Choosing HR software for a South African employer

HR software keeps the record of each person who works for you: who they are, what they were hired to do, what leave they have, what they were told and when. In South Africa that record is also your evidence. If an employee goes to the CCMA, the leave balance, the signed contract and the date of a warning are what you produce. The software you choose decides whether that record is easy to find or impossible to defend.

HR and payroll are different products

HR software holds people, leave, documents and, in some products, performance reviews and hiring. Payroll software works out pay, tax and the returns that follow. Some vendors sell both, some sell one and connect to the other, and some HR products run payroll only for their home country. Decide first which you are buying. If payroll is separate, see a payroll software checklist.

1. Leave by South African rules

Leave is where a product built abroad most often fails a South African employer. The BCEA sets minimum annual, sick, family responsibility, maternity and parental leave, with their own cycles. A product that assumes a calendar year and a standard five day week will misstate the balance of a part time employee or an employee in the first six months. Ask the vendor to show you how it accrues each type, and read BCEA leave: what HR software must accrue before the demonstration.

2. Does it talk to payroll?

If HR and payroll are two systems, the same facts live in both: a new employee, an increase, a resignation, a week of unpaid leave. Each fact entered twice is a chance for the two to disagree, and the employee who is paid wrongly is the one who notices. Ask whether the product connects to the payroll you use, what moves across automatically and what you capture again.

3. Built for which country?

Check where the vendor says its product was built to work. The HR sector page records which products state support for UIF, BCEA leave and POPIA on their own pages, and HR software sold in South Africa lists the ones with a South African presence. A product that does not state them may still handle them, so ask, and ask to see it work. Some products state that their payroll or benefits add ons are for employees in their home country only. That is not a flaw in the HR part of the product, but it is a reason to pair it with South African payroll.

4. Personal information

HR software holds the most sensitive information in the business: ID numbers, bank details, salaries, sick notes and disciplinary records. Some of it is special personal information under POPIA. The questions in POPIA and your software vendor apply with more force here: where the data is stored, who can see it, how access is limited by role and how long it is kept after an employee leaves.

• Can a line manager see their own team's leave without seeing anyone's salary?
• Can you attach a medical certificate to a day of sick leave and limit who sees it?
• Is there a log of who viewed or changed an employee's record?
• Can you delete or anonymise a former employee's record when you are allowed to?

5. What it costs for each employee

HR products are usually priced per employee per month, so the bill grows with your headcount. Many sell a core plan and then add modules, such as timesheets, performance and recruitment, each with its own price. A few set a flat monthly minimum for small companies, which makes a small team cost more per head than a large one. Price the modules you will actually use, for the headcount you expect in a year, on the footing you pay. See including and excluding VAT.

6. Documents and records

The BCEA expects employers to keep records of time worked, pay and leave for three years. Check how the product stores contracts, warnings, letters and policies, whether employees can sign electronically and whether you can pull an employee's whole file in one go. If you are a designated employer under the Employment Equity Act, ask whether it can report on the information you must submit each year.

From the checklist to a shortlist

1. List the five things the product must do for you, such as leave, onboarding documents and a link to your payroll.
2. Open the HR sector page and read which products state BCEA leave and UIF.
3. Price each for your headcount and your modules, with VAT on the same footing.
4. Put two or three through a trial with a real part time employee and a real leave request. See how to test software in a free trial.