Great Union Payroll System

We have a very complicated payroll for the simple fact that we are a multi state, multi union company. This means many different rates of pay, taxation tables and unions, as well as our Administration and Shop payrolls. P4C thru Foundation has been able to handle this with ease and I really am happy with the service they have provided to us in the past 2 1/2 years. I hope to continue a much longer relationship with them. Whenever a support call is logged, usually one of the 2 reps. call back almost immediately and help work through any issue, no matter how long it takes. They are personable and professional and always helpful. Reliable system, easy time entry and reports generated are very easy to read.

Pros

I love the fact that P4C can handle all of our multi state and multi union (sometimes up to 55 different unions) Time entry is very easy, and includes attaching hours to jobs and tasks with ease. The system is very user friendly and the Support staff is phenomanal. Generates great union reports, job costing and also great HR reports as well, such as 401k reporting. We can process same day layoff checks which is a must for union payrolls. Also not charged by the number of employees in the system as with other payroll companies. I love that it is web based so i can work from anywhere. They are able to create payroll cycles, so each cycle can have a different address, and they deliver the checks to the exact locations. So i can enter all my time and be assured that jobs in other states have checks go directly to the location versus coming here.

Cons

I don't like that if i have multiple payroll cycles computed and i have to purge one, that it will purge ALL computed cycles, not just the one I had chosen.

Cary & Associates Builders, Inc. is an award-winning Full Service General Contractor specializing in negotiated projects for the Design and Construction of Commercial, Industrial, Winery and Agricultural buildings. We used a very well-known complex construction software for approximately 18 years. Through the years, the problems with the software were accompanied by inordinate increases in support fees. We discussed each year whether to renew our support or look for another construction software. In April of 2003, it became obvious that the software could not be kept up and running and we had constant "crashes". At the same time we received the next year's support contract for about $6,000. It was the last straw for us. I began a search for a new software because I knew our system would crash as soon as our support ran out (which it did). I interviewed everyone I could locate and talked to our subcontractors. Our CFO said that ultimately I would have to go with my "gut" feeling and pick one. He said if it did not work out, we would just buy another one next year and we would still be ahead of the game. All my instincts said to buy FOUNDATION. With a lot of trepidation, I purchased the software and bought a ticket to Cleveland to attend training. FOUNDATION was able to help me before I got to class by transferring my Vendors, Job Numbers, Cost Codes, etc. into my new FOUNDATION Software. I had pulled my G/L down in the middle of our FYE and was ready to open it as soon as I knew what I was doing. Surprisingly, by the end of the week, we ran my first payroll right in class! We spread open my G/L and we were ready to go. They dropped my information off on a disk and I headed for home. The following Monday, we rolled FOUNDATION out on our server and have never had so much as a glitch in anything, let alone a crash. Once it was up and running, our team has able to learn the system easily. It is very user-friendly. Any problems or questions, you can click on the support button and get a call back in about 20 minutes! They can also connect directly to your computer (with permission) and help show you how to fix a problem (human generated) or they will fix it for you! Love it! We have benefited in so many ways it would be hard to describe them all. We are currently on version 11.9 and FOUNDATION has just rolled out their new automated update that updates your server and clients automatically! I suppose one of the biggest benefits is the amount of time it has saved. I used to work every holiday due to having to make hard closures, etc. but with FOUNDATION I have not worked a holiday since 2003! This system is astoundingly efficient. The AIA billing is easily reversed if an architect or owner decides on a different amount. The certified payroll is a dream. Although we are not union, it prepares multi-state, multi-county, multi-union etc. It does a wonderful printout for the 941 and in California our DE9. Our CPA loves the Fixed Asset module. He framed the first print out since he said he had never had one so accurate. Quite simply, we love FOUNDATION! We get great customer service from real people and a software solution that keeps progressing and enlarging on concepts to help construction companies!

My family owns a complete Road Construction business. We have been in business for over 32 years and have tried many accounting programs. They all were lacking something. Most were just not construction specific or were more geared towards buildings and had very few vague options for Road Work. The other down side was the cost increased every year for support and maintenance, and the programs were just not user friendly! We read an article about Foundation Software in a construction magazine, which in part listed Foundation Software as America’s #1 construction accounting software. We decided to look into it and get a demo cd. We could tell right away this program made sense. It was like the staff at Foundation was running a Road Construction business and knew exactly where everything needed to flow and offered all the options we had been longing for. A few months later, we purchased Foundation Software for windows and could not be happier!!!! The implementation went very smoothly and only took a couple of months. The training was very easy and the support staff is extremely knowledgeable. With Foundation, we have saved time and money. We used to have 4 people in the office inputting different information into our accounting program. We were able to cut down to 2, comfortably. The modules are integrated perfectly and therefore double entry of items is no longer necessary. Foundation Software is extremely user friendly and is setup to fit your specific needs – customized for the way you run your business! Just a few of our favorite things about Foundation Accounting Software - the Date Genie easily creates and customizes just about any report to fit your needs, cutting back almost entirely on manual spreadsheets. You can add notes to a vendor’s record, a job, or a customer, and then view that note in reports. There are no updates or software versions to pay for – just continuous enhancing of the program and the annual fee stays at 18% of the purchase price. The reports offer a wide range of filtering and sorting options – allowing for very specific reporting. Certified payroll reports cover all required forms with a wide variety of options– no need for a manual weekly hours and minority spreadsheet. Import bid’s from estimating software to create estimates and AIA forms– no need to manually type them. Also, we have found answers to most questions/issues by clicking on the help button whereas with previous programs we had to wait to receive a call back. Sometimes it took a day or more! Finally, you can set up each module to prevent errors like double entry, paying a vendor who has an outdated certificate of insurance, posting to a closed gl period, and much much more!

All encompassing software program

I would highly recommend this program to contracting and construction businesses that employ 20+ people and also wants to track maintenance for equipment. The program, in my opinion, is not cost effective for smaller businesses

Pros

Very user friendly, if you have a basic understanding of accounting practices, it is easy to figure out where to go or what to do to find things, or fix errors. The report are easy to find, run & read. Customer service is excellent! The company hosts a training week for the software that is incredibly beneficial for both new & seasoned users. This software is similar to People Soft in what it can do without the complications and confusions!

Cons

Some of the add on programs (such as project management) appear to be unnecessary or even over complicated. You purchase a specific number of "seats" for users to log on which can be a huge hassle if you do not have enough seats, as it leaves employees waiting for others to finish up their work or stop mid-stream so that another user can log on and work.

FOUNDATION Construction Accounting

FOUNDATION for our business, is just that, our Foundation. It has become a valuable part of our everyday input and reporting that keeps us organized and compliant. We utilize many of the modules and learn more about the Software features every day. We appreciate the very helpful Customer Support and use it often for help. They answer efficiently and walk you through things, so it also teaches you to better use the software. We are very happy with FOUNDATION and only hope to incorporate it more into our daily and yearly tasks.

Pros

FOUNDATION is user friendly, but there are many advanced features that allow for great reporting and organization. We enjoy utilizing the many Modules for different aspects of our business and it keeps all of our information in one place that is easy to call up, report and organize. We are able to efficiently answer questions and share information and it has become invaluable to our business.

Cons

There are sometimes small features that we realize they could implement, for instance, when there is a long list, there would be a search bar available.

We are a low voltage electrical/telecommunications company that started in June 2006. In 2009 our company was beginning to outgrow the capacity of Quickbooks. We needed something that would give us a more in depth look at job costing as well as track our expenses and all other apsects of doing business. We had no idea what we were getting ourselves into and how far we could take Foundation. We implemented Foundation on January 1, 2010 and are still learning functions everyday that contiue to help us grow! We have grown to a multi-million dollar a year company and we truly believe that we wouldn't have come this far without Foundation. With the detailed job costing we are able to see exactly to the penny where every job comes in at as well as calculate our rates for estimating purposes. We run our accounts payable, accounts receiveable, and payroll all through Foundation. The ease of doing AIA billing as well as certified payroll with a click of a button was one of the major reasons we first looked at Foundation. Today, we couldn't survive without Foundation. We have three administrators that work in Foundation daily to enter all of the information and we have 6 project managers that view reports daily. To this day, my husband, Owner and President no longer has to rely on the information for the jobs, costs, accounts payable accounts receiveable and many other things being kept in his head or many notebooks because he can rely on the detailed information that he can see in Foundation. We purchase the webinars every year along with the support and updates because we want to continue to grow with Foundation and we want to make sure that we are learning everything that we can. Switching from one accounting system to another is a big project, but this one was well worth it. We love working with the customer service and technical departments. Everyone is so helpful and makes sure that all of your needs are taken care of. As a side note, we also love seeing the Christmas Cards that are sent out each year! It reminds us that everyone at Foundation is a person and it really puts into perspective how much everyone must really love being a part of the Foundation team!

Lighthouse Electric is a commercial / industrial electrical contractor operating primarily in Pennsylvania, West Virginia and Ohio. We are a union shop dealing with many local electricians, laborers, carpenters and operating engineers. We routinely employ several hundred tradesmen. Our software quest started with a goal: increase volume by 50% without adding overhead. That was 2001 and we soon realized our current accounting software was detrimental at current levels and could not support such an increase. We started looking for new software, prioritizing stability, support and functionality. We compiled a list of functions necessary to support our business. The candidates were narrowed to three who could support our efforts. Foundation Software had a clear edge in all three categories and, surprisingly, was the least expensive. We took the opportunity to reexamine our processes and develop streamlined procedures, taking advantage of Foundation’s features. We had in-house training and imported data for jobs, employees, customers and vendors. We paralleled a few payrolls, tested other systems and went live in January 2002. We accomplished our business goal in two years. Currently we operate at 300% of our 2001 sales level with a few more people but the majority of them are estimators and project managers. Foundation continues to add features and functions but stays true to its core competencies: stability, support and functionality. We are certainly proof of their scalability. Foundation provides outstanding job costing and the unprecedented ability to reproduce any report back to your first transaction. The support staff is well-trained and very responsive, traits that are found in all the employees I have encountered at Foundation software. Utilizing Foundation’s data genies (report writer) and Crystal Reports to access the MS-SQL data base, it is a very rare instance when we cannot provide information requested from internal or external sources. Our relationship with Foundation Software is a truly a partnership. Currently, we are using Foundation for Windows version 11.6. There are usually several updates per year which we apply without reservation.

Great software

Over all I am happy we have it. The reports are easy to use and entering invoices, jobs, vendors and all that is easy. Their customer service is probably the best I have seen.

Pros

Easy to use. I did not have a lot of training but figured it out pretty fast. When I cant find something or do something, their customer service is right there helping. I love that they can take control and show you where to go.

Cons

There are a lot of add-ons that cost extra. Also, it would be great if there was some stuff you couple permanently delete so it would show up anymore.

Maybe good for accounting but not anything else..

I think the accounting staff finds this software acceptable.

Pros

I'm dubious of any review that gives this software 5/5. I cannot fathom how any honest and daily user of this software would rate it this high. I can only assume the accounting portion of this software is useful. The project management and documentation modules are weak at best. These modules to have been added only to allow this to be advertised as a complete construction enterprise software.

Cons

I've been using this software for 10 years. I'm not a programmer but this software appears to be pretty outdated w/ a feeble attempt to give it a moderately current appearance. The buttons & menus are very reminiscent of Windows 95 type software. I have never seen a display or output remotely close to the screen shots offered on Foundations's website & marketing literature. I suspect these screen shots have been developed for sales & marketing. The actual software does not look like this.

The actual user interface is very unattractive & outdated. The user interface is also very unfriendly. Most of the data input fields / windows are very small. Furthermore the data entry fields are fixed in size. You cannot increase the size even by adjusting the size of the window. They are fixed making typing and editing difficult. I often times write my text in MS Word then copy it into Foundation. Another work around is to write the body of your order in MS Excel or MS word & attach it to a basic non-descript cover sheet prepared in Foundation. This work around is effective for orders, Submittals, RFIs, etc.

The included forms are very generic & hardly usable. Developing company specific forms is expensive &
cumbersome.

Forget custom support. It exists in name only.

Major flaws: user interface-fixed data entry fields-no spell check-no UNDO button-long standing bugs that remain, ineffective customer support.

Strong Program, lack of support and updates

There are better programs out there.

Pros

The program does it all besides estimating. Has a good system of checks and balances and everything is tracked so very hard for employees to cover their tracks. It does a lot well but everything has its hiccups.

Cons

There are several things I dislike about the product as it has so much potential to be 10x better yet they have no ambition to make it better. 95% up the updates released by foundation software are fixes to glitches or problems. Very rarely is there an actual new feature or upgrade to the program. There are several flaws with the program that would be easy to fix, which have been suggested but go unanswered. Such as the pages scroll very awkwardly, they jump at the end of the page onto the next page but not at the top of the page. Very difficult to review a report on the screen when it keeps going bac