As one of the main indicators of employees' performance and productivity, punctuality and attendance are always important at the workplace. Many HR spend considerable time to gather and cross check all the attendance data manually for accurate records and salary calculation every month if attendance registration is still done in an “old-fashioned” way in which overflowing excel files and paper time sheets are used. Such time-consuming and error-prone attendance-tracking methods may overwhelm the HR by increasing their workload.
At this point of time, you may wonder how your company is going to improve attendance accuracy and keep track of the punctuality of your employees in a more effective way. In this article, we will introduce some of the most common and popular mobile clock in/out functions available in the market and share some tips on how to choose the right methods based on different company scales and business types.
6 Common Types of Clock in/out Functions: Living in the wake of the pandemic and the emergence of new working mode as remote working, it is the time for HR to reconsider adopting a HR Mobile App with clock in/out features to connect the employees in real time and allow them to report their attendance anytime and anywhere on their go. Here are six popular mobile clock in features to ensure accuracy and avoid “buddy punching”:
1. Geofencing
HR can decide the radius in which your employees can clock in and out of work. In the other words, employees are required to clock in within the set radius and not allowed to report their attendance outside that radius to ensure they are not clocking in on their way to work or at a wrong location.
2. GPS Tracking
When your employee is using a mobile device to record their attendance, their GPS location will be captured under the GPS tracking function. HR can easily check the GPS coordinates in each employee’s attendance record and spot any abnormal check in activities while validating their attendance.
3. IP Address Locking
Another feature to verify employees’ clock in location is IP Address Locking. By applying this feature, HR are able to restrict the network that the employees can use for attendance taking via mobile devices. If employees are not connected to the specific network, they cannot clock in at all which further enhances the data accountability.
4. Facial Recognition
Facial recognition is one of the most common and popular features to avoid “buddy punching” since the device will scan the faces of the employees to verify their identity in order to clock in.
5. Instant Photo Taking
Instant Photo Taking shares similar functionality with Facial Recognition. The only difference between the two is that the former requires employees to take a picture of their face with their mobile device, instead of having facial scanning and recognition, when clocking in to prevent “buddy punching”.
6. Bluetooth
In general, bluetooth only allows employees to clock in within 10 - 20m distance. It allows a more detailed and accurate location check in such as identifying offices or outlets on different floors by using different beacons with unique location names.
How To Choose The Best Clock in/out Methods For Your Company?
1. Regular Working Location
If your employees mostly work at a fixed location without the need to travel or remote working, you may consider adopting GPS or IP Address Locking. By assigning a specific network for your employees, you can limit employees' clock in location as they can only clock in when they are connected to the specific wifi network. For GPS, the app will simply record the GPS coordinates of your employees so that you will have relevant data to verify their accountability. These two features are suitable for HR who wish to restrict the location or network where your employees can do the check in. To further avoid buddy punching, you may also add Facial Recognition or Photo Recognition features.
2. Multiple Offices/Outlets/Sites at Different Locations
For managing employees who work at multiple offices or outlets scattered around different regions, HR may wish to obtain a more detailed location tracking and limitation function. In this case, Geofencing may be a good choice for you. Geofencing can be used in multiple locations by creating different geofences with unique job code. Employees can check in at different working locations within a specific radius to ensure accountability by ensuring the employees know that they are working at the right sites.
3. Multiple Offices/ Outlets/ Sites at the Same Location
If your business scale is large enough to have many branches or outlets at the same location, for example, a few shops at the same shopping mall or more than one office at the same commercial building, you may find Bluetooth more helpful. Despite the fact that GPS or Geofencing can both record or limit clock in locations, they are unable to detect specific floors. Yet, Bluetooth can do the magic. HR can set up different beacons each with a unique code name, such as “Retail Shop - 1/F” and “Retail Shop 5/F'' and hence employees can only clock in at the right beacons within a pre-defined distance to further ensure accuracy.
4. Remote-working/Flexible Working Without Any Fixed Locations If your company allows flexible working such as work from home and no location restriction needed, Face Recognition or Instant Photo Taking may be your choice. By adopting such features, HR can make sure the right person is working remotely through image and facial verification.
Better Control Over Workforce
No matter which clock in features you will choose for your business, the adoption of HR mobile app with attendance module will definitely help HR to save time by eliminating manual tasks of cross checking of the attendance data every month. Furthermore, HR can obtain more accurate and real time data via mobile clock in, hence a complete tracking and control over the working hours of each employee even on a daily basis. Immediate actions can be taken if any abnormal attendance is spotted in the system.
Integrated with Payroll System: Higher Accountability and Accuracy
Another key benefit for keeping accurate attendance records is increased payroll accuracy. Some online attendance systems allow integration with payroll systems for salary calculation. All the real time clock in and out data will be synchronized into the payroll system for automated calculation to reduce monetary loss from inaccurate timekeeping. Furthermore, your company may further reduce costs on human resources due to intentional or unintentional employee “time theft” with the adoption of an appropriate clock in/out function.
Searching for more on the new mobile trend in 2023? Don’t miss our upcoming issue about how to handle leave requests in a smarter way after global travel reopening! If you would like to learn more about the features of BridgeBuilder HRMS Mobile App and how it can enhance your attendance policy, please click HERE for a complete guide or contact us at 3798 4400.