4 Hidden Costs of HRMS Self-Service

You’ve heard of the benefits of HRMS self-service, both the hard savings, such as reduction in staff cost, as well as the soft benefits like increased access to data and information needed to make better decisions. But HRMS Self-Service does involve business costs, and often they are not apparent at the outset. Prepare yourself for these hidden costs lurking behind your HRMS self-service implementation.

Recommended Reading: HRMS Self Service - Steps to Success

Employees Who Prefer 'the Old Way'

There will always be employees who prefer to conduct transactions person-to-person, rather than using HRMS self-service functionality. Even when you have the best change management in the world, you will still have employees who revert to the old forms process, or who call up their HR contact as a back door. Many companies do not acknowledge that these activities still happen which can cause them to miss disruptive workarounds and the costs involved.

Upper Management Employees Who Will Not Use HRMS Self-Service

At elite levels of the organization, upper management may have an assigned HR contact who handles such transactions in the current world. While some upper management may embrace the option, it would be remiss to suggest that HRMS self-service will automatically remove that level of service. This is another example of a workaround which not only disrupts HRMS processes, but can also undermine the system in view of employees lower down the hierarchy.

'Stuck' or 'Stalled' Transactions

Even with the most efficient process design, you’ll always have organizational changes or personnel shifts that will cause transactions to ‘fall out’ of the process. HRMS self-service does require administration and oversight. If you remove support resources from the process, it will be a nasty surprise and add costs to fix these issues.

Employees Who Misuse HRMS Self-Service

While the majority of employees in most companies will be able to use HRMS self-service functionality easily, there will always be a minority who misunderstand or misuse the functionality. For example, an employee who changes address repeatedly in the HRMS due to staying with friends or family, but who does not have proof of legal address will cause hassles via self-service that would not necessarily have be possible under the old system where the employee could speak to HR directly on address requirements.

HRMS self-service has numerous benefits. Hidden costs can derail those benefits, so be sure to consider all aspects holistically when implementing HRMS self-service.