Success story:
PTSB

PTSB, formerly Irish Life and Permanent plc, is a leading provider of retail and SME banking in the Irish market, with 2,500+ employees servicing more than 1 million customers.

Operating exclusively in the Republic of Ireland through a network of 78 branches, PTSB has been providing mainstream transactional banking, lending, saving and deposit taking services for over 200 years.

PTSB is regulated by the Central Bank of Ireland.

The HR team at PTSB were completing tasks on Excel spreadsheets and numerous siloed systems. This was a time-consuming and manual process, posing a high risk of errors and potential compliance challenges in adhering to financial industry regulations.

PTSB was already using our in-house payroll software, PeopleXD Payroll – previously part of CoreHR before they were acquired by The Access Group – which was more than meeting their business needs. So, when PTSB made the strategic decision to seek cloud-based HR software, our all-in-one integrated PeopleXD HR and Payroll suite was selected as the ideal system to meet their needs. 

Access PeopleXD was within budget, scalable, and integrated with their current payroll solution in a secure, unified platform.

Prior to implementing the People Management module, the Access People team worked collaboratively with PTSB to undertake an enhanced audit, to ensure all security and compliance requirements were met, to help them meet strict industry regulations, whilst avoiding interference with PTSB’s day-to-day IT infrastructure.

Access PeopleXD’s foundational module People Management covered all the firm’s core HR needs, from employee data, organisational charts, working hours and salary.

As PeopleXD offers limitless growth, PTSB could also continue building their HR software suite, never having to input the same data twice, to meet their future challenges and requirements.

In 2019, after experiencing challenges with employees booking leave, PTSB invested in Access PeopleXD’s Workforce Management module to improve their holiday and absence management processes; enabling their employees and managers to submit, track, and manage attendance, sickness, absence and leave entitlements, all on one system.

Prior to this, employees at PTSB had to email managers to book holidays, which often caused delays and frustrations. Holidays and absences would then get recorded in an Excel spreadsheet, with different managers filling it in in different ways.

Since the introduction of Workforce Management, employees can self-serve and take control of their holidays and leave without having to chase for approval. Managers can save time manually overseeing absences, and errors associated with this task have now been reduced. As all employee data is stored in their secure, cloud-based system, PTSB managers can also get access to real-time reports to help them more effectively monitor and manage leave and absence across the business.

“The Access Group is an innovative and forward-thinking company, and these qualities are reflected in the PeopleXD software. Over the last 20 years of being a customer, they’ve continuously evolved the product and seamlessly delivered countless upgrades, improvements, and enhancements, ensuring we always have the best user experience for our employees,” says Sonya Nevin, HR Data & Technology Manager at PTSB.

PTSB is also able to personalise the system with their branding, helping them to further improve the employee experience. This flexibility includes the ability to customise the graphics on their log-in page to raise awareness of topical workplace themes that are important to the business and its people, such Fraud Week, diversity, inclusion, and Pride.

During the pandemic, PTSB recognised the need to enhance their internal communications for employees wherever they were working, as well as enhance their self-service offering for employees. 

“We’re committed to promoting a healthy work-life balance at PTSB, and when we found out about the PeopleXD mobile app’s capabilities, we knew it would support us with reinforcing this culture,” says Sonya.

The Access PeopleXD mobile app enables PTSB employees to access their data, book holidays and view and download their payslips at any time and from wherever they are.

“The Access People team were brilliant at guiding us along the way to ensure a successful launch in less than 5 months and during lockdown. As we’re heavily regulated, we had a lot of questions along the way but no question was too problematic or inconvenient for the Access People team to answer. The responses were clear, quick, and helpful. We worked closely together in partnership, which was why we had such a successful launch,” continues Sonya.

The Access People team worked closely with PTSB to ensure they continued to meet necessary regulations, from a security governance and data protection perspective.

PTSB has a named Customer Success Manager and Support Agents as part of the Premier Customer Support Plan, who work with the HR team to make sure they’re getting the support they need to achieve their goals. As part of this plan, PTSB also has a training and consultancy allowance to further support them with their strategic objectives.

“Since investing in the Premier Customer Support Plan, our relationship has gone from strength to strength. The Access People team are brilliant at supporting and updating us. It’s with their support and dedication that we really look forward to continuing our journey with Access People,” says Sonya.

Over their time as an Access customer, PTSB has scaled their PeopleXD system to include our Payroll, People Management, Recruitment, and Workforce Management modules, and also use our Access Career Development software to support employee development.

The Access Group's HCM division, Access People, offer an unrivalled suite of solutions for businesses, including HR and Payroll, Absence Management, Workforce Management, Compliance, Recruitment, Talent, Learning, Employee Benefits and Engagement, Health & Safety, all of which are underpinned by the powerful Access Workspace platform. 

The Access Group is one of the leading providers of business management software to small and mid-sized organisations in the UK, Ireland, and Asia Pacific. We help over 100,000 customers across commercial and not-for-profit sectors become more productive and efficient.