Customer background

A leader in the media sector in Africa, whose digital satellite television offering has brought about a revolution in the home entertainment industry across the continent, giving it a true pan-African presence, currently uses the nuQ payroll system in seven countries in Africa and is looking at rolling out in more countries.

Business situation

When xpedia applications was approached in 2005 to provide a payroll solution for the client, the requirements were neither unique nor complex. Yet, the payroll systems that could address the requirements were few. A solution was needed that would address the varying nature of statutory requirements across seven African countries (Botswana, Ghana, Kenya, Namibia, Tanzania, Uganda, Zambia) whilst providing for certain company-wide standards to be implemented and enforced across all countries. Central control and support for payroll operations outside of South Africa from the head office in South Africa was also a pre-requisite.

Solution

Over a period of five months, xpedia applications and the client joined forces to implement nuQ in these African countries. Much of the implementation was handled by xpedia applications in South Africa, with the client taking the responsibility for the final roll-out to each country, thus building valuable competencies to facilitate future in-house support. The local office in each of the seven countries can now run their own payroll, with support provided by the head office in South Africa. Each country’s payroll setup is unique to cater for the statutory requirements of varying tax authorities, but they’re all based on the same template to ensure consistent standards and reporting.

Benefits

Today, the client runs the nuQ payroll system, designed to be global, to pay employees in operations in seven different countries. Since the same system is used in all seven countries, the client has been able to build a high level of in-house competency at head office to coordinate and support payroll processes with resultant gains in efficiency. Support staff at head office are in a better position to identify and resolve problems early, while management enjoys consistent and accurate reporting from all countries. In-country payroll administrators reap the benefits of more accurate calculations than ever before and of a system that automates a lot of the menial tasks previously done by hand.