Zoho

Zoho People has reports built in, and deeper analytics comes from a second product

Role-based access, audits that cover Zoho People and several ways to export

Zoho does several things well for an HR buyer. The main ones are access by role, audits that cover Zoho People and clear ways to export.

Zoho Analytics has its own access rules, one owner and its own sync timing

Most of the limits start when you add Zoho Analytics. That is where the access rules, the owner and the data timing change. Several are decisions for your team, not faults to avoid. Each is easier to settle before the first report is built.

Customers range from about 50 to 1,000 or more people

Customer examples help you judge whether your size and your reporting job match what others do with Zoho People.

A free plan for a small start, then analytics, set-up and support to price

A Free plan covers a small start. The cost grows with advanced analytics, set-up help and support, so price all three before you decide.

A 30-day trial leads to the Free plan. The Free plan covers 5 users, or 3 on the US edition. Each of the four paid plans has a minimum of 5 users. Licences apply to active users only. Above 500 users, ask for a price quote. Zoho People includes Advanced HR analytics in its Premium plan. Ask for the Premium price per user in your region.

How you pay depends on the terms that apply to you. You can pay by card or PayPal. Yearly subscriptions can also pay by bank or cheque transfer. Under the India edition terms, a subscription of less than a year can be paid only by credit card. Under the same terms, a price increase applies only from the end of the current billing cycle.

Zoho Analytics is priced on its own. Its Basic plan starts at 2 users and 0.5 million rows. Each Zoho Analytics plan comes with a monthly AI allowance. Each time you use Ask Zia or an AI agent, it uses some of that allowance.

Set-up help is a separate cost. A dedicated expert sets up the system and does the customisation. Zoho sells this as Jumpstart packages. The Premium package of 60 hours costs $3,000. Jumpstart hours apply to organisations of up to 500 employees and are set by employee count above that. Jumpstart includes creating custom reports in Zoho Analytics. Custom service carries extra charges and does not include feature development.

Support has its own fee. Enterprise support costs 25% of the recurring licence fee, for a minimum of 500 users per organisation. Premium Support costs 20% of the recurring licence fee, or a higher amount. Ask Zoho what that higher amount is.

Leaving needs a plan too. Subscriptions renew automatically. Terminating an account deletes the data in it. Zoho’s agreement for Zoho One makes subscriber data available for electronic retrieval for 30 days after termination. Ask whether the same 30 days apply to Zoho People. Unpaid inactive accounts can be terminated after 120 days. Zoho’s India edition terms name the courts of Chennai and the laws of India for disputes. If the analytics owner leaves, report data is no longer accessible, so plan any change of owner before it happens.

Ten questions before you sign

1. What is the Premium price per user in our region? What does the Zoho Analytics plan we need cost beside it? Good answer: A written price per user for the Premium plan and for the Zoho Analytics plan.
2. Who will be the Database Owner for our connection, and what happens to our reports if that person leaves? Good answer: A way to hand the role to someone else without losing report data.
3. Which of our reports follow Zoho People permissions, and which follow Zoho Analytics permissions? Good answer: A written list of each route and who can see each report on it.
4. How often does data sync for each report, and which data cannot sync daily? Good answer: A schedule per data set, with the attendance and performance limits written down.
5. Which description of Zia applies to our plan? Does Zia train on our employee records? Does AI use in Zoho Analytics cost extra? Good answer: One written description of Zia, a setting to switch training off, and a written monthly AI allowance.
6. Can we limit who sees the Bradford score and time log reports? Good answer: Yes by role, and shown to us in a test account.
7. If we use face matching or location for attendance, what is kept beyond the verified photo, and for how long? Good answer: A written retention period for photos and location, and sample wording for our handbook.
8. When the contract ends, how long can we retrieve our data? Which file types do you offer for Zoho People and for Zoho Analytics? Good answer: A written retrieval period and file type for both products.
9. Which edition of the terms applies to us, and which courts hear a dispute? Good answer: Our own region’s edition, named in the order form.
10. Which data centre will hold our data, and could we move later without losing Zoho Analytics data? Good answer: A named data centre, and a written plan for moving the analytics data.

Alternatives to Zoho

If Zoho comes off your shortlist, look at BambooHR, Personio and Keka, which are HR systems with their own analytics. One Model and Visier are separate platforms built for people analytics. Staying with the built-in reports is a sixth route.

BambooHR sells its custom dashboards only inside the Elite package, not as an add-on. That makes the price one decision instead of two. Personio suits companies with 10 to 5,000 employees. Its People Analytics brings HR data together in one place. Its Personio Assistant answers questions from headcount to turnover trends. Keka has separate analytics for payroll, hiring and performance.

One Model brings HRIS, ATS, payroll, engagement, performance, finance and other business data into one governed HR data model. Visier maps the systems a customer runs into one workforce model. Choose one of these when your people data sits in many systems and Zoho is only one of them. Zoho Analytics is a general reporting tool. A platform built only for people analytics starts from a workforce model instead.

Doing nothing extra is also a real choice. Zoho People already gives you individual, team and organisation reports, and forms export to Excel and CSV. Try those first. Add Zoho Analytics when a question needs data the built-in reports cannot join. Our people analytics guide covers how the whole market splits this choice.