As a follow-up to our last blog, "Building a Vendor Management System in Healthcare Staffing," describing a brief history and current state of Vendor Management Systems in the healthcare staffing industry, we will take a look at some of the operational nuts and bolts in its application in the healthcare environment.

Operationally, the most ornery step in providing a seamless integration for a VMS in the healthcare staffing industry is collection of time and attendance. Accurate accounting for the hours worked, where they were worked, and by who is where variables are invariable! There is currently a continuum of methods in the marketplace for the accumulation and accounting for time and attendance. At one end of the spectrum is the age-old practice of paper time sheets, signed off and recorded at the client facility, and copied to the VMS and employer.  This is not the most accurate or efficient method, but may be a requirement of the client or facility. On the other end of the continuum is the electronic capture of time worked, which includes location of services rendered, and of course flags for rates of pay, overtime, shift differentials, and any other system-generated criteria.

Automation

The desire for fully automated time tracking has significant benefit to all parties, but requires extensive planning prior to introduction. The best solutions to this type integration typically require contracted labor to be accounted for in the same manner as the clients’ regular staff. The philosophy is that if the current time and attendance systems are adequately managing the primary workforce, they can be used to monitor the contingent workforce as well, eliminating the need for endless faxing or emailing of time documentation back and forth from client to VMS.

Although this type of integration provides real-time cost accounting down to each cost center, it requires some modification of the clients existing electronic transfers of data. Most time and attendance packages on the market today provide mapping for non-permanent, temporary personnel, but these settings must be mapped differently for integration with most human resource packages and VMS solutions. Our experience has shown that time spent on the front-end with a client to seamlessly integrate the time and attendance data with the VMS solution pays for itself over and over again with efficiency and elimination of billing issues.