If you own a small business you know the greatest expense is often payroll. Payroll and tallying up time and attendance hours is also one of the greatest sources of disagreements with employees. If you use a punch clock or electronic time clock such as those you can get from office supply stores, someone has to add up the hours at the end of the week. This always causes errors — always.
I worked for 8 restaurants by the time I was 17. Yeah, I got fired a lot. The major cause was being late. Every restaurant I worked in had an employee time clock with punch cards that printed the time in and out in dark blue ink. I found myself stretching to dispute printed times if the printing was at all not legible. These clocks also used to break down and when they did, fixing them was costly.
Using these employee time clock devices caused errors. Aside from the time clocks breaking down, the major cause of errors in every one of these places where I worked was because the person adding up hours made a mistake. Then you have to go to the trouble to stand around in the payroll or manager’s office arguing about the amount on your paycheck. How degrading.
I work for a software company now. The founding programmer came from The Netherlands and while still there developed a sophisticated program for personal time tracking and billing at the request of a client. This was back in the mid-1990s. Core functions of that program evolved into an employee time clock software program called Prikklok, which means “time clock” in The Netherlands. A company called Nedsoft then began selling this employee time clock software with outstanding results. “I went from agonizing at the end of the week adding and tallying hours accounting for overtimes and vacations — I went crazy” were the reports that came back. “Now I print a report and simply hand it to payroll.”
The system was then developed into an English language software time keeping system called Clock Real Time. It was developed to be the lowest cost full function time and attendance system ever offered (we checked). It is not just a time record, but a software based system that captures detailed work attendance data and applies conditions to employee records based on their contract with your company, the department they work in or the position they hold. Clock Real Time can compile instant detailed reports. No need to total time or calculate vacation times, work overages, lateness or overtime. The system performs all calculations specific to the employee’s profile and has a central terminal where each employee clocks in and out.
Clock Real Time used swipe cards but employees can manually enter themselves in at the central terminal. We’ve found that swipe cards offer:
- The fastest way to clock in and out of any method
- The most consistently accurate method
- Built in deterrent to buddy punching by clocking in at a single monitored location
- Highest level of security for the lowest possible price
Monitoring exact times is important for both employers and employees. Many companies work employees more hours without paying them more or giving them more time off. This is known as wage theft and is growing in reported cases. Employees that work extra without compensation find ways to retaliate by sneaking breaks or just by being at work without doing work. On-the-job time theft is insidious and difficult to monitor but always psychologically induced in the employee that feels undercompensated. Employee time clock software solutions protect employees from this work-without-pay condition by accurately keeping track of employee time that is managed by the employee’s action of clocking themselves in and out.
The opposite situation also occurs where employees show up late, leave early and take too many or long breaks. This financially hurts the employer. This is known as external time theft and the ultimate victim is usually the employees. Wage theft costs billions per year and it adds up quickly with every minute. Say for example that a company with 100 employees at $15 per hour experiences half of them arriving from lunch 15 minutes late. That’s 750 minutes or 12.5 hours per day of lost work to the employer. This will cost the employer $48,750 in the course of one year. Where do you think this loss will be recovered from? Although almost undetectable the employer will see at the end of the month and year an erosion of productivity and will surely be less inclined to give employee raises or benefits. Employee time clock software like Clock Real Time can resolve both conditions of wage theft and time theft for unlimited employees. Clock Real Time is not “software-as-a-service” that keeps billing you every month – it is a one-time cost of $398. It provides all the functionality of other very expensive and monthly service time and attendance solutions for a fraction of the ongoing cost. You can read more about Clock real time at www.ClockRealTime.com
Tags: attendance hours, employee punch clock, employee time clock, Software Time Keeping, time and attendance software, Time Clock Software
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