Riverside, the UK's Leading Social Housing Provider, Transforms Operations with Oracle HCM Cloud

Riverside—one of the UK's largest registered providers of social housing, with over 56,000 homes serving 90,000+ lives across England—faced critical workforce management challenges as it scaled rapidly. Managing 3,500+ employees across geographically dispersed locations with varied pay policies, complex payroll schedules, and legacy systems created operational inefficiencies—payroll sign-off alone required 12 days involving 100+ spreadsheets and manual cross-organizational coordination. PCL One's implementation of Oracle Cloud HCM enabled Riverside to establish a unified, cloud-based people platform, standardizing payroll processes, improving employee engagement, and achieving return on investment in less than six months.

Riverside began in 1928 as Liverpool Improved Houses with just 15 homes in Swan Street, Liverpool, committed to making housing affordable for those in need. Riverside expanded rapidly following the 1974 Housing Act, and by 1996—with over 19,000 homes—had been renamed Riverside Housing Association. Following the acquisition of One Housing Group, Riverside is now the leading registered provider of social housing in the UK, managing nearly 56,000 homes. It specializes in social housing, homeownership, veterans' services, retirement living, and supported housing, transforming the lives of more than 90,000 residents. Recognized as 'Social Landlord of the Year' for two consecutive years, Riverside continues to build approximately 3,000 homes annually and is committed to £1 billion in stock improvement and £2.5 billion in resident-support initiatives.

Riverside had 3,500+ employees with varied pay and HR policies (pension schemes, student loans, salary sacrifices) managed across disconnected spreadsheets without cloud-based systems or audit trails. Legacy systems with limited functionality created significant operational bottlenecks. The payroll process was particularly complex—managers required 12 days to complete payroll sign-off by referring to 100+ spreadsheets while handling 500+ work schedules, complex accrual plans, and redundant processes across geographically dispersed operations. Additionally, limited visibility between employees and managers hindered engagement, while regulatory compliance across multiple operational jurisdictions required constant manual oversight.

Riverside selected Oracle HCM for its comprehensive, one-stop solution to efficiently manage and organize its workforce at scale. Oracle's consistent #1 ranking in Gartner's HCM Magic Quadrant—particularly for 'Completeness of Vision'—differentiated it from competitors. Following extensive stakeholder consultations, Riverside determined that Oracle HCM offered the robust operational capabilities needed to streamline payroll processing, standardize processes under one automated system, and drive meaningful cost and time savings. PCL One was selected as the implementation partner due to their domain expertise in complex payroll implementations, HCM transformation, and ability to navigate company-specific compliance requirements, UK labour regulations, and legacy system migration challenges including data extraction, validation, and cleansing of 30,000+ records.

The implementation strategically addressed Riverside's most critical challenge—payroll complexity. PCL One streamlined 500+ work schedules into a rationalized, standardized structure and consolidated accrual plans, eliminating 36 customizations and standardizing pay codes from 400+ to just 148. When Riverside's legacy payroll system unexpectedly failed two months before Oracle HCM go-live, PCL One rapidly advanced the payroll module implementation by two months, ensuring continuity and mitigating organizational disruption. The deployment ensured full compliance with UK labour regulations and HMRC filing requirements while creating a unified platform across the entire organization.

The implementation was delivered by PCL One within budget and timelines, with comprehensive payroll support and continuous training ensuring smooth adoption and platform optimization. Riverside now achieves efficient, error-free payroll processing for 3,500+ employees with sign-off time reduced by approximately 90%. The unified platform increased visibility, ensured compliance with labour regulations, and enabled employees to manage overtime at different rates while maintaining accurate HMRC submissions. Most significantly, Riverside achieved return on investment in less than six months. When Riverside completed a significant acquisition within two months of go-live, the integration was managed internally—testament to the depth of expertise and operational capability transferred by PCL One's team. The platform has fundamentally improved employee–manager connections and organizational engagement across the business.