Asendia is the international e-commerce and mail delivery business founded by La Poste and Swiss Post, serving more than 200 destinations worldwide. In the UK it runs three operational sites: a parcel processing and export hub at Heathrow, order fulfilment in Bedford and a mail production and returns centre in Southampton.
Every one of those sites depends on a large hourly workforce that flexes with volume, and the peak season leaves no room for payroll errors or missed shifts.
The Challenge
Parcel volumes at Asendia UK move with the retail calendar. The Heathrow hub in particular has to scale up quickly in the run-up to Christmas, blending permanent staff with agency workers who may only be on site for a few weeks. Before Synergy, each site captured hours and absences in its own way, which meant HR and payroll were reconciling three sets of records every pay run and operations managers had no live view of who was actually on the floor.
“We had three sites doing three slightly different things, and payroll was the team picking up the pieces at the end of every week. What we needed was one system that everybody, from the shift supervisor to the payroll team, could trust as the single version of the truth.”
Sean Klemis, Head of Operations, Asendia UK
The Solution
Synel deployed Synergy Time & Attendance across all three sites, with clocking terminals at each entrance feeding a single cloud platform. Permanent and agency workers clock in the same way, so every hour worked is captured at source and attributed to the right cost centre from the moment someone arrives on shift.
The HR and payroll teams work directly in Synergy rather than waiting for site returns. Absence and holiday management, overtime rules and Working Time Regulations checks are all handled in the platform, and payroll pulls approved hours straight into its export without any re-keying. Shift supervisors use the live attendance dashboard to see who is in, who is late and where they have gaps before the shift starts rather than after it.
Support
Asendia deals with a named Synel account manager and holds regular account reviews, so changes to shift rules, new cost centres and the seasonal intake of agency staff are set up in the platform ahead of peak rather than fixed during it.
Success
Three sites now run on one set of rules with one source of attendance data. Payroll processing time has fallen, exceptions are caught at the site rather than at head office, and operations has a live picture of labour across the network during the busiest weeks of the year.