Welcome to the Toolbox Times
A quarterly newsletter from the HRToolbox Team, Issue 1 - August 2002

Thank you for reading the very first HRToolbox Newsletter. The purpose of this quarterly newsletter is to communicate current events, preview upcoming enhancements to our services, and share a few tips & tricks to help our clients make the most of our tools.

We hope you enjoy this issue of the Toolbox Times!

Client Spotlight - Bombardier, Inc.
Learn how we helped Bombardier, Inc. implement a global reporting solution and helped them tackle year-end tax reporting issues for 600 expatriates scattered around the globe with 24 administrators in 4 different countries.
Read More >>>
Upcoming HRToolbox Events
Plan for upcoming education sessions or stop by and visit us at a local executive briefing. Read More >>>
Planned Updates
Preview some of our planned enhancements and new features. Read More >>>
Did You Know?
Tips & tricks for getting more out of our tools and services. Read More >>>
Comments & Feedback
If you have any comments or feedback on the content or any ideas for upcoming issues, please feel free to contact:

Mary Weaver Shonda Wilbourn
mweaver@hrtoolbox.com srwilbourn@hrtoolbox.com
(770) 481-2109 (770) 481-2192
 
Toll-Free Number: 1-877-478-6652

    Client Spotlight
BOMBARDIER, INC.
Bombardier Aerospace - "Ideas that Fly"
"We desperately needed to be able to have one source of information [including a] single place to store the expenses reimbursed to expats as well as taxable benefits. We wanted to have HRToolbox for reporting at year-end and to make sure we were tax compliant in all countries with expats."

Suzanne Bernard

The Team at Implementation of Bombardier Aerospace
(Pictured above from left to right) Back Row: Debra Teelucksingh, Sandra Storey, Suzanne Bernard, Linda Pinion, Sylvain Lebire. Front Row: Mary Weaver, Valerie Gauthier, Debra Burton


Have you heard of the Lynx Snowmobile? No? Well what about Sea-Doo Watercraft? Or certainly you’ve heard of Learjet? These three names have a common factor – they are products of Bombardier, HRToolbox’s Spotlight Client. Bombardier, Incorporated is a Canadian corporation active in the fields of aerospace, rail transportation equipment, recreational products and financial services. It operates plants in 35 countries in North America, Europe and Asia, and more than 90% of its revenues are generated outside Canada. A division of Bombardier Incorporated, Bombardier Aerospace is the world's third largest civil airframe manufacturer and the leader in regional airliners, business jets and amphibious aircraft. Headquartered near Montreal International Airport, Bombardier Aerospace is an internationally integrated organization with full design and production operations at Canadair and de Havilland in Canada, Learjet in the United States and Shorts in the United Kingdom.

In May 1999, Etienne Brodeur, Senior Compensation Director, attended the annual ORC JointRoundtable conference in Longboat Key, Florida. At the conference, Etienne observed the HRToolbox suite of services and ideas began to fly. This tool was of particular interest to him, because it provided a single source to collect accurate, real-time data that could be shared between the expatriate administrators in his company. With administrators in different locations, this was extremely important. Ultimately, HRToolbox would provide an avenue for all entities within Bombardier, Incorporated to share data, streamline reporting, and create up-to-date compensation packages. Even better, this solution was cost effective and currently available. And so began the relationship between Bombardier, Incorporated and HRToolbox.

Etienne, along with David Payet-Pigeon, implemented HRToolbox in the Bombardier Transportation division in August 2000. Etienne also spurred another division, Bombardier Aerospace, to do the same. In February 2002, Suzanne Bernard of Bombardier Aerospace, was named as team leader for the HRToolbox implementation. This team included members from Wichita, Toronto, and the United Kingdom. Suzanne was excited to implement this new system as she explains, “We desperately needed to be able to have one source of information” including a “single place to store the expenses reimbursed to expats as well as taxable benefits. We wanted to have HRToolbox for reporting at year-end and to make sure we were tax compliant in all countries with expats.”

Suzanne coordinated meetings and conference calls in preparation for the on-site workshops and diligently worked, along with her team, to gather the necessary data for population of the database. In May 2002, HRToolbox participated in meetings to complete the team’s final educational session. Throughout implementation, the Bombardier Aerospace team noticed certain areas of their expatriate tracking that would require more attention. Suzanne says, “We have transitioned from tax protection to tax equalization recently and we have now found out that the compensation module would be a great tool to help in day-to-day tracking of the compensation elements.”

The results speak for themselves. Today, Bombardier, Incorporated has 24 administrators tracking 600 employees in HRToolbox.

Our relationship with Bombardier, Incorporated continues to grow thanks to Etienne, Suzanne and the entire Bombardier team. We are currently preparing to implement HRToolbox in Europe for Bombardier Transportation. An additional 10 administrators located in 7 countries will use HRToolbox to track 180 employees.

We look forward to working on many projects in the future.

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Upcoming HRToolbox Events
    Tuesday, October 1, 2002
8:30am - 4:30pm, Continental breakfast and lunch will be served

Compensation and Reports Workshop


Would you like to learn more about the compensation and reporting tools available in your HRToolbox database? Would you like a hands-on demonstration of the major release scheduled for September?

You’ll learn…
  • How to more effectively manage compensation templates and worksheets
  • How to process worksheet payments for better payment tracking
  • How to set criteria to produce valuable management reports
  • How to use new reporting features to be included in the September release such as Report Favorites, security/access reports and custom family reports
We’ll also have a question and answer session to discuss other topics of interest.

Cost for this full day workshop is $500. Registration deadline is August 30th. This workshop will be rescheduled if we do not have a minimum of three participants.
     
    Wednesday, October 2, 2002
8:30am - 11:00am, Continental breakfast will be served

"Doing More with Less": An Executive Briefing


How will you meet the global human resource needs of your organization with less time and fewer resources? Specifically, how will you simplify processes such as assignment tracking, immigration management and compensation planning?

You’ll learn…
  • The benefits of having a single source for recording, tracking and reporting on expatriate/international employee information.
  • Why immigration “how—to” is so important since 9-11 and how the rules have changed.
  • How you can analyze your current global policies regarding taxation and compensation to save $$$.
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Planned Updates
Here is a preview of items to be included in future releases:

  • A Question and Answer forum in which you can post questions for other clients to view and answer or post those questions that you would like only HRToolbox to view and answer.
  • Ability to report based on multiple fiscal years
  • Ability to produce custom family reports
  • Client access to an administrator usage report
  • Screen for deleting inactive employees
  • Multiple webLINK enhancements
  • Secure, limited access to the Custom Report Writer for those administrators that do not need full access for reporting purposes
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Did You Know?
Tips & tricks for getting more out of our tools and services.
  • The next HRToolbox Quarterly Release is scheduled for mid-September.
  • If you enter the incorrect password five times in a row you would be locked out of HRToolbox. This is a security feature to prevent unauthorized users from using your login id. If you are locked out, contact Mary Weaver or Shonda Wilbourn to have your password reset.
  • The HRToolbox Database works best and the speed of access is greatest when using Internet Explorer 5.5 or higher. If you are currently using Netscape as your Internet browser, consider switching to Internet Explorer.
  • HRToolbox can transfer employee data to/from your other HR systems. Data that is typically transferred includes employee demographic data and payment data.
  • You can access the Release Notes and Training Guides directly in your HRToolbox database. To access these documents, go to the Home Documents section of your database.
  • You can calculate scenario compensation worksheets prior to sending someone on an assignment. You simply need to create an employee record by entering and saving the first and last name. Then create a compensation worksheet in “Scenario” status to generate assignment allowances and net compensation.
  • HRToolbox offers an Employee Self-Service module, a Taxation module, a Relocation module, as well as a Global Human Resource Database. Call Linda Pinion at (770) 481-2106 for more details.
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