Invaluable tool for flexible rotas

RotaCloud have been great to deal with. They have great documentation, and on the rare occasion we have needed support, it has been brilliant; fast and effective.

Pros

With a mix of full time, part time and seasonal staff working across 3 locations, preparing rotas was a nightmare. Rota Cloud makes this so much easier, faster and more accurate. It is incredibly flexible and easy to use and we can prepare in minutes, making sure the rotas are fair to staff, take account of holidays and other working restrictions, and monitor our labour costs as we do so.

Cons

There are some additionas we know are on the product road map we would like to see sooner, especially a daily hours total on the weekly rotas which would help us check we have the coverage we need, and a lock on current and old rotas to prevent accidental changes. However, there is virtually nothing we don't like about it.

Not perfect, but pretty good

The cons I describe above are really small, and are 'enchancements' or dev requests more than problems. I could not run this business without RotaCloud!

Pros

Being online means I can create rotas at home or work, and the app means team can access their rotas in the way that's easiest for them. I like being able to copy a shift from one day/person to another, and being able to copy a week's shift from one week to another. The reporting is good also, enabling me to do payroll easily.

Cons

A few things are bit fiddly and could be improved. 1. having to change between publish mode and rota mode. it would be better to be able to publish a week with a button, or a right click for just one shift. 2. it is cumbersome having to create holidays in a different screen. it would be better to be able to do it from within the rota screen. 3. if I'm creating a rota for next week, and then navigate away to, say the holiday screen, when I go back to the rota screen it will go back to THIS week not the week I was editing. On more than one occasion I haven't spotted that and erroneously then edited THIS week instead! 4. it would be great to be able to include paid leave in the report so that I know to include that person's day in a pay run. At the moment, I have created a role of 'paid leave' so that their holiday hours get included in their hours for that week 5. I like being able to see how many shifts a person has for that week (ie in a row) but it would also be helpful to see how many shifts are logged for each day (ie in a column).

Does what it says on the tin!

Generally - take time to set it up - you will reap the rewards, the first couple of payroll took time as we had to double check everything - now we're flying! Saves a lot of time, is accurate, and very very easy to use.

Pros

I like the control our staff have over their shifts, and hours. I also like that we retain control and have very easy to use functions. Visuals to see daily, weekly etc exactly what your spend is per person, per day etc Excellent reporting, no longer doing things retrospectively when you have a higher wage bill than you can expected!! We are a very busy pub/restaurant staff can swop shifts, even between roles if we allocate this. Very easy to use - worth taking time to set up.

Cons

Sometimes it's not 100% clear how to set things up, most of the time it's really easy, but sometimes it's a little thing you have missed, however use the online chat - never failed to help! Really pleasant and helpful, even when some of our staff struggle with new technology - they have all managed easily.

Simple enough to use for the regular and basic tasks.

Saves time. Employees are notified via the app. Communication is much easier.

Pros

Ease of use for making changes to the rota. Prompt and helpful attitude to customer support via the online chat.

Cons

Perhaps the 'Availability' feature. Could be more intuitive. Mobile version of software is slow on many occasions.

Staff rota's are no longer a hated task

Excellent. What can I say? Rota allocations are now a simply easy exercise regardless of me being in my office or enjoying a day out. I can create, edit and update a rota anywhere. The hourly tracking is a simple operation using a tablet as a keypad for clocking in and out allowing for verifying projected cost to actual cost.

Pros

The software is simple and easy to use regardless of web app, IOS or Android. You can allocate your team members and keep apprised of the operational cost of a shift, trading day, week or month. The reporting area is detailed and tailored to what you require when you require it.

Cons

I think the only area I would like to see improved would be holiday accrual. If this could show a column of accrued, used and balance for zero hour staff it would help me substantially.