Case Study: Tri-City ValleyCats

Background

The Tri-City ValleyCats are a Frontier League baseball team, founded in 2002 as an affiliate of the Houston Astros, and then joined the Frontier League in 2021. They have been using GTM for their payroll service since 2011, but after significantly increasing their employee count, they needed to add solutions to improve their timekeeping and onboarding processes, and help facilitate their HR functions.

Finding a Solution

The ValleyCats needed a human capital management solution that could:

• Fully integrate their timekeeping with their payroll
• Manage accruals for every type of employee
• Allow access to all time and HR data from a single login
• Eliminate paper onboarding with manual entry
• Manage time for seasonal and remote workers

A Better Way: GTM Payroll Services’ HCM Platform

GTM’s human capital management (HCM) platform from isolved met the ValleyCats’ needs and more.

After adding the Time & Labor Management and Onboarding modules to their isolved platform, the ValleyCats have streamlined their processes, saving time and making it easier on their employees and payroll staff, as well as providing the reporting they needed to make quicker business decisions.

The Solution
With isolved, there are no more manual processes – all employee data fully integrates with the ValleyCats’ payroll, streamlining everything with just a single login.

“GTM has helped our front office automate administrative functions, facilitating our human capital management through their technology,” said ValleyCats President Rick Murphy.

An extraordinarily different experience
GTM’s isolved HCM platform provides a unified solution for human resources, onboarding, payroll, benefits, time and attendance, ACA reporting, and more. It’s flexible and intuitive while delivering the vital data finance and HR professionals need to make more informed business decisions.

Being “in the cloud,” gives a business total control of their data and accessibility anytime, anywhere. Having an integrated platform, means a single sign-on for everything needed to manage employees. There is no need for multiple logins or exporting and importing data into different systems.

“GTM’s platform allows our employees to access their payroll and hours individually without having to go through our front office,” says Murphy.

Accurate automated timekeeping
The ValleyCats have full-time as well as seasonal workers, many of whom have variable work schedules week-to-week. They were using a POS system for time cards which they then had to export to GTM for payroll. Automating the timekeeping through isolved eliminated the antiquated, scattered process, and allows employees to clock in and out from their mobile devices, which is very convenient. The geofencing feature eliminates time clock errors by creating map boundaries and allowing employees to clock in and out within the boundaries. Now managers can set schedules and approve time, all in one place.

“The geofencing lets us track our employees’ time but lets them manage it on their own, and all the data flows right into the system,” said Michelle Skinner, the ValleyCats’ Assistant General Manager.

They can also easily manage accruals for PTO, vacation time, and New York State sick leave, all based on the number of hours worked, all integrated into their payroll.

Electronic employee onboarding
The ValleyCats’ process for adding new employees was previously done through their insurance company portal. Only part of the process was digital, which meant new hires had to spend their first day filling out paperwork, which then had to be manually integrated into the company payroll database, allowing for errors and duplicate entry. Employees had to use one login for onboarding documents, another for the POS system, and another for training. With isolved’s onboarding process, new hires receive one link that gets them set up throughout the system, letting them focus on their job and saving valuable time.

Because the ValleyCats have two different types of employees – baseball players and regular staff – the onboarding process is not the same for each. With isolved, they were also able to set up two different onboarding templates to meet their needs, and were able to include employee handbook acknowledgment as part of the process, eliminating the need to track down each new hire to check whether they had opened the handbook.

“GTM’s platform allows small businesses like ours to fill in gaps in our HR processes,” said Murphy. “Their technology takes any HR stressors away from our office staff.”

Customized reporting
As a unique business, the ValleyCats have unique reporting needs. They need to track uniform sizes so they can do seasonal orders. They also need to track payroll costs per night, per game, which can be complicated in the case of a double-header. isolved provides reports that lets the organization simply choose a date and see profit and loss based on attendance.

Exceptional local service and support
GTM’s accessible and knowledgeable account support team provides dedicated, high-touch service when the ValleyCats need any type of assistance. They appreciate the immediate response they receive from their dedicated service representative.

“GTM has the products and service to help us become a more efficient and productive business,” said Murphy. “Using GTM benefits our business and grows our relationship with other local companies.”

Conclusion
With GTM Payroll Services, the ValleyCats have streamlined their processes and have full control over their employee data. isolved lets Rick and his staff focus on running the team instead of worrying about payroll and HR issues. And as their business grows, they trust GTM to grow with them. The isolved platform can expand right alongside, backed by a dedicated service and support team who will be with them every step of the way.

“Our staff is really enjoying the isolved system,” Murphy says. “Partnering with a local company is beneficial if they have the technology and service to meet your needs, and that’s what we have with GTM.”