I would love to comment about Timetastic's customer service, but I have never had to use it. The program has very few glitches, provides vacation and leave information flawlessly, and meets my organizations leave management needs beyond what I hoped. I highly recommend this program.
Pros
My company used to have four different managers who received time off requests, but the managers did not always communicate the leave schedule with the rest of the organization. Chaos ensued. With Timetastic, those same four managers still receive their time off requests, but once approved, the leave is scheduled and there for the whole organization to see. I especially appreciate the feature allowing each employee to have a designated approval person within the organization, rather than defaulting to Timetastic admin. My employees also love having consistent, easy access to their vacation time information. Employees are able to see, understand, and access their vacation time, making it easier for them to use.
Cons
The settings feature is a bit confusing, but Timetastic continually heard and responded to improvement requests, making items like local holidays perfectly customizable. My one consistent criticism is that it sometimes takes a day for leave requests to sync with Google calendar, but that is a minor drawback considering the benefits of the program.
Rating breakdown
Likelihood to recommend: 10/10
- Shared holiday calendar means all managers can see who is in/out at a glance (integrates very nicely in google apps) - Our entire leave policy pretty much just references 'use timetastic' - The cost is very much worth the benefits
Pros
Timetastic was a big step up from our previous spreadsheet leave system. As the team expanded, it made it easy for us to have a 'proper' approval system for leave, avoid clashes between critical staff and scrap the rubbish paper calendar on the wall that no one ever bothered to look at!
Our leave booking is now simple, and there is no excuse for forgetting to mark your holiday. The calendar sharing means I can see at a glance who is out of the office. We also use Timetastic for signess leave and tracking who is out the office for sales trips and meetings (an extra bonus)
Cons
Some useful features are not there yet
- If some staff get extra holidays each year, this cannot be done automatically
- Holiday roll-over options are basic and may need manual tweaking at year end
- Moving your holiday year end is a nightmare as you effectively have to 'start again', entering all holidays by hand (though to be fair this is not something you do frequently)
Rating breakdown
Likelihood to recommend: 8/10
Its great to have so we know the whereabouts of the team as not everyone keeps an Outlook Calendar. Also people don't always have to ask me!! The guys are very efficient / on the ball at answering my questions.
Pros
Its great to have a picture of all team members and where they are - be it on leave, on site etc.
Easyish to use when people get the hang. Some people have trouble getting on in the first place (I think may be user error).
Good for resourcing (when used properly).
Cons
If we could have a bit more flexibility with leave etc. that has been input if we need to cancel just one day out of 7 for example. You need to cancel the whole request and resubmit.
More colours for categories would be good too.
Rating breakdown
Likelihood to recommend: 9/10
We use Timetastic to manage the whole companies leave and have done for years now. It's cheap and does exactly what it says on the tin. Wouldn't go anywhere else.
Pros
Timetastic is simple and quick to use. It doesn't make something that is need to be simple, complex which is important for a product of its type. It makes requesting and approving holiday easy and takes a lot of stress out of the management of the whole process. Not only is it easy to use but it is very cost effective compared to other choices.
Cons
I find that their API could be extended a little further as there are things that I think it's missing. A desktop app would also be a good thing for them to develop.
Rating breakdown
Likelihood to recommend: 10/10
The few times I've had occasion to contact them, the support team have always been quick to respond and very friendly. We've been using it for years and it's not hard to see why.
Pros
Timetastic is fast to use and easy to configure as an administrator. I'm responsible for a couple of teams and everyone loves how simple it is. I also like that you can subscribe to its calendars, so I'm always up-to-date on my teams' movements.
Cons
I'd like just a little more configurability around the types of "leave". For some workers we want to declare the days they're going to be in the office, so "leave" doesn't really apply there. I like that you can control whether a leave type is deductible from the overall total, but being to change how each "leave" type is described on-screen would be the finishing touch for me.
Rating breakdown
Likelihood to recommend: 8/10
$1 per user/month