees since your organization will always be compliant.
14. Homebase Integrates with Other Third-Party Apps
The Homebase App can be integrated with several third-party apps making it very continent and flexible. It can be integrated with Toast to offer firms single scheduling with an entire data table for hours worked enabling organizations to determine labor costs and sales more efficiently. Another App is the Clover where Homebase integrates with it so that your employee can clock in and out from Clover POS with the same information been synchronized with the Homebase timesheets hence no need for double entries. Finally, among others, it can be integrated with QuickBooks so that data concerning employee total hours and breaks can be synchronized and transferred to QuickBooks online
15. Employee Happiness
Homebase gives your team early access to their wages as there is no delay while preparing payrolls. The team can then be able to settle the bills and handle emergency expenses this makes your employees happy and motivated which in turn enhances productivity. The other benefit is that Homebase covers all costs and liability and doesn’t impact payroll as well as helping your employees to cash out before payday to avoid overdraft hence having a happy team.
16. Homebase Has Been Rated the Best Overall Employee Scheduling Software
The Homebase App, according to Investopedia, has been rated as the best App for workers scheduling which has been attributed to several advantages among them being the App offering Free iOS or Android Apps, pricing based on locations not a number of employees, different packages to suit different clients and ability to track employee using GPS.
17. Homebase Has Raised $ 108 Million Up to Date
The Homebase Company has been able to raise a huge amount in funding this far an indication of its strong market presence. Currently, the company has 100, 000 small businesses on board and I million employees having signed in the platform. The funding according to the CEO shall be important in looping in more small businesses, addressing the challenge of the COVID19 pandemic by providing features relevant to the frontline and essential workers.
18. Boosting Employee Retention
Homebase also helps in reducing staff turnover. Inequality has in most cases contributed to high staff turnover as staff becomes dissatisfied when they feel favoritism is being practiced at the place of work. Poor work scheduling, incorrect payment, and uncoordinated shifts are some of the causes of inequality at the place of work.
19. Homebase creates transparency and trust in your team
Since all employees have information about the schedule, hours worked and other information from the organization, trust is created about their engagement with the organization. The employee also feels empowered to make the right decision as they are not ambushed by abrupt work schedules or emergency calls at work.
20. Homebase Business Idea in Response to a Problem.
One of the interesting details about the Homebase App was that it was an idea born as a result of the founder observing a societal problem for which he sought to create a solution by the startup. The goal was to offer simple solutions to small and local enterprises and their employees. This was brought about by the need for a childhood buddy of the founder who owned several restaurants which gave him a headache of scheduling the work and employees. There was also the sister of this friend who also had a similar challenge although she was underemployed. She was experiencing challenges such as not knowing when to report for work, having to call if she needed any requests as well as keeping a personal diary to note the hours worked to ensure the right payment. The founder, John Waldmann, therefore developed the Homebase to address the local problem which now has developed into an internationally recognized App.