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Zenefits has their users create an admin ADP user. Then zenefits uses those credentials to pull whatever data they want. They chose this route instead of workin

Zenefits has their users create an admin ADP user. Then zenefits uses those credentials to pull whatever data they want. They chose this route instead of working with ADP's third party system (without giving any justification as to why). I might sympathize if ADP's API access was severely limited or extremely expensive, but it appears as if Zenefits made no efforts to go this route.

cddotdotslash 11y ago
Exactly. If I found a third-party company that was having users create accounts on my systems for the purposes of pulling data out, I would block it too, probably more quickly than ADP did. Imagine if a company asked for your Google password instead of using the proper API channels. I don't know many users who would do that.
- pyre 11y ago
  > Imagine if a company asked for your Google password instead of using the proper API channels This would be more like creating a new Google Apps email account for someone, and allowing them to use it to (e.g.) manage things on your Google Drive (by sharing a group folder with them). How many companies hire a 3rd party accounting / HR firm (or person) to manage their bookkeeping? How many of them create an ADP admin account for these people so that they can manage payroll? How is this that much different than Zenefits?
  - eitally 11y ago
    Ironically, this is typical in the Google Apps reseller arena, where the reseller creates your domain for you under their Google account, and then also administer it using a superadmin account they create in your domain for that purpose.
  - aioprisan 11y ago
    This is exactly how most resellers on Google Apps are set up, actually.
- whoisthemachine 11y ago
  The Google password scenario actually used to be a pretty common thing before Google built an API.
eropple 11y ago
From having been there, ADP is a tin-plated nightmare to work with for third-party API access. I'd do the exact same thing in Zenefits' shoes; ADP knows that they are eternally your competitors and will screw you at the first opportunity. Of course, ADP doing that is not doing right by their customers, but who cares, they're just cash cows.
- hamburglar 11y ago
  How smart is it to build a business on unofficial, non-API access to a system maintained by someone who you know will try to screw you at the first opportunity? If I were ADP, I'd probably be intentionally breaking those types of integrations just to make it clear that they don't intend to hamstring themselves by supporting interfaces they never published. The fact that it's someone in a market they intend to enter is gravy.
  - eropple 11y ago
    I didn't say it was smart, but it's smarter than ADP's jokestore of an official API. If you want to talk to ADP customers--and, functionally, you very close to need to talk to ADP customers--those are your options. I feel like maybe the point of my post was not completely clear, though: this would not be a problem, and Zenefits would not be doing this, if ADP was good (not good in the "not poor software" sense, but good in the moral sense). And we should be faulting ADP for not being good to its customers, not Zenefits for trying to bring good to ADP's customers.
    - mynameisvlad 11y ago
      ADP's customers are most definitely not the third party developers, though. Because of that, you can't really conflate the two into one argument. ADP can easily be "good" to their customers while still having shitty APIs. Hell, plenty of companies do this every day, why should we chastise ADP for running a business? Furthermore, a profit-seeking corporation shouldn't really be on the moral scale to begin with. At best, they should be amoral, that is, not involved at all in morality. Their primary goal is, and should be, to earn more money, not to be good citizens of the world.
cbzink000 11y ago
I'm not speaking for or against Zenefits and their methods, but ADPs API is severely limited and extremely expensive. I worked with their Dealer Services division when I was at a startup in the automotive space and ADP had one of the worst crafted APIs I have ever seen. I made a comment about it on an earlier Zenefits post, but the gist was that the "stable, production API" was a constantly moving target that changed without notice or reason. I believe we had incurred over $50,000.00 in fees before we ever reached the testing stage or purchased the right to use the API (that license is on a client by client basis, too). That $50M number was fees directly to ADP, and does not include our own payroll and expenses. We were completely bootstrapped and started with about $70M in the bank, yet we were still able to complete that integration. I can't see how a company with over $500MM in funding[0] couldn't unless they were prohibited by ADP. https://www.crunchbase.com/organization/zenefits https://www.crunchbase.com/organization/zenefits
fweespeech 11y ago
As someone who is a customer of ADP [we use them for payroll, etc, etc] I'd go the Zenefits route too [and we do for our automation in relation to ADP precisely because ADP's API is insufficient]

cddotdotslash 11y ago

Exactly. If I found a third-party company that was having users create accounts on my systems for the purposes of pulling data out, I would block it too, probably more quickly than ADP did. Imagine if a company asked for your Google password instead of using the proper API channels. I don't know many users who would do that.

pyre 11y ago
> Imagine if a company asked for your Google password instead of using the proper API channels This would be more like creating a new Google Apps email account for someone, and allowing them to use it to (e.g.) manage things on your Google Drive (by sharing a group folder with them). How many companies hire a 3rd party accounting / HR firm (or person) to manage their bookkeeping? How many of them create an ADP admin account for these people so that they can manage payroll? How is this that much different than Zenefits?
- eitally 11y ago
  Ironically, this is typical in the Google Apps reseller arena, where the reseller creates your domain for you under their Google account, and then also administer it using a superadmin account they create in your domain for that purpose.
- aioprisan 11y ago
  This is exactly how most resellers on Google Apps are set up, actually.
whoisthemachine 11y ago
The Google password scenario actually used to be a pretty common thing before Google built an API.

eropple 11y ago

From having been there, ADP is a tin-plated nightmare to work with for third-party API access. I'd do the exact same thing in Zenefits' shoes; ADP knows that they are eternally your competitors and will screw you at the first opportunity. Of course, ADP doing that is not doing right by their customers, but who cares, they're just cash cows.

hamburglar 11y ago
How smart is it to build a business on unofficial, non-API access to a system maintained by someone who you know will try to screw you at the first opportunity? If I were ADP, I'd probably be intentionally breaking those types of integrations just to make it clear that they don't intend to hamstring themselves by supporting interfaces they never published. The fact that it's someone in a market they intend to enter is gravy.
- eropple 11y ago
  I didn't say it was smart, but it's smarter than ADP's jokestore of an official API. If you want to talk to ADP customers--and, functionally, you very close to need to talk to ADP customers--those are your options. I feel like maybe the point of my post was not completely clear, though: this would not be a problem, and Zenefits would not be doing this, if ADP was good (not good in the "not poor software" sense, but good in the moral sense). And we should be faulting ADP for not being good to its customers, not Zenefits for trying to bring good to ADP's customers.
  - mynameisvlad 11y ago
    ADP's customers are most definitely not the third party developers, though. Because of that, you can't really conflate the two into one argument. ADP can easily be "good" to their customers while still having shitty APIs. Hell, plenty of companies do this every day, why should we chastise ADP for running a business? Furthermore, a profit-seeking corporation shouldn't really be on the moral scale to begin with. At best, they should be amoral, that is, not involved at all in morality. Their primary goal is, and should be, to earn more money, not to be good citizens of the world.

cbzink000 11y ago

I'm not speaking for or against Zenefits and their methods, but ADPs API is severely limited and extremely expensive. I worked with their Dealer Services division when I was at a startup in the automotive space and ADP had one of the worst crafted APIs I have ever seen. I made a comment about it on an earlier Zenefits post, but the gist was that the "stable, production API" was a constantly moving target that changed without notice or reason. I believe we had incurred over $50,000.00 in fees before we ever reached the testing stage or purchased the right to use the API (that license is on a client by client basis, too). That $50M number was fees directly to ADP, and does not include our own payroll and expenses. We were completely bootstrapped and started with about $70M in the bank, yet we were still able to complete that integration. I can't see how a company with over $500MM in funding[0] couldn't unless they were prohibited by ADP. https://www.crunchbase.com/organization/zenefits https://www.crunchbase.com/organization/zenefits

fweespeech 11y ago

As someone who is a customer of ADP [we use them for payroll, etc, etc] I'd go the Zenefits route too [and we do for our automation in relation to ADP precisely because ADP's API is insufficient]