Guide for human resources and the hostel office
Change your own name, phone or photo, set salaries and build payroll runs, add staff and keep the staff list, and run the hostels from blocks and rooms to applications, allocations and maintenance - on a computer or a phone.
Who this guide is for
HR officers set what each member of staff is paid, build each month's payroll run, and keep the staff list.
Hostel officers set up the hostel blocks and rooms, allocate beds to students, and log and follow maintenance requests.
Both roles see the institution's Dashboard and their own payslips. The menu shows only the pages your role can use: on a computer it is down the left of the screen, and on a phone it is under More in the bar along the bottom.
Before you start
Open your institution's portal and sign in with the email address and password your institution gave you. Select Sign In.
You arrive on the Dashboard, with the institution's figures: students, staff, registration, hostel occupancy and at-risk students. On a phone it is the Today tab.
If your institution sent you a link to set your password, open it, enter a New Password and Confirm Password, then select Set Password.
To sign out on a computer, open the menu with your initials at the top right and select Sign out. On a phone, open More and select Sign out at the bottom.
Use it on your phone
The portal works in your phone's browser, with the same account and pages as on a computer.
Open your institution's portal address in your phone's browser and sign in.
The first time, the portal may offer to install itself: Install app puts it on your home screen, where it opens like any other app. Not now closes the offer. On an iPhone the offer says to tap the Share button, then Add to Home Screen.
The bar along the bottom holds your tabs, then More:
HR officers: Today and Payslips.
Hostel officers: Today, Students and Payslips.
More opens the whole menu — Salaries, Payroll Runs and Staff List, or the Hostel pages — with Appearance (System, Light or Dark), Language (English or Français) and Sign out below it.
The top bar shows your institution's name, the search button and your initials.
On a phone, lists that are tables on a computer are one card per row, with every column on the card.
Change your own name, phone or photo
On a computer, open the menu with your initials (or your photo) at the top right and select My profile. On a phone, open More and select your name at the top.
Change your First name, Last name or Phone number, and select Save changes. The name and phone number on your staff account change with it, so colleagues and the staff list see the same name.
To add a photo, select Add a photo (or Change photo) and choose a JPEG, PNG or WebP image of up to 3 MB. Remove photo takes it off. If there is no photo button, photo uploads are not set up for your institution.
Your new name and photo show at the top of the page and in More straight away.
Your email address and password are how you sign in, so they are not changed on this page; Email and password says where to change them. If you sign in through the suite, Change password opens the suite's sign-in page, where you set a new one. If you sign in to this portal directly, ask your institution's administrator for a new sign-in link. To change the email address you sign in with, ask your institution's administrator.
Find a person
On a computer, select Search at the top of the page, or press Ctrl K. On a phone, tap the magnifying glass in the top bar: the search opens full screen.
Type at least two letters of a name or a number. HR officers find Staff; hostel officers find Students.
Select a result to open their record.
Set a salary
HR officers only.
Open Salaries under Finance (in More on a phone) and select Set a salary.
Choose the Member of staff. Optionally enter a Salary grade (optional) and a Step (optional), then enter the basic salary per month.
Under Allowances and Deductions, select Add for each line and give it a name and an amount.
Check the Gross, Deductions and Net worked out beneath, then select Save salary.
To change a salary, select Change on its row. Changing a salary closes the old one and opens a new one: payslips already issued keep the figures they were issued with.
Build a payroll run
Open Payroll Runs under Finance (in More on a phone).
Choose the Month and select Build the run. The run is built from the salaries standing today, as a draft.
Select Payslips on the run to check each member of staff's pay.
If something is wrong, correct the salary, select Delete on the draft run, confirm, and build it again.
The bursary approves the run. Once approved, it is frozen and can no longer be changed or deleted.
Keep the staff list
Open Staff List under Staff to see each member of staff's number, name, academic rank, specialisation, role and status. Search by name or number, filter by rank, and select a row to open their profile.
Add a member of staff
HR officers add every member of staff, whatever their role.
Select Add staff.
Enter their First name, Last name, Email (the address they sign in with) and Staff number.
Choose their Role, their Department (or None for office staff) and their Academic rank, and select Add.
The Human resources role works at once: they are emailed a link to set their password, and if it does not arrive, give them the link shown on the page. Every other role is listed with (needs approval), because it can do things an HR account cannot (a lecturer's marks, the bursary's approval of the payroll you build). For those, say why they need the role under Why they need this role. The person is added straight away, so you can set their salary as usual, but they have no role and cannot sign in until an institution administrator approves it. The administrator is emailed; once they approve, the person is emailed the link to set their password.
Follow a role you asked for
Select Role requests on the staff list to see your requests: Waiting for approval, and under Decided recently, Approved or Not approved with who decided and any note. The person's profile shows the same in its Role section. You cannot approve a request yourself.
If a role is not approved, the person keeps their staff record but has no role and cannot sign in. To ask again, open their profile, select Ask for a role, choose the role, and select Ask.
Set up hostel blocks and rooms
Hostel officers, and institution and campus administrators.
Open Overview under Hostel (in More on a phone). The page is headed Hostels and shows the number of Blocks, Beds, Occupied and Vacant beds.
Select New block. Enter the Name and a short Code, choose who it Accommodates (Men, Women or Mixed), and select Save.
Select a block to open it, then select Add room. Enter the Room number, the Floor, the number of Beds and the Type (Single, Double, Triple or Dormitory), and select Save. Beds are created from the number you enter.
Use the edit icon on a block or room to change it. When you edit one, you can clear In service to close it: a closed block or room keeps its records but is not allocated into.
Allocate beds
Students apply for a bed from their own portal. To place them:
Open Applications under Hostel. Filter the list with All, pending, allocated and waitlisted.
Select Allocate by order applied to fill the free beds in the order students applied, or Run ballot to fill them by lottery. Everyone who cannot be placed goes on the waitlist, in order.
To place one student by hand:
Open Allocations under Hostel and select Allocate a student.
Choose the Student from those on the waitlist and a Bed from the beds that are free, then select Save.
The allocations list shows each student's block, room, bed and the date allocated. Filter it by Block.
Log and follow maintenance
Open Maintenance under Hostel and select Log a request.
Choose the Block and Room, a Category (plumbing, electrical, furniture or other), and describe What is wrong. Select Save.
As the work progresses, change the request's status in the list: open, assigned, in progress, resolved or closed.
Use the filters above the list to show one status at a time.
See your payslips
Open My Payslips under Finance, or the Payslips tab on a phone. Each month shows your net pay. Select Breakdown to see the basic pay, each allowance and deduction, and the gross and net.
Look up a student
Hostel officers can open Students (the Students tab on a phone) and find a student by matric number or name. Select a row to open their record.
Language and appearance
Language: on a computer, select EN or FR at the top of the page. On a phone, open More and choose English or Français. Not every page is translated yet, so some text stays in English.
Appearance: the portal follows your device's light or dark setting. On a computer, the sun or moon button at the top switches it. On a phone, open More and choose System, Light or Dark.
Tips and common questions
Why can I not approve a payroll run? Approval belongs to the bursary, so that the office that builds payroll is not the one that signs it off.
A student is not in the list when I allocate by hand. Only students on the waitlist can be chosen. Run an allocation first, or check their application under Applications.
Getting help
For help with the portal, contact your institution's administrators. The portal has no support chat or ticket desk of its own.
Try it yourself on the demonstration institution.
Try it yourself in the live demo.