Bank of the West Selects SmartTime's Workforce Management Solution; Time and Attendance Software Will Track 7500 Employees At Corporate HQ and 308 Bank Branches.

Business/Technology Editors

SmartTime Software, Inc. today announced that San Francisco-based Bank of the West has chosen SmartTime 7.0 to track time and attendance for all 7,500 of the bank's employees.

Bank of the West chose SmartTime over two competing solutions, for managing time and attendance at the bank's California headquarters and 308 branches in California, Oregon, Washington, Idaho, Nevada and New Mexico.

"As Bank of the West grows rapidly, the demand for payroll automation is also increasing," said Ed Miller, vice president of payroll services at Bank of the West. "To eliminate manual time card processing, we began looking for software that would be easy and quick for employees to use and would upload information automatically to our ProBusiness payroll system. We found that the features and functions of SmartTime's software were uniquely suited to our situation, and that their staff is eager to work with us and answer all our questions - they have a real solutions perspective."

SmartTime 7.0 is a powerful and scalable enterprise application designed for companies with large, diverse workforce populations. The flexible web-based or client-server architecture provides efficient, cost-saving solutions to track employee time, work activity and paid time off, and to perform a wide range of other time, attendance and labor reporting functions. SmartTime 7.0 reduces the costs of implementation, maintenance and operation, while lowering network bandwidth requirements.

"We anticipate that SmartTime will save Bank of the West money, while eliminating the human errors that result from manual processing," Miller added. "The SmartTime screens are very easy to understand, and the unique retro-pay calculation function will provide time and cost savings throughout our organization."

Bank of the West is currently evaluating SmartTime Software's other integrated strategic workforce management products in the SmartWorks(TM) suite, including SmartStaff's automated employee scheduling system.

"We welcome Bank of the West to the SmartTime family, and look forward to a long relationship with this premier financial institution," said Kevin Rhone, president and CEO of SmartTime Software. "Our goal with Bank of the West, as with all of our customers, is to enable them to optimize and effectively manage their labor resources. By doing so, they can maximize workforce efficiencies to achieve a strong competitive advantage and increase profitability."

About Bank of the West

Founded in 1874, Bank of the West is California's fourth largest bank, with assets of $13.6 billion. It operates 308 branches and additional work sites serving households and businesses in California, Oregon, New Mexico, Nevada, Washington and Idaho.

About SmartTime Software, Inc.

SmartTime develops strategic workforce management solutions that enable leading enterprises to control labor costs by streamlining the process of deploying and managing their most precious resource: the workers. The SmartWorks(TM) Suite automates critical pay-cycle tasks including employee scheduling, labor transaction collection, labor analysis and the fair application of time and attendance rules. SmartTime solutions enhance employee satisfaction and productivity by improving employee-manager communications. Companies reduce labor costs through efficient workforce utilization, knowledge-driven decision processes and error elimination.

SmartTime, headquartered in Framingham, MA, has many distinguished customers including Universal Studios, General Dynamics, Miller Brewing, Shell Oil and Gillette. For more information, visit www.smarttime.com.

(c) 2002 SmartTime Software, Inc. SmartTime, SmartWorks, and SmartStaff are registered trademarks or trademarks of SmartTime Software, Inc. Other brand or product names may be trademarks or registered trademarks of their respective owners.