
Charlie – Free HR platform for small businesses - jbrooksuk
https://www.charliehr.com/
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casca
I'm the target audience for Charlie - long running small business in the UK
willing to spend money on a service that saves time and effort. However I
wouldn't risk something as important as my HR on a company that has no visible
form of financial sustainability. When the VC bubble bursts, my data is gone
and it would be irresponsible of me to take that risk on behalf of my staff,
suppliers and customers.

 _Edit_ People seem to be comparing it positively to Zenefits. From what I can
tell, Zenefits raised >$500mm and has $60mm annual recurring revenue (ARR)[1].
They also recently fired 250 people, which is 17% of their workforce. This
means that they have around 1500 people working there. If each person
conservatively costs $100k/year, their staff costs are $150mm/year so they
have a way to go before they're profitable. Then of course there's the ethical
issues[2].

I don't mean to imply that there's anything wrong with CharlieHR and I wish
them all the success in the world. I hope the product works and that in a few
years, I'll be able to use the service of a business that is likely to
continue operating.

[1] [http://uk.businessinsider.com/zenefits-missed-sales-
projecti...](http://uk.businessinsider.com/zenefits-missed-sales-projections-
by-a-lot-2016-2) [2] [http://www.nytimes.com/2016/02/18/technology/zenefits-
scanda...](http://www.nytimes.com/2016/02/18/technology/zenefits-scandal-
highlights-perils-of-hypergrowth-at-start-ups.html)

~~~
petenixey
Disclaimer - I know the founders and they're a really good crew. Super solid
background in business and really care about creating a great product.

The business model for this is all based around providing pensions / pension
brokering. Since all UK businesses have to transition to providing pensions
over the next few years there's a huge opportunity in helping make it easy and
painless and that's what the guys behind Charlie are focussed on.

Sorting out pensions is going to be a massive headache for both businesses and
employees so there's a huge window for a startup to take that pain away and
make it all seamless. They've got lots of companies using it already and it's
very well built and well funded so I think they're in a great spot.

Will be interesting to see how they compete against Xero or perhaps integrate
with them but in a pure HR/pensions play there's a lot of room to make a swoop

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bphogan
Trying to figure out if US businesses can use this. Seems very UK-centric from
my reading so far.

~~~
simonswords82
It's quite tricky to create HR software that works for the US and UK market,
especially when the offering is free and they make the money from selling
pensions which will almost certainly be a UK-centric provision.

So while US companies might be able to use it, they'll miss US specific
functionality that US HR apps offer.

Source: I built and run
[http://www.staffsquared.com](http://www.staffsquared.com), a competitor to
CharlieHR (but we're not free!)

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ProAm
This looks like it's focused on the UK, anything tailored for the US? HR is
fairly regimented here and I want to ensure the free HR system will not land
me in court.

~~~
tzier
Zenefits

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brudgers
I like the idea of building a general platform and adding paid features,
pensions are mentioned on the |product| page. Because pensions don't really
exist much anymore for private business in the US most of the time, it got me
thinking.

Since one of the important roles of HR staff is compliance with employment
laws, it would probably be good for the guiding legal framework to be explicit
in the description of the product.

~~~
popey456963
Wow, you don't have pensions very often in America? Mind if I ask what
alternatives you have, or if you are just paid your pension in cash for you to
spend as you please.

~~~
Akkuma
Most places offer a 401(k). Here's the differences between the two
[http://www.investopedia.com/ask/answers/100314/whats-
differe...](http://www.investopedia.com/ask/answers/100314/whats-difference-
between-401k-and-pension-plan.asp)

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goeric
Great to see competition in this space that isn't a PEO. There's still a lot
of room for disruption here.

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georgespencer
I know a bunch of businesses using Charlie HR. It gets great reviews.

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jwcrux
Just a heads up, the header on the security page [1] says "SSL and TSL". I see
later on that you correctly say "TLS", but mistakes like that in headings
don't spur confidence :)

[1] [https://www.charliehr.com/security](https://www.charliehr.com/security)

~~~
erichurkman
There are quite a few typos, "enrol" on the home page.

~~~
popey456963
Just to put it out there that as far as I know, it is spelt "enrol" in most
other countries to America. At least, England spells it with only one 'l' and
that's where this company was made.

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awinter-py
enough is enough with free products. I get freemium but this always turns into
a messed up incentive structure where the service perceives no obligation to
their bottom-tier users and they have to do something filthy to them to make
money.

how about cheap-mium instead? keep the lights on with breakeven service.

half the appeal of freemium is that account signup and electronic payments are
still pain points. Solve those problems and freemium's advantage narrows.

There's an uncomfortable parallel here with nation-states. Finland can afford
to provide high-quality free education because their 'freemium mix' (i.e. tax
base) is a healthy normal distribution. Not naming any names, but in
'freemium' countries where the GDP centers on top earners, there's tremendous
tension about providing basic services and quality declines.

Point being: freemium is a bad model if your community structure is wrong and
incentivizes a bad community structure even if you start out right.

~~~
josh_carterPDX
I can see this becoming a very lengthy debate about the pros and cons of a
freemium model, but the point I think is that many new companies offer this to
help get their product into the hands of people who may otherwise shy away
from them. I agree with you that it provides no incentive for companies to
support their bottom-tier users, but if those same users find value in the
service they eventually become paying customers who are confident on the
platform and more likely to do business with them long-term. It's a marketing
thing more than anything else. Not unlike drug dealers. Give em a taste and
you'll get em hooked. :)

