Notes from — June 17, 2010
Human Resources Council Meeting
June 17, 2010
GCUA Offices, Duluth
Attendees:
Tish Fernandez from GCUA
Candace Marsh from CGUA
Romal Holder from MEA Federal CU
Jackie Cagle from Georgia’s Own CU
Cindy Boyles from Georgia’s Own CU
Jeff Smith from CU of GA
Sharon Smith from Southeastern FCU
Paula Kitchens from Augusta Metro FCU
Dee Dee Figueroa from MidSouth Community FCU
Bryttani Crawford from MidSouth Community FCU
Karen Pennington from Associated CU
Lana Beck from APCU
Melinda Corley from APCU
Kimberly Nichols from Phenix Pride FCU
Carol Wagner from LGE Community CU
This meeting was held at MEA Federal CU’s training room. In the roundtable discussion, topics varied as usual, and were as follows:
Health Care Reform – all of us are trying to decipher through the new health care reform and what it means for us and our CU? One individual spent some time researching and found that small employers (25 of less employees) may be eligible for a 25% rebate if they offer health insurance. Another CU has created a timeline to help manage the changes as they approach. The first change to impact employers will be allowing dependent children, up to age 26, to join the plan. This change goes into effect September 2010 but gives employers the option to wait until their January 2011 open enrollment. One CU will be holding open enrollment meetings in September to allow employees to take advantage of the change, all others will wait until their normal open enrollment to roll out the change.
Most of us are accessing SHRM to keep abreast of the changes; some also receive updates from Cuna Mutual Group.
Payrolls – one CU is converting from a monthly payroll to a bi-weekly. The conversion is taking up a lot of time and as expected, employees have questions. To ease the transition, all employees were paid an extra 8 hours of holiday pay for the Memorial Day holiday. The first pay date on the new schedule will be June 18.
Employee Recognition – one CU just started a “shout out” rewards program for the employees. It is an employee of the month program acknowledging a job well done. Each employee receives 4 a month to give out that month, at the end of the month, the employee with the most gets to spin the wheel where they can win prizes. The prizes consist of gift cards to local places (restaurants, retail) or CU money where they purchase logo items.
Another CU has employee to employee recognition as well as member to recognition.
One CU distinguishes 2 employees a year as a “shining star” and they are given a small reward. Additionally they are able to show off a crystal trophy for a 6 month time period.
Recruitment - there are résumés coming in but the process is still time consuming as you have to sort and interview more candidates to find the right fit. This CU runs AD’s in the AJC/Yahoo and uses word of mouth. Temporary agencies are utilized occasionally and some CU’s prefer the ‘temp’ route for some positions because you can test them out before you hire. The positive about this is you do not have the liability of employment and benefits. A few CU’s use the temp route for Collectors, all agreed that Collectors are hard to recruit for.
Conversion with ADP – we have mentioned several payroll providers in previous meetings, dealing with payroll providers can be an enormous task. One CU is converting to ipay statements, the HR portal and the GL interface. They are really looking forward to finishing with the conversion so they can see the many benefits of having the HR portal.
Patient Protection Act – most credit unions already have a space that they can designate for nursing mothers returning to work. This act will mandate that employers provide a place for expressing milk, other than a rest room.
Social Media – several CU’s indicated that they will be looking at adding or modifying their current policy. This is necessary because so many employees are tapping into different social media whether on/off the clock.
Job Descriptions – adding the physical requirements to each job description is highly recommended, some of us are actively working on getting these updated.
Donating leave – the question was asked if your CU allows donation of leave, what is your policy? Do you attach the hours or the pay rate to that time? It was agreed that the easiest and most common way was to donate hour for hour and not consider the hourly pay rate equivalent. A fair amount of CU’s have a policy in place and the donations are kept confidential and can strictly be used for designated FMLA or serious illness. Additionally, the person donating cannot take their balance below 40 hours available. Another stipulation is that donation of time cannot be solicited by employees; it must be a voluntary donation.
Wellness programs – one CU is working very hard to promote wellness, holding lunch and learns, blood pressure screenings, CPR classes, etc. They hope more employees become healthier and that the CU will have better claims experience and lower renewals. They have worked with the Fulton County Health Department and some of the activities have been free. They also include a raffle to encourage participation.
Employee morale – some CU’s offer discounted tickets to amusement venues such as the Atlanta Zoo, Stone Mountain, Six Flags. This does not cost the CU any money so it is a free way to save employees money for things that may have done anyway.
Personality profiles – a few CU’s utilize profiles when recruiting for new positions. One company that was mentioned was Profiles International and the cost can be $30 for a teller type profile or $150 for a management position. The CU finds this tool very valuable.
The next meeting with be held sometime September 2010 with location to be determined, does anyone want to volunteer their CU? Details will follow as the meeting gets planned.
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