Film production house moves HR and payroll onto Zoho People and Zoho Payroll

A film production company in Kerala with about 20 employees wanted onboarding, attendance, leave and payroll out of spreadsheets and into one HR system.

The problem

Scattered HR records

Employee details and policies sat in separate files, with no single record.

Manual leave and attendance

Leave, comp-offs and holidays were tracked by hand, so balances were hard to trust.

Payroll disconnected from HR

Attendance and leave figures were compiled by hand for every pay run.

What we built

Zoho People (Premium)

Central employee database with HR policies
Onboarding workflows
Custom leave policies with rule-based approvals
Attendance by web, mobile and a face-recognition kiosk
Timesheets, performance, self-service and reports

Zoho Payroll (Standard)

Set up for the studio's salary structure
Fed directly by Zoho People

Before and after

Area	Before	After
Employee records	Scattered files	One database
Attendance	Inconsistent	Web, mobile and kiosk
Leave	Tracked by hand	Policy-based approvals
Payroll inputs	Compiled monthly	Fed by Zoho People

How the project ran

Discovery: on-site review of HR processes and payroll inputs
Design: policies mapped to Zoho People forms and workflows
Configuration: Zoho People set up, then connected to Zoho Payroll
Testing and training: client-led testing and role-based training
Hypercare: ten working days after go-live

Results

HR and payroll now run on one connected platform. Each employee has a single record, leave follows the studio's policy, and payroll uses that data directly.

Questions about this project

How is attendance captured?

Through the web portal, the mobile app and People Kiosk, a face-recognition app at the front desk.

Were existing HR policies kept?

Yes. Leave types, approvals, holidays and comp-offs were set up to match how the studio already works.