Terra Firma automates HR onboarding with next-generation intelligence
INDUSTRY
Engineering
SCENARIO
Leveraging artificial intelligence and automated systems to reduce the HR admin burden around identity verification and information data capture.
KEY BENEFITS
- 60-second onboarding process for new employees
- Three-way biometric checks with the Department of Home Affairs and identity documents
- Reduced risk of identity fraud and a smoother onboarding process
INTRODUCTION
Terra Firma Solutions is the leading turnkey solutions provider of Solar PV systems, real-time smart metering systems for both electricity and water sustainability strategy development and performance monitoring, based in Cape Town, South Africa. The company is part of the JSE Listed Reunert group and a Level 2 BBBEE contributor.
The company offers comprehensive support, strategy, project implementation, and maintenance services and has decades of expertise building customer relationships and exceptional solutions. Due to constantly changing customer requirements, the firm has to onboard a significant number of new employees every month. The company struggled with time-consuming manual processes and the HR team wanted a solution that would make their lives easier and make new hires feel welcomed. This meant transforming a legacy system into an accessible, automated platform that could manage HR and employee requirements efficiently and at speed.
OVERCOMING IDENTITY VERIFICATION OBSTACLES
Terra Firma hires and onboards an average of between 3 and 5 new employees on a monthly basis. However, the HR team struggled with processes that cost a lot of time, money and effort and needed a faster and more efficient way of verifying new hire identities. The old system required that HR staff manually verify each identity, gathering information and capturing data which ran the risk of incorrect data being input due to employee error or falsified information.
If an employee was not who they said they were or provided incorrect documents and data, HR teams would only find out further down the hiring line, making the process increasingly complex and introducing unnecessary delays. Getting a new hire wrong impacted the team and the company across time spent and costs incurred, and frustration felt by the HR team, the new hire, and the relevant department.
Terra Firma needed a quick and effective way of verifying the data provided by an employee, ensuring that their identity was accurate, and gathering information about potential new hires. This would then alleviate the risks of fraudulent identities and information and introduce a faster way of onboarding new people that minimized disruption for both the company and the employee.
RESHAPING AUTHENTICATION AND EMPLOYEE VERIFICATION
The answer to Terra Firma’s problem lay in the visionAI VisionVerify framework for HR onboarding. An identity verification and onboarding system designed to verify new hires in a minute, VisionVerify can be used across multiple touchpoints and devices.
It provides eight-way checks that include the Department of Home Affairs, advanced face matching and third-party verification and helps organizations to manage their Know Your Customer (KYC) and anti-money laundering (AML) requirements. The solution implemented for Terra Firma gave them the flexibility, reliability and speed they needed to confirm that every new hire was precisely who they said they were without extensive delays and admin. Instead of HR staff spending time gathering and capturing information manually, verifying identities and managing inaccuracies, the new platform handled this complex and frustrating process in minutes.
It also alleviated the risk of incorrect or inaccurate data provided by the employee using biometrics, artificial intelligence, and a number of configurable checks.
The solution allows for the company to run each employee through the VisionVerify process by capturing parameters such as expected name, live selfies, liveness indicator, Home Affairs information, third-party corroboration, last-known address, email and more. It then provides the HR team with a comprehensive report for each employee that’s aligned to Terra Firma’s configuration requirements.
IT’S ALL ABOUT INTELLIGENT SUCCESS
The solution has allowed for Terra Firma to implement a quick, 60-second process to onboard new employees that includes three-way biometric checks with Home Affairs and identity documents. It ensures that identity fraud is not causing issues with new employees and that the company is hiring the right people that have the correct background and identity checks. In addition, new employees experience a smoother and more efficient onboarding process that makes them feel part of the team and that reduces friction.
These steps have not just made it easier for HR to streamline its onboarding and to ensure compliance and alignment with legal expectations, but it has increased staff stickiness as employees aren’t put under unnecessary pressure while they manage onboarding paperwork. Overall, it has made the entire experience faster and smoother, and has transformed complexity into seamless and easy.
