HR Software for Large businesses

Customer Services

When investing in our software our client’s expect to receive outstanding support. Cascade recognise this and take the support role we play extremely seriously. Cascade is committed to its clients based on a long term relationship and operate on a philosophy of co-operation and mutual partnership through solid relationships built through communication and understanding. We have a high level of client retention and a successful approach to upgrading our clients to new generations of our solutions, in fact many of our customers are now on their 4th generation Cascade product which is a testament to this philosophy.

We employ an experienced Client Services Team headed by our Client Services Director who implement our systems to your specifications. They are highly qualified IT professionals and pursue Continuous Professional Development.

Handover from Sales to Projects

During your pre sales process your Cascade Sales Executive will gather information regarding your requirements in order to ensure you receive the solution that will meet your specific needs. To accomplish this they may involve technical, project and support staff from our organisation at any stage.

This will result in a detailed proposal document, order schedule and written responses to any specifications of requirements you provide to us. We also provide this document as a confirmation of the functionality provided in our systems.

Once your contract is confirmed to Cascade the very first activity we undertake is to complete a detailed handover meeting from Sales to Client Services. This includes a detailed handover form that provides your Project Manager with full details of who you are, your company and what you have purchased. This is supported with copies of your proposal and order schedule as well as any other documentation referenced by them.

The proposal and order schedule represent the full and total description of what has been purchased. This is documented in these documents and we encourage clients to ensure that we have summarised any and all requirements that may have been previously discussed at any stage. These documents provide Client Services with the sum total of what they are to deliver to you.

This avoids any confusion at project stage and has resulted in a 100% success rate on projects for Cascade and our clients.

Once the handover is completed your Cascade Project Manager will contact you and initiate the project.

Project Methodology

It is essential that we provide the framework, processes, guidelines and techniques to manage the people and the workload that is incumbent with a modern IT project. A proven, quality controlled methodology ensures success and delivers accountability as well as improvement through review and evolution.

Our Client Services team includes project and implementation staff such as Project Managers, Implementation Consultants, Implementation Support Consultants and Trainers and is headed up by Cascade’s experienced Client Services Director.

Delivering Value

Cascade have a reputation for delivering projects on time, to budget and to specification. This means that achievement of project goals set out at pre sales, handover and project planning stages is absolutely key to us, vital in the long term success of our relationship with you, the client.

The Cascade project and implementation team will perform an essential role deploying the system within your organisation and will provide a seamless transition to our products from any legacy or in house solutions. The Cascade Project Manager will be allocated to you and will conduct a project initiation meeting which is designed to identify and document an agreed specification and project plan consisting of project milestones, key deliverables and responsibilities for both your project team and Cascade’s.

Your Project Manager will be your named contact throughout the project.

The specification meeting will be managed by our Project Manager who will be responsible for ensuring that all agreed conditions are met prior to hand over and final sign off.

The specification documents we produce at the start of a project are extremely detailed. This ensures that the testing procedures we carry out at the point of hand over are typically able to show that the system is working as specified. We do not typically find that any prolonged and costly program of post-installation work is required. However we can provide optional User Acceptance Testing if required.

Training

Quality user training is essential to any IT project. Gaining a detailed understanding of client requirements at pre sales, passing this knowledge to the Project Manager, Project specification meetings and detailed in depth project implementations are pointless if the users cannot make use of the end result of that work as they are not trained to use the system properly.

Cascade recognize this and have invested heavily in the development of a training plan and series of courses which are mixed to suit each client. Each course is flexible and can be configured to suit the specific requirements of users much like our system can.

Of course proven courses and infrastructure must be delivered in a friendly and professional, whilst knowledgeable and informative, manner and subsequently our Trainers are experienced and well trained, constantly reviewing the courses and being reviewed themselves to ensure the best possible user training is delivered to our clients.

We aim throughout to ensure you are self sufficient and proficient in every aspect of our systems. We believe, as a core value, that our clients should choose to purchase additional service days from us because they want to, not because they have not been trained sufficiently.

Of course our support desk is always available as is your Account Manager, both of whom are genuinely interested in everything you do with our systems.

Users will leave the courses empowered by their understanding of Cascade, feeling confident and enthusiastic about using the system to carry out their tasks and create reports. Training courses are designed to reflect how your organisation will be using Cascade, and where specific tasks are delegated to certain team members we can organise a special in-depth course on a certain module, such as Training, Recruitment or Payroll.

Training can take place at your offices, or off-site to suit your needs and the location of your team(s). For newcomers to your team, we can offer a one-off training session to bring them up to speed with the system and help them share the common language of Cascade.

Ongoing Support

Investing in a new HR and Payroll software solution can be daunting. Cascade is committed to delivering outstanding support to all clients and anybody who uses Cascade. At our Head Office in West Yorkshire, we have a support team who is dedicated to resolving customer queries. Queries may range from simple 'how do I do this?' queries through to more complex configuration or operational assistance, through to assistance with writing query reports, to full on technical IT support.

All support calls are logged and our systems help us monitor and escalate against SLA's (Service Level Agreements) to ensure timely responses, excellent communication and fast resolutions. We review and improve performance constantly and this is a key aspect of Directors management meetings which are held monthly.

We have remote support and diagnostics giving very fast issue identification and resolution.

As well as the help-desk you are allocated a dedicated account manager who will contact you throughout the year to ensure everything is running smoothly. We also have regular user-group meetings each year, giving you an opportunity to learn about forthcoming features and modules we are developing; to influence our future product features and development plans; and you get a unique opportunity to network with fellow HR professionals.

Our comprehensive support and maintenance service INCLUDES FREE UPGRADES to new releases of the products you have purchased. Any new features we introduce to each product are available to you at no extra costs. New features and good ideas come from people like you, i.e. our satisfied users. We have found that the people who use our system day-in, day-out have the very best ideas, and we welcome your feedback.

Account Management

When your system goes live your Project Manager will complete a handover meeting from the Client Services Team to your appointed Account Manager at Cascade. Your Account Manager is dedicated to existing clients and is not a Sales person from the new business team.

Once complete your Account Manager will contact you to make contact, introduce themselves and arrange an Account Initiation Meeting. This will involve a review of your implemented solution and a discussion, which will be documented, to confirm your plans to further develop your use of the Cascade system.

Your Account Manager will then support you in achieving the goals you have set out.

Cascade User Group

Feedback is essential to our success. Too many software developers develop systems based on the technology they want to use or the features that they want to include. At Cascade we actively seek feedback from our clients via our Account Management team, User Groups, feedback forms and also at project stage, through direct feedback to our Project Managers and Implementation Consultants.

Quality

For Cascade, Quality Control is critical in ensuring all our applications are robust, scalable and achieve high levels of performance. Cascade’s Quality Assurance department works very closely with Development, providing a structured approach to the testing of all new products and upgrades prior to their release.

Testing is not just limited to Cascade’s software. Testing is also carried out on our software against new operating systems, operating platforms and Microsoft packages to ensure their compatibility on all levels.

Any configuration performed for customers at their request are also rigorously tested before they are dispatched.

Our Internal Quality Procedures are also maintained by the Quality Assurance department to ensure a single company standard is met for all Cascade documentation and processes.