Bolton Wanderers

The Challenge.

Better control and insight into game day labour costs and hotel labour spend
Flexible solution to track employees who work different types of shifts with different pay grades
Improve employee engagement with their casual workforce and reduce time spent manually finding cover for shift gaps.
Free up admin time being spent on schedule creation, cross-checking time sheets and inputting payroll

The Solution.

Unprecedented visibility into labour spend across both the stadium and the hotel, facilitating better budgeting and forecasting for the management team.
A flexible solution that considers different pay grades for different roles - Rotageek now makes it much easier to track this and pay workers correctly.
Employees can drop, swap and pick up shifts to suit their personal schedules, in a simple-to-use app
Schedule and timesheet processes are faster and integration into IRIS HR & Payroll, streamlines payday processes

Bolton Wanderers Football Club, established in 1874, holds the pride of being one of the oldest football clubs in England. With a rich history and a dedicated fan base, the club boasts a 29,000-seat stadium and 125-room hotel on site. With the constant possibility of a chance at promotion, Bolton Wanderers came to Rotageek with a need to improve its outdated incumbent workforce management solution for their 200 permanent employees and 500 casual staff - needing a solution which would be able to scale and cope with increased demand across both its stadium operations and hotel management.

Given the nature of Bolton Wanderer's operations, characterised by fluctuating schedules and reliance on casual staff, managing rotas efficiently was imperative to the success of their business and enabling smooth operations on game days.

The management team relied on an outdated system that wasn’t being developed and invested in by their incumbent provider. This meant they were spending too much time creating schedules that weren’t optimised to their fluctuating visitor demand, and resulted in them spending lots of admin time cross-checking hours worked vs timesheets submitted to payroll.

Given the majority of casual staff making up their workforce, increasing employee engagement was a key objective hoping to be improved with a workforce management solution. They were keen for their casual workers to be able to easily pick up, drop and swap shifts with other colleagues, as well as make it simple for them to report absence to mitigate no-shows and being short-staffed on event days. In addition, finding shift cover was a manual task, resulting in the management team's time being spent calling, texting and emailing staff to fill shift gaps.

Another key area for concern was being able to control costs in the on-site hotel. With similar fluctuating visitor numbers to the stadium, it was imperative to have the ability to control their labour costs in the hotel, all from one solution. Therefore, the club sought to consolidate stadium and hotel rotas into a unified platform for streamlined management.

Furthermore, with the constant possibility of a league promotion leading to increased attendance and staffing requirements, scalability was a pressing concern. Seeking digital solutions to these internal operational challenges, Bolton Wanderers turned to Rotageek.

“Rolling out Rotageek has been revolutionary for our stadium and hotel operations. We have a clearer insight into game-day labour costing and labour spend in the hotel, and our casual workers are thrilled to have a solution that gives them better control over their schedules. It’s so simple to use - during rollout, we had barely any questions from our staff! The added bonus of the IRIS Cascade integration has freed up our payroll teams' time and allows us to be more flexible in what tasks we’re assigning to staff, as we know the different pay grades will be tracked in Rotageek. The Rotageek team has been so helpful and communication throughout the whole project has been excellent - couldn’t recommend them enough!”

Amy Capstick, Group Head of HR at Bolton Wanderers

Rotageek emerged as the solution to Bolton Wanderers' workforce management woes. Moving to Rotageek provided them with unprecedented visibility into labour spend across both the stadium and the hotel, facilitating better budgeting and forecasting for the management team.

By simplifying shift broadcasting to casual workers, Rotageek freed up managerial time previously spent on manually ringing, texting and emailing to find shift cover. This also helped engage their casual workforce, giving them the control to own their schedules and pick up and drop shifts that suited their personal schedules.

Having already deployed IRIS HR and Payroll (and Rotageek partner!), our established integrations into this solution resulted in streamlined payroll and leave management processes, eliminating manual data entry and cross-checking timesheets. Moreover, Rotageek’s flexibility enabled accurate tracking of varying roles and pay grades, ensuring fair compensation for employees for the shifts worked and tasks completed.

The time saved in creating rotas and filling shift gaps has been significant, empowering both managers and casual workers with a user-friendly cloud interface that can be accessed at any time, on any device for schedule management.

Rotageek was successfully implemented across the Bolton Wanderers estate, marking a transformative milestone in their workforce management strategy. Through the adoption of Rotageek, Bolton Wanderers Football Club has revolutionised its workforce management practices, paving the way for enhanced efficiency, cost savings, and scalability. By leveraging digital solutions tailored to their unique requirements, the club is poised to navigate future challenges with confidence, ensuring optimal performance both on and off the field.

We're thrilled to be working together and excited to see what the future holds for Bolton Wanderers FC and Rotageek!

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Rota Geek Limited is a company registered in England and Wales with the company number 06783810 and registered address of Unit 6 & 7, Foundry Court, Foundry Lane, Horsham, West Sussex, England, RH13 5PY

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