Neil Duguid, Business Consultant and Chairman of Henley Information Systems, on responding to the need for an effective payroll solution for furloughed employees in the construction industry.

When the UK government introduced a job retention scheme to support people through the Covid-19 lockdown, it delivered a lifesaver for many workers but a knotty problem for payroll managers; especially those working in the construction industry.

We have many clients in this sector who pay employees weekly and who require a solution, fast. In the last few weeks I have spoken to companies who have tried to apply changes manually – and have ended up making incorrect payments – and others in searching of an integrated approach.

In the last week, we have responded to this demand with a new solution which can be adapted and applied to the COINS Payroll Configuration.  We can implement this reconfiguration for clients or they can install it themselves for free using our supporting documentation. The system reduces the chances of making incorrect payments and even tracks and reports on the exact amounts that your organisation can claim as a grant.

All the work can be completed remotely with training and walkthroughs conducted using video-conferencing and for most sites installation is likely to be less than two man-days. Of course, this can vary depending on the age and complexity of your payroll, and we offer ongoing support after installation

Henley Information Systems has been a COINs partner for over 12 years and I was part of the original team that built this extraordinary one-stop-shop software solution for the building trade.  COINs is widely used across the industry and we hope our innovative solution will support struggling payroll teams to implement this crucial government job retention scheme effectively so that furloughed construction workers can receive their correct pay on time.

You can find more about our new COINS Payroll Configuration or contact me at neil.duguid@HISL.co.uk or lindsey@hisl.co.uk