Streamlined Salary System

Sopra Group's award winning work with McDonald's UK MIS team and the Payroll department to support and enhance the existing payroll solution has provided a more time-efficient and cost-effective system. 

With an average of 45,000 staff being paid every fortnight, it is essential to maintain a robust and flexible payroll system that continues to ensure payment in a correct and timely fashion.  The enhanced payroll system has transformed a previously labour intensive process into a highly efficient and robust key business system saving the payroll department two days each fortnight.

Background

Since the first restaurant was opened in 1955 in the United States, McDonald's has grown to become a household name, with a total of 30,000 restaurants worldwide serving an estimated 46 million customers every day.  In the UK alone the company now has 1250 restaurants nationwide, employing around 45,000 hourly-paid staff. 

A further 3500 staff are involved in restaurant management and Head Office duties, and approximately 25,000 more are employed by one of the 450 franchisees around the country.  Despite its massive penetration in the UK fast food market, McDonald's continues to grow at a rapid rate and around 60 new restaurants.

Situation

As the business continues to grow rapidly, so too does the role for IT.  Staffed by 17 permanent employees, the MIS team must juggle priorities to ensure that it continues to meet the demands of the business and to deliver an optimum service to its customers.

Faced with the challenge of limited resource and an increasing workload, McDonald's has chosen to focus the in-house team on essential areas such as business analysis and project management.

McDonald's has long since adopted the approach of establishing business relationships with specialist organisations that can provide quality based, complementary and cost effective services.

With in excess of 20 different supplier relationships however, it was recognised that there was a need to consolidate and focus on two or three partnerships with organisations that could develop an in-depth understanding of the business and deliver real value.

Sopra Group was chosen to partner with McDonald's to identify areas where Applications Management could deliver the greatest benefits in terms of cost, efficiency and effectiveness.  Initially, the top priority was identified as the AS/400 payroll application "Payplan".

Solution

Taking over the development and support of Payplan required a partner with experience and the ability to learn quickly.  Based on recommendations and track record, McDonald's invited three companies to tender, including Sopra Group.

Steve Tiley, Head of MIS at McDonald's, said: "Our primary objective was to migrate all Payplan support issues away from key staff within MIS and instead encourage customers to deal directly with our chosen partner. 

Part of our review process, therefore, involved a thorough assessment of the support desk facilities provided by the three organisations.  We also took a close look at the development teams of each and approached several reference sites before finally choosing Sopra Group."

After the in-depth evaluation, Sopra Group was selected – a choice that continues to pay dividends for McDonald's and the MIS department in particular.  Having successfully enhanced and supported Payplan since 1998, Sopra Group was invited to provide support and development services for a number of other applications at McDonald's.

Jon Clayton, Senior Account Manager at Sopra Group, spoke about the implementation of the support service: "It was clear from the outset that the McDonald's team had a strong picture of what they required and we worked closely with them to ensure that their needs were met.  We spent time gaining an understanding of their business and technical requirements and worked as a unit to help develop a workable solution."

Tracey Bolden, Project Manager at McDonald's commented: "Our current internal resources are limited.  It was therefore essential that we worked with a team that understood our business requirements and could work with us to provide a robust service and ongoing support.  Sopra Group consultants have been invaluable in providing expertise and support and as a result they have truly become part of our team."

Key Benefits

McDonald's now receives a quality service, clearly defined in a service level agreement, which offers  a number of significant benefits, including:

• A quantifiable value for money service.
• Significant system and process enhancements. For example, previously all payslips were printed in-house on a fortnightly basis, collated manually and distributed to all employees.  System enhancements have enabled data to be sent directly to an external agency for printing and distribution, transforming a previously labour intensive job into a manageable task saving the payroll department two days each fortnight.  A scalable, flexible resource-pool with a greater breadth and depth of skills.
• An ability for the MIS team to focus on core business areas whilst delivering more benefits to the business.

The Future

Based on the success of the work to date, it is anticipated that a number of other areas will be identified where Application Management services will deliver considerable benefits to the McDonald's business.  The Sopra Group team will continue to work collaboratively with the McDonald's MIS Team and their customers, providing a consistency of approach and common working practices, regardless of the project, to ensure MIS continues to meet and exceed its customers' expectations.