Oracle Payroll Implementation for West Midlands Railway

On being awarded the franchise, WMR discovered that the previous operator did not have a separate payroll system that could be handed over to them. Due to the short turnaround time from the previous operator to WMR, there wasn’t enough time to set up a new payroll system. The consequence is that any delay in payments, especially for the drivers, could bring the rail network to a halt.

As a solution, WMR and the franchise’s previous operator agreed that the previous operator would run the payroll for WMR for up to twelve months. This was delivered as a bureau service, allowing WMR to develop and implement a new payroll system.

WMR chose to implement iTrent – a system designed for large company payrolls. With the historical and eclectic nature of differing employment contracts for staff going back several decades, customisation and practical flexibility of the iTrent system were key for the payroll system, particularly in terms of dealing with the complexities of different terms and conditions and individual contracts. However, it became clear that with 4 months until the live date, the iTrent payroll system would not be ready on time. This could result in WMR incurring significant extra costs to extend the bureau service.

WMR approached us to develop a solution that could be implemented quickly using Oracle E-Business Suite HR and Payroll. A typical solution like this could take up to twelve months to design and install, as it involves understanding the business requirements and configuring Oracle E-Business Suite to meet those needs.

Our solution was to host a copy of the previous operator’s E-Business Suite Payroll on Claremont Cloud and purge or anonymize all personal data unrelated to WMR. This would deliver a GDPR-compliant system holding only WMR’s staff details and contracts. The benefit of doing this was that all the payroll processes would be in place and would not have to be redeveloped, saving time and cost. This was not a standard Oracle approach, and we would have to build technical routines to complete the project.

WMR and the previous operator accepted this solution. Once the details of the project had been agreed upon by all sides, it was underway, with the deadline fast approaching. Against all odds and involving some long hours, we successfully delivered the project a few days before the deadline. WMR’s payroll team left on a Friday and came in on Monday and ran the December payroll without even noticing that the system had changed.