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Try this at home: Ceridian provides seamless product support, security for telecommuters

As rising gas prices continue to siphon disposable income away from paychecks and work-life balance becomes increasingly tricky, more employees are opting to work from home. A 2006 online survey from Manpower Inc. confirms that 76 percent of respondents feel that rising gasoline prices impact their work-life balance. In a recent survey by True North Research, 80 percent of employees indicated they would like to work from home if their employer allowed it. Not only does working at home (or a virtual office) help employees offset costs associated with commuting to and working at the office, it can be a very important tool for ensuring continuity of operations, such as a disaster striking the corporate office.

"Ceridian has the ability to take networking information from our clients and put it into the Ceridian product or service application," explained Travis Bish, Ceridian technical infrastructure consultant. "When some of our customers' operations were recently hit by Hurricane Fay in Florida, they were pleased to have a built-in disaster recovery system because they were able to log in remotely and access payroll information."

Ceridian's application service model is designed to host Ceridian's payroll and HR services while giving clients' employees secure remote access to a Web page. The Web site allows work-at-home professionals to enter changes, such as those related to payroll, and also offers self-service features for telecommuting employees, any time of the day. By accessing the Internet via PC, laptop or cell phone, employees can log in and view their paycheck before they receive a paper check or deposit advice, sign up for training classes, make benefits elections and enter changes due to life events such as moving, getting married or adding a dependent.

"Our clients' employees are expected to be in the office certain hours each week. With the telecommuter-friendly flexibility that Ceridian provides for our hosted services and products, employees have the ability to go home and wrap up their work if the weather is bad or if a family situation requires them to leave the office. The advent of the Internet blew the lid on virtual access. An employee using Ceridian's hosted payroll services can take a grandparent to the hospital, use the hospital's business room, double-check the payroll and make sure employees get paid that afternoon."

High-tech safety net
Of course accessing all of this sensitive data from home or virtual office poses an important question: What are the security concerns with accessing confidential HR and payroll data away from the office? Ceridian has had to answer the question with regard to its own employees who work virtually. For example, a few of Ceridian's employees can be closer to the customers they serve when working from home and can better support them, making remote access of client data essential. Therefore, extensive security measures are in place to ensure that sensitive client data is protected when accessed remotely.

"We are incredibly concerned about the privacy of our clients' data," explains Bryon Miller, Ceridian risk and compliance manager. "Ceridian employees who telecommute or work virtually must connect to our hosted site via a virtual private network, which is a secured tunnel between the remote user and the Ceridian internal network. All data is encrypted to prevent any unauthorized users from gaining access to or viewing the information."

Security is also tightened by making sure that Ceridian employees with a laptop have whole disk encryption, which means all contents of a user's hard drive are encrypted to prevent unauthorized access.

For further security, user IDs are reviewed and passwords must be changed on a regular basis. A Ceridian user's access level is also checked to verify that it is appropriate for the job an employee performs, since an employee could have changed jobs or have new job responsibilities.

"Ceridian employee access to both Ceridian and client data systems and data is based on need to know and least privilege," Miller adds. "If I need to access the data to do one task, I don't get the keys to the kingdom. I get access to perform that task and that task alone. Also, from a payroll or HR perspective, if the data has been deemed at a certain level of sensitivity, it will not be accessible by a remote user.

"When it comes to security, new vulnerabilities can pop up at a moment's notice. Ceridian knows that it is critical to maintain a protected environment as they are identified. A lot of companies are challenged with managing a data inventory and understanding what needs to be protected. On a regular basis, Ceridian maintains and reviews a data inventory by identifying all the data and how to better protect it. This lets us know who has access to data today and if that access is appropriate."

Experts agree that telecommuting and the virtual office are the future. Advances in portable, affordable technology will continue to drive a mobile and dispersed workforce. Contact a Ceridian representative to learn more about our suite of HR and payroll solutions that can provide your workforce with flexible, secure access, whether in the office or working from home.