Oyster Inn Case StudyThe world is your Oyster with Crystal Payroll.

John from Oyster Inn, a restaurant on Waiheke Island, is so glad to have made the switch to Crystal Payroll. Hear all about how Crystal Payroll has helped John make his payroll more flexible and cost-effective than ever.

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Testimony from Oyster Inn

Watch how Crystal Payroll makes payroll simple for Oyster Inn.

Josh and Helen Emett took over the ownership of the Oyster Inn on Waiheke Island, in 2020 – just before the Covid lockdown. So while it was a much-loved destination for the Emetts, the timing for the purchase wasn’t the greatest. All the same, they have emerged stronger and the Oyster Inn, along with its sister restaurant Onslow in Auckland city, now employ some 65 staff, ranging from salaried through to part timers, full time and casual.

During the Covid lockdown, John Williams, Business Manager for the Group, was keen to find savings with a view to sharing some of the restaurants’ success back with the staff. What he found was their existing payroll system was chewing into profits.

The problem was, we were using a system that was charging per employee, and that gets quite expensive when you pay weekly – like in hospitality everyone gets paid weekly.” Explains John.

Using the lockdown to do some homework, John checked out a few payroll systems and soon discovered Crystal Payroll was far more flexible than the other payroll systems out there. It was also one sixth of the cost!

Making the choice.

After having time to explore all that Crystal Payroll could offer, John decided to move both restaurants over to the new system. While some companies are nervous about losing their historical data, John found it a breeze.

I got Crystal Payroll to do the first migration and I was testing everything, and I did the second restaurant myself – it was really simple. That’s one of the things I love about Crystal Payroll – you can see how it’s calculating things. If you want to see what’s happening with the annual leave or the sick pay, it’s there…you can see how it’s calculated.”

Rolling out the app.

Giving staff access to their personal payroll information through the Crystal Payroll app is important to John and he’s looking forward to launching that feature.

We’re literally rolling it out over the next couple of weeks. Staff will be able to see their own payslips, their hours, when they’ve taken holidays, and how much they’ve got left. I think they’re going to be really excited about that.”

John’s also looking forward to not chasing staff for their leave applications and all those emails that float around the ether.

The main reason we use the app is to manage leave. It’s quite hard with 60 different employees. That’s a lot of employees to manage and ensure it’s all done properly.”

Making Payday filing a non-event.

“It just happens.” Says Johns with a grin. “It’s never been an issue , I don’t even know it exists, really. Crystal takes care of it and we’ve never had any issues with it for 16 months now. No IRD phone calls. No fines! “

Even if there were mistakes with the filing, John likes the fact that Crystal Payroll allows you to go back in and make subsequent changes even after you’ve filed.

A tip for the hospitality industry?

The whole hospitality industry has been through tough times and is not out of it yet – so every bit helps. For John Williams, he loves the flexibility Crystal Payroll brings and the fact it’s not costing the earth, plus it enables him to give his staff an automatic weekly incentive top-up – something that would be impossible to do manually.

But perhaps most important of all is the time Crystal Payroll is putting back on John‘s plate.

For me personally, the benefits with using Crystal Payroll are twofold: One we know that it’s done right and we’re taking care of our legal responsibilities. But two, we know that our staff are getting paid correctly and it’s not taking forever to do. I mean, literally it takes, an hour and a half to 2 hours a week for 60 employees. That’s quick.”