Detroit Business calls SherWeb’s Cloud Servers “Phenomenal”

Dean Mathews hasn’t always been a big fan of cloud servers. In fact, the first time the Detroit-area business owner tried using virtual machines for his company he was far from impressed.

“Quite honestly, the whole thing left us with a bad taste in our mouths. The servers were crashing and they were down for a while. I think the technology wasn’t 100 percent there. So, we were a little afraid to trust virtual servers.”

Fast forward 4 years and the story has changed. OnTheClock, which sells an online time clock application to businesses across North America, now has 6 virtual machines running on SherWeb’s Performance Cloud. Mathews, the company’s founder, said using SherWeb’s cloud servers has given OnTheClock a level of performance and reliability it hadn’t experienced before.

“Honestly, after going to virtual servers, I am 100 percent sure it was the correct way to go, especially if you’re working with a qualified provider. One of the things we really liked about Performance Cloud was the fact that we could have Disaster Recovery and all the redundancy for all the different servers. We have tens of thousands of employees punching in and out every day and if an employee can’t punch in, that’s a big problem. It’s extremely important that it works when the employee is there. That’s how they get paid.”

App More Accurate

Customers use OnTheClock’s app to punch in and out from their personal devices. Mathews said the app is convenient, easy to use and more accurate than the traditional methods of calculating time cards.

The company, which has been in business since 2004, currently has more than 7,000 clients in the insurance, health care, education and dental industries. Customers pay a monthly fee for the service, which includes unlimited technical support and a free phone app. Mathews said most of their customers are small businesses.

OnTheClock had been working with OrcsWeb, a North Carolina hosting provider, when the provider was acquired by SherWeb. Mathews said the company had to decide whether it wanted to stay with SherWeb or look for a new provider. He said it was important that OnTheClock be able to stay up and running if a natural disaster occurred.

“We did our homework. We talked to a few of your customers and OrcsWeb. We’re happy to say that over the last 3 years, it’s just been phenomenal working with SherWeb. We’ve basically had just a few minutes of downtime. The biggest thing we were looking for was that reliability.”

Other Providers Unreliable

Mathews said OnTheClock had worked with other cloud providers for smaller projects, but wasn’t satisfied with the service they received.

“We didn’t get that same warm and cozy feel. It was a lot more hands-off. Phone calls were returned a day or two later; we had to wait several hours for emails. The level of service with these other companies was definitely low enough to where we knew that we wanted to stay with you for anything critical.”

Technical support is another issue. Mathews said he’s not a hosting expert and it’s comforting to know that SherWeb’s support department can help him any time he has a server problem. He cited a specific example.

“One of our servers was down; I forget what it was exactly. It was two in the morning and for us, there’s still people using our system at two in the morning. So we got on the phone with one of your support people. They connected us up really quickly to somebody who could actually log into the server. Within half an hour or so, the issue was resolved. That level of support is very critical for us and you’re really good at that. Even at two in the morning, somebody is there for us.”

Prevents Buddy Punching

While an online time clock application seems very convenient, some people might wonder if it’s just an easier way for employees to cheat by asking a friend to punch in for them, a practice called buddy punching. Mathews said cheating is actually harder with his company’s app because all the times are controlled by the server and employees can only clock in and out from their own devices. He said even if someone tries to punch in before they leave the house, the app can be configured to work only when the employee is within a 50-metre radius from the office. In other cases, employees might have to connect to the office Wi-Fi to log in.

So, what does the future hold for OnTheClock? Mathews said the company wants to continue improving its time clock application to make it easier and faster for its customers. He said while some business owners might be skeptical about adopting cloud servers, it’s just a matter of finding the right provider.

“If other people have had bad experiences with virtual machines, they might have that same bad taste in their mouth that we had. Now that we’ve got to a modern platform with a real provider like SherWeb, things have changed. It wouldn’t make sense not to do it.”