Developing and Enhancing a Custom SaaS Platform for HR Management

A US-based company delivering a software as a service (SaaS) platform for managing HR administrative tasks reached out to Apriorit after receiving a positive reference from one of our existing clients. Together, we developed a Microsoft Azure-based SaaS human resource management platform.

Later, the client returned with a new request to enhance the platform with additional reporting functionality, new features, and support for different subscription types. The client’s main goal was to move away from using a third-party payroll management service and implement the needed functionality within their existing HR SaaS platform.

To assist our client with this challenging task, we set up a dedicated team of web development specialists with all the required skills. This team quickly prepared a detailed proposal and successfully implemented the project within the estimated time and budget.

The client: PDR Group

Payday Resources (PDR) Group is a US-based company with headquarters in Lehi, Utah. PDR provides a wide range of administrative services for effective employee management. In particular, they deliver online services for handling human resources, payroll, benefits, and taxes.

We started our collaboration long ago when PDR Group outsourced the development of their SaaS HR management platform to Apriorit. We delivered a reliable solution for professional consultants, allowing the company to combine and streamline all HR management, reporting, and related activities.

A few years into our partnership, the company decided to reach out to us with new requests for enhancing their product with new functionalities.

The challenge

Initially, the payroll management functionality in the client’s platform was powered by a third-party solution. PDR Group wanted to change that. 

Substituting a third-party component with a custom one would help them save on subscription costs and allow for better platform flexibility and smooth integration of more relevant features.

The client’s initial request was to build a new payroll management component that would include:

• Custom reporting functionality
• A new set of social security forms
• Support for new subscription types
• Numerous performance improvements

Later, the client requested our assistance with two more challenging tasks: building a custom payroll engine and building comprehensive invoicing functionality for their SaaS platform.

The result

PDR Group received the desired component and successfully integrated it into the existing platform. This component allows users to handle different payroll-related issues, from calculating payrolls to generating reports. It covers all important stages of the employee lifecycle and can be integrated with third-party services, enabling support for additional HR-related products such as accounting software.

Apriorit SaaS development professionals built the new payroll management functionality in accordance with the client’s vision and completely satisfied all technical requirements:

• Added support for different levels of access for different user groups
• Implemented several new payroll management and reporting features
• Introduced several types of reports and filtering options
• Improved overall system performance

Through further product enhancements, the Apriorit team assisted the client with expanding the capabilities of their SaaS platform for HR and payroll management, including developing and integrating new invoicing, reporting, and payment features.

Our approach

PDR Group had already decided on the technology stack for building their new payroll feature. Key technologies included AngularJS, ASP.NET, MS SQL, and Microsoft Azure. And since they knew about our expertise working with these technologies, their choice of Apriorit was obvious.

Once we approved the initial scope of work with the project stakeholders, we provided PDR Group with a dedicated development team possessing the required set of skills and level of expertise. At first, our team included several professional SaaS developers, a quality assurance specialist, a business analyst, and a part-time project manager. For further product enhancements, Apriorit adjusted the team upon the client’s request, involving more software engineers and QA specialists when needed.

How we did it

1. Business analysis

Since custom module development can be much trickier than it seems at the start, Apriorit began with project research and discovery activities.

First, our business analyst (BA) discussed different development strategies with the client and clarified all business requirements for the product. Then, our BA translated these requirements into clear technical specifications.

The role of the business analyst in this project included:

• Bridging the communication gap between business executives and developers
• Understanding business requirements and the client’s product vision
• Creating a clear set of specifications that accurately reflect the client’s requirements
• Further developing technical documentation for the project

Conducting business analysis before moving to development helped us to eliminate the risk of not meeting our client’s needs due to misunderstandings or communication barriers.

2. Custom component development

Once we had finalized the business analysis and agreed on a development strategy with the client, our team started to work on the requested features and the SaaS platform for HR itself.

In particular, Apriorit’s team focused on:

• Preparing employee data needed for payroll reports
• Importing old data from a third-party payroll solution
• Generating payroll reports in different formats

The upgraded system was supposed to include a number of human resource management software features that would improve the overall user experience and make the platform comply with industry standards and regulations. Our focus was on reporting functionality that wasn’t present in the original version of PDR Group’s SaaS application. Once enhanced with our new component, the platform could generate and work with standard types of reports requested by the client. These were mostly focused on payments for taxes, employee benefits, and insurance.

After implementing the new reporting functionality, Apriorit specialists also upgraded access rights for existing user groups. In this way, we ensured both proper functioning of the platform and data security.

Finally, Apriorit developers needed to make sure that all data as well as existing clients were safely moved from the old payroll database (stored in a third-party solution) to the new client database. We transferred all critical data to the new database without any issues.

3. Product enhancements

When the client decided to expand their platform’s functionality, they approached us with a new request. They wanted to adopt the SaaS platform as their primary payroll and invoicing tool, enhancing its potential to streamline their financial operations.

To fulfill the client’s request, our team created a robust payroll engine and comprehensive invoicing functionality within the platform, tailored to the client’s unique requirements. Their HR SaaS software now covers the entire payroll management process, from processing payroll to invoicing, handling ACH operations, and reissuing stale checks, providing a complete and reliable solution for managing all aspects of payroll and financial operations.

Aside from this task, the Apriorit team has continually enhanced the product, ensuring it remains at the forefront of payroll and invoicing technology. For example, Apriorit engineers added the ability to generate yearly and quarterly tax reports for submission to the IRS, as well as integration with sophisticated MasterTax payroll tax software. These features have significantly improved the efficiency and accuracy of the platform’s tax-related processes.

We’ve also integrated the client’s product with Plaid, a data network and payments platform. This integration allows company owners to automatically and securely link their bank accounts. Thus, our client managed to streamline financial management and enhance the overall user experience, offering a seamless and secure way to handle invoicing.

The impact

Outsourcing SaaS platform development helped PDR Group receive the exact solution they wanted, lowering costs and reducing development time in the long run. Thanks to the new features and improved performance of the SaaS HR management system, our client saw a 20% increase in new business. They were also able to stop using expensive third-party solutions, as their own platform now had all the necessary functionality.

A dedicated Apriorit development team was able to deliver a complete product on time and within budget, leaving the client satisfied with our work.

Continued development and enhancement of the platform have allowed our client to maintain a competitive edge. The Apriorit team remains committed to supporting the client’s product, ensuring it continues to meet the evolving needs of the company and the industry.

The next big step in updating the client’s SaaS HR platform was migrating it to Angular, which we describe in a separate post.