Research From Equifax Workforce Solutions Explores Onboarding Best Practices for Higher Education

New White Paper Highlights How Institutes of Higher Education Can Improve the New Hire Experience and Compliance With a School-wide Automated Onboarding Solution

ST. LOUIS, Sept. 3, 2014 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) -- Equifax Workforce Solutions, a leader in human resource, analytics and verification services, today announced the release of its latest white paper, "Onboarding Best Practices for Higher Education: Big Results Make the Grade," which examines how standardized and automated onboarding technology can help colleges and universities streamline their onboarding processes, reduce hiring costs, improve compliance and brand image, and achieve greater efficiency.

Institutions of higher education face significant and distinct challenges when onboarding new employees. A single college can hire thousands of new employees each year across multiple departments, campuses or of various citizenship statuses for different types of positions – including professors, administrative professionals and maintenance personnel, as well as full-time, part-time, seasonal, contingent and student workers. Given this diversity, and the numerous hiring managers and offices involved, the process of onboarding a new hire can become rife with complexity. Moreover, filling out new hire forms, such as I-9s, W-4s, employment contracts and confidentiality agreements, is often completed manually, which can be costly and time-consuming and introduce errors and compliance risks.

"Onboarding Best Practices for Higher Education: Big Results Make the Grade" explains how automated onboarding and compliance technology not only streamlines the completion of new hire paperwork, and thereby reduces costs and errors, but it can also help colleges and universities gain a consistent approach to their new hire and onboarding processes while significantly reducing compliance risks. This white paper focuses on the success that two universities, The University of Florida and Northern Arizona University, achieved in implementing Compliance Center from Equifax Workforce Solutions. As both universities hire thousands of new employees from across the employee spectrum each year, they attained significant process efficiency while reducing costs and time spent on their onboarding activities.

As a result of implementing Compliance Center, The University of Florida and Northern Arizona University reported significant improvements in their onboarding activities. For instance, The University of Florida was able to reduce the error rate in its new-hire paperwork from 68 percent to less than 5 percent. At Northern Arizona University, three months following implementation, 94 percent of administrative users stated that the solution had a positive impact on the new employee experience.

"A positive onboarding experience is often the key to making a strong impression on new hires and keeping employees engaged from the beginning and throughout their tenure," said Kristin Harty, vice president, Strategic Solutions – Education Vertical at Equifax Workforce Solutions. "This is especially true in the higher education space, where the sheer hiring volume and complex employment situations, combined with numerous hiring managers and departments, can make onboarding particularly challenging. Compliance Center is specifically designed to help colleges and universities transform their processes, giving new hires a completely digital onboarding experience that eliminates the burden of paperwork and ensures they can hit the ground running on their first day of work."

"Colleges and universities that rely on manual forms processing for their new hire paperwork not only spend a great deal of time and resources on this administrative work, but they also open themselves up to greater compliance risk," said Angela Lockman, vice president of Equifax Workforce Solutions. "Our Compliance Center gives employers in the higher education space and beyond a robust, automated tool to bring greater consistency to their hiring processes, helping them avoid the risk and penalties that can result when forms are completed incorrectly or not on time."

"Onboarding Best Practices for Higher Education: Big Results Make the Grade" is available for complimentary download at: http://insight.equifax.com/onboarding-best-practices-for-higher-education/.

About Equifax, Inc.

Equifax (NYSE:EFX) is a global leader in consumer, commercial and workforce information solutions that provide businesses of all sizes and consumers with insight and information they can trust. Equifax organizes and assimilates data on more than 600 million consumers and 81 million businesses worldwide. The company's significant investments in differentiated data, its expertise in advanced analytics to explore and develop new multi-source data solutions, and its leading-edge proprietary technology enable it to create and deliver unparalleled customized insights that enrich both the performance of businesses and the lives of consumers. Equifax Workforce Solutions (also known as TALX), an Equifax business unit, is a leading provider of human resource, data, analytics and verification services.

Headquartered in Atlanta, Equifax operates or has investments in 19 countries and is a member of Standard & Poor's (S&P) 500® Index.  Its common stock is traded on the New York Stock Exchange (NYSE) under the symbol EFX. In 2013, Equifax was named a Bloomberg BusinessWeek Top 50 company, was #3 in Fortune's Most Admired list in its category, and was named to InfoWeek 500 as well as the FinTech 100. For more information, please visit www.equifaxworkforce.com or www.equifax.com.

Note to editors: Trademarks and registered trademarks referenced herein remain the property of their respective owners.

CONTACT: 550 Peachtree Street, N.W.
         Atlanta, Georgia 30309

         Pam Stevens
         Equifax Workforce Solutions
         (314) 214-7235
         Pam.stevens@equifax.com

Equifax Inc. logo

Source: Equifax Inc.