- International staffing firm provides easier timesheet submission to 1,200 consultants across Canada and the United States -

CNC Global Consulting, Inc., a leading North American IT contract staffing firm, has launched a new program that intends to make timesheet submission easier and more efficient for their team of over 1,200 field consultants across the U.S. and Canada. CNC Global consultants work on-site on a contract basis to meet the additional IT resourcing needs of the company's clients, which include some of world’s foremost banking, financial, insurance, medical and telecommunications organizations.

Like most contract staffing organizations, CNC Global requires consultants to submit paper-based timesheets to report hours for client billing purposes and to generate paychecks. Also typical of most staffing companies, CNC Global allots a brief, three-day window to both receive timesheets and process consultant pay. In an effort to eliminate manual data entry requirements for timesheets, increase data integrity, and offer consultants an easier, more efficient means of time reporting, CNC Global has taken steps to automate the process.

After investigating a variety of processing techniques within the staffing industry, CNC Global found that most other staffing firms were also processing consultant pay manually. Research into automation led the firm to solutions from Adobe Systems and Cardiff Software. Using Adobe Acrobat^® 4.0 and Cardiff’s TELEform^® PDF+Forms, CNC Global will now be able to automatically enter timesheet data from anywhere in the world via the Internet by leveraging Adobe’s portable document file (PDF) format and automated forms-processing technology from Cardiff Software.

While one option was to create an online timesheet that consultants could submit over the Internet electronically, this method did not facilitate the required inclusion of a hand-written client signature on the timesheet. Cardiff’s TELEform^® PDF+Forms solution had the unique capability of storing the client’s written signature directly to a database field.

Prior to implementing the automated Internet solution using Acrobat and PDF+Forms, CNC Global staff had to manually enter timesheet data. Twice each month, 1,200 consultants filled out and faxed in paper timesheets to a 1-800 number that rolled over to three fax machines. A huge influx of faxes poured in over two days and presented several challenges.

"Since there was no confirmation of receipt of the fax, consultants often re-sent their timesheets several times, generating duplicates for our Human Resources department," said Erik Holmberg, CNC Global Project Manager, System Integration. "In addition, consultants would frequently call CNC Global’s administration department to receive verbal confirmation that their timesheets were received, which created its own workload since administration staff had to search for each consultant’s timesheet from more than a thousand faxed documents."

And there were other challenges. Since consultants completed forms by hand, there were often math errors and ineligible entries. Also, to meet rigorous turnaround demands, 15 administrative staff members were required to focus on the processing of consultant pay, taking them away from regular tasks. Once all timesheets were received via fax, staff had to manually enter data into CNC Global’s proprietary PayBill™ system. For billing purposes, they had to simultaneously pre-sort faxes by contract number so a copy of the timesheet could be attached to each client invoice. The manual process reduced both data integrity and staff productivity.

Using PDF+Forms has allowed CNC Global to electronically create in Adobe PDF format, a timesheet similar to its previous paper-based timesheet, but with additional features. PDF+Forms also allows the company to create customized timesheets to meet client requirements. Now consultants can log in to a password-protected Extranet accessible through the CNC Global Web site. A customized timesheet, mapped to each pre-assigned user ID and password, appears automatically. With a bit of extra programming on the Web server, the PDF+Forms timesheet also appears with the consultant’s name, contract number, client name and email address already entered on the timesheet.

While the company’s solution still requires the faxing of paper timesheets due to the requirement of a physical signature, TELEform software has been configured to automatically scan the timesheet for information and write it directly to a database file.

"Using TELEform and PDF+Forms, as well as some custom Java-script programming, we can automatically total the timesheet’s daily hours and total hours as the user enters the information, minimizing any chance of math errors. The solution also lets us set up validation rules, such as disallowing entries less than zero or greater than 24 hours for a single day," said Holmberg. Now that consultants type in information, the problems of illegibility are also no longer an issue. The few consultants who do not have Internet access can still retrieve the PDF timesheet via email or disk, store it locally on their workstation, and run it through Adobe 4.0. Reader.

Once the timesheet has been completed, printed and signed by the client, the consultant submits the timesheet via the same 1-800 fax number. As the image comes in via a multi-line fax server, the data is captured, interpreted, and automatically exported to a Microsoft Access^® database file via TELEform's proprietary Tri-CR^® recognition technology. As soon as the record is entered, CNC Global has written a customized program which reads the record for the contractor number and Email address and automatically sends an emailed confirmation of the timesheet receipt, together with the total hours entered, directly to the consultant. If the consultants spot any errors, they can then notify the Consultant Customer Service immediately. The final step moves the data from Access to the PayBill system, eliminating the manual entry of 1,200+ timesheets.

Looking ahead, CNC Global plans to employ digital certificates which may be forwarded to the client supervisor for approval and automatic validation back at corporate headquarters.

Company Information

Electronic Data Forms Interface Corporation -EDFI Corp., headquartered in Huntington, New York, is a global leader in Sales Force Automation and E-Commerce/Digital Commerce solutions that integrate into major Accounting/Distribution software packages. Data (most often Sales Orders) can be collected via fax, scanner, internet/intranet or via email utilizing spreadsheet styled order entry forms.
TELEform products provide an integrated solution for total data collection including paper, electronic, and World Wide Web-based forms. TELEform Standard for automated departmental data collection; TELEform Elite for mid-range, production-level forms processing; and TELEform Internet Solution and PDF + Forms for data collection via the Internet and corporate intranets. For sales information, contact EDFI Corp. at            (516) 300-2413.

For additional information send Email to sales@edfi.net or call (516) 300-2413