The challenge
Quadrat P is an interior fit-out specialist in the cinema and hospitality sector and covers everything in this area from 3D visualisation and the first draft through to completion. That means not only classic joinery work is carried out here, but also welding, wiring and installation. Everything that is eventually installed at the customer's site is produced in-house.
Like many businesses in manufacturing, Quadrat P is currently facing a lot of new challenges: there are many bottlenecks in sourcing raw materials; supply chains and delivery dates cannot be kept to, and together with inflation prices are rising as a result. In this situation, inefficient, bureaucratic processes can threaten a business's competitiveness.
Quadrat P has had to struggle with processes like these in the past too. Benne Pier, one of the co-founders of Quadrat P and responsible for the 3D visualisation of projects, bookkeeping and HR management, describes how time tracking used to work:
“Up to now it was always the case that we handled time tracking by recording it digitally, with an app that did not run smoothly and that, in terms of usability for the guys and girls who work here, was simply relatively confusing and poor. On top of that, you could not submit vacation requests in the app or book travel time separately.”
But probably the biggest sticking point was the fact that it was not possible to book time to individual projects. So although the working hours of each employee were recorded and they could be paid accordingly, all working hours still had to be assigned to individual projects by hand – a workload that cost an incredible amount of time and therefore money.
That has serious consequences for the business itself. Benne explains:
“All in all, the poor user interface and the missing options meant that a great deal of employees' time went to waste, time we could of course have used, and should have used, far more efficiently. Because on the one hand supply chains could not be kept to, and on the other hand time is being given away. That is of course maximum inefficiency.”
While looking for a new, more user-friendly solution, Benne and his colleagues came across clockin. What impressed them above all was the simplicity of the website and straightforward communication. After successfully signing up for a free trial and the first contact with clockin staff, the team quickly noticed: „With clockin's support we fell into such a rhythm that we immediately noticed it basically runs by itself.“
clockin as the solution
By now the guys and girls at Quadrat P have been using clockin for a year. With a single click the employees clock in on their smartphone in the morning and clock out again just as simply in the evening.
The biggest impact of clockin, though, is on project work. The employee concerned can clock in on an individual project without any trouble, so that the working time for the customer is recorded separately. That not only makes it easier to issue invoices afterwards, but also allows resources to be planned better in advance.
The option of having travel time recorded within projects likewise reduces the extra bureaucratic work many times over. What previously had to be noted down awkwardly in folders and later transferred by hand is recorded separately by clockin in a few clicks.
On top of that, employees can clock in on individual machines by scanning QR codes. That way, when invoices are drawn up later, it is possible to trace not only exactly which machines were used for this project, but also how long they were in use. This allows Quadrat P to bill projects realistically.
Vacation requests and absences can now also be processed digitally for the first time: “Vacation requests can now be submitted digitally. The administrator then gets a pop-up saying that an employee would like to request vacation, and can either approve or reject it. That is a great feature. And then of course the sick leave notifications: an employee can't come to work that day because they are ill? Then they can simply report sick via clockin and upload their sick note”, Benne enthuses. That way resources can not only be organised better, but employee data is also stored more clearly in one place and easy to retrieve.
Benne explains that what he likes most of all is the app's simple user guidance: “Overall it is much clearer for us now: we can follow far better how many hours an employee has worked, when which vacation is coming up and where there are production gaps that are too large. That is of course the most important thing in planning.”
By automating processes such as working time tracking and recording project hours, Quadrat P can now concentrate on the essential things in day-to-day work again.
