Questions to Ask During a PTO Software Demo

Before you choose a PTO tracking system, you’re likely to research several different options in the hopes of finding one that is just right for your organization. As you do demos and talk with each vendor, it’s helpful to have a prepared list of questions from which you can work.

To save you time, I’ve prepared a list of questions that go beyond the obvious, basic questions that will naturally come to mind. As you go through a PTO software demo to discuss your PTO policy needs with each software vendor, these additional questions can help you identify the products that are truly worth using.

Even though some of these questions are a bit technical, please don’t shy away from asking them! When it comes to a PTO software demo, the answers to these questions can make all the difference in a vendor that you can trust vs. one who you might later regret choosing. If you aren’t sure what some of these questions mean, or if you’d like help understanding the answers a vendor gives you, don’t hesitate to reach out via our support chat.

Sophistication

1. Can your system accurately project an employee’s available balance as of a future date, including factoring in future time off, future accruals, and all policy settings such as max balance rules?
2. Does your system support the more advanced and accurate approach of tracking account data in hours? Or does it only support a very basic approach using days?
3. What is the precision of the numerical values stored in your system? In other words, how many decimal places are stored for account balances and transactions? You should expect at least 3 decimals.
4. Is your system timezone aware, so that employees in each timezone see dates and times accurately?
5. Does your system automate accruals, carryovers, and increases in amounts earned based on tenure?

Security

1. Is your system hosted and maintained in a SOC II -certified environment?
2. Will all of my data be fully encrypted in transit and at rest?
3. Do you use key rotation in your data encryption scheme?
4. Is data backed up regularly and are backups encrypted?

Scalability

1. Can your system support hundreds of users per account? Thousands?
2. Does your system have additional features beyond PTO tracking that allow me to expand on a single platform?
3. Does your system require my employees to install anything on their computers?

Support

1. During what hours of the day do you offer support?
2. What is your average response time during support hours?
3. Do you have a knowledge base or support site with articles and tutorials?
4. What is your process for incorporating customer feedback into product updates?
5. How frequently do you release product updates?
6. Are product updates immediately available to all customers?

Hopefully this list of questions makes your search for the right PTO tracking software a little bit easier. A good PTO software demo should leave you feeling certain about whether a given product is a good fit for your organization. Contact us if you have any questions about finding the right leave management system for your organization!