How to Track Employee Time: Best Methods & Tools

Whether you’re tracking employee time because you’re required to by law, because you need to bill clients’ accurately, or because you want to have a better understanding of productivity, there are several different methods and tools you can use, each with their own pros and cons. 

This post will help you weigh the benefits and disadvantages of each so you can determine how to track employee time in the way that works best for your business.

Why tracking employee time is important

Tracking employees’ hours is important for several different reasons:

• It’s required by federal law. The FLSA (Fair Labor Standards Act) states that employers are responsible for keeping accurate time records for employees. This includes their hours worked and wages earned.
• Keeping records is also required by federal law. Employers are required to maintain records for at least three years, including time cards, work schedules, and reductions from wages.
• It ensures that employees are paid accurately for their work. Inaccurate timesheets can hurt employers who pay for work that wasn’t done, but it can also negatively impact employees who aren’t accurately compensated for every task they complete. 
• It provides insight into job and project costs. Knowing how much time it takes your employees to complete tasks is a critical component of creating effective project plans and budgets. 
• It ensures invoices are accurate. In some cases, timesheets can even be used directly to provide proof of work to clients and customers.

Do you need to track hours for your employees?

Whether or not you need to track time for your employees will depend on the type of employees you have: hourly vs. salaried and exempt vs. non-exempt.

• Hourly employees: Hourly employees are employees whose pay is determined by the amount of time they work. The FLSA requires that employers keep an accurate record of time worked for hourly employees.
• Salaried employees: Salaried employees are employees who are paid the same amount every pay period regardless of how many hours they work. In most — but not all — cases, the FLSA does not require you to track time for salaried employees.
• Exempt employees: Most salaried employees are designated as exempt, which means they are not eligible for overtime pay. While you can track hours for salaried, exempt employees if you want to, it is not required by law.
• Non-exempt employees: In some cases, salaried employees can be designated as non-exempt, which means they do qualify for overtime pay. The classification is tied to both the amount of money the employee makes per week and the specific responsibilities of their role. Here’s a page from the U.S. Department of Labor explaining what criteria qualify an employee as exempt or non-exempt.

In summary, employers must track time for hourly employees and non-exempt salaried employees because their pay is determined either entirely or in part by the number of hours they work. You do not have to track time for salaried, exempt employees unless you want to because hours worked has no impact on their pay.

How to track employee time: 6 methods to consider

The first step in tracking employee time is choosing the method you want to use. Each method will work for tracking hours, but each has different pros and cons you should consider in order to find the right option for your business.

Mechanical punch clocks

The most basic way to track employee hours is by using a mechanical punch clock. These devices function very simply: employees enter paper timecards into the punch clock when they start and stop working, and the clock automatically registers the time and date of punch on the timecard using printer ink.

Pros

The big advantage of using a mechanical punch clock is that it’s a low-cost option. You can get the machine pictured above for around $300. After that, the only ongoing expenses you’ll have are the cost of the paper timesheets that work with the punch clock (around $60 for a package of 250) and ink ribbons (less than $20 each).

If you’re looking to track time on a low budget, this can be a big advantage.

Cons

We used a mechanical punch clock when tracking time for over 20 employees across three locations in our previous business. And at first, we were happy with its results.

We would have our employees punch in and out using a mechanical clock. Then, before each pay period, we would sit down and review all timecards one by one, calculating all the time worked using a clock-in clock-out calculator. We’d take the information and use it to run payroll for all of our employees.

However, we quickly started running into problems:

• What you save in costs, you lose in productive time. To run payroll, you’ll have to collect all timecards, add up all hours for all employees, and determine if anyone worked overtime. Then you have to manually enter all of that data into your payroll provider.
• It’s easy to make a miscalculation, forget to account for overtime, or overlook a shift, which causes rework. Plus, it’s upsetting for employees when they’re not paid correctly.
• Employees can lose or misplace their timecards, giving you no way to validate what hours they worked. Plus, employees often insert the timecard incorrectly, causing two punches to overlap each other and make both illegible.
• Manual time tracking has no safeguards against time theft acts — like buddy punching or clocking in and leaving work — which can increase your labor costs.

Paper timesheets

A good alternative to using a mechanical punch clock is to have your employees write down when they started and stopped working on a sheet of paper.

Pros

The biggest upside of using paper timesheets is that they’re simple and intuitive. You won’t have to train anyone on how to use the system; it’s self-explanatory.

Additionally, paper timesheets are an even lower-cost option than a mechanical punch clock because all you have to pay for is low-cost printer paper and ink.

Finally, paper timesheets eliminate one of the big issues with mechanical punch clocks: employees inserting the card wrong so the clock prints on the same spot twice, making the data illegible.

Cons

Despite their simplicity, paper timesheets come with many of the same problems as mechanical punch clocks:

• Calculating work hours is still a time-consuming process that requires extreme attention to detail and is prone to errors.
• Pieces of paper are easy to misplace, and when that happens, you’ll have no record of what hours employees worked.
• Time theft is even simpler with this method: employees can simply write down whatever times they want to get paid for.

If using paper timesheets seems like the right option for your business, we have 18 printable timesheet templates you can use to get started quickly and easily.

Spreadsheet software

Another way to track employee hours is with an Excel or Google Sheets spreadsheet. If your employees are more tech-savvy and have access to computers, you could have them enter their hours into a spreadsheet instead of writing or printing clock-in and out times on paper.

Pros

Spreadsheets eliminate some of the risk of lost data that comes with using physical papers for tracking time.

It’s hard to lose an electronic file these days since most systems automatically back your files up in the cloud. Most also keep a history of changes to the file, so if someone accidentally overwrites a field, you can go back and see what it was before the change.

Spreadsheets also let you skip one step of the payroll process: instead of having to manually transfer all data from paper timesheets to your computer, you can simply send the finalized spreadsheet to your payroll provider.

Additionally, when using a spreadsheet, the process of calculating regular and overtime hours does get a little bit easier since you can set the spreadsheet up to do all that math for you.

Cons

Your employees still need to sit down and write down the time and date of their punches, meaning they can easily forget to punch or make a mistake when recording the time (e.g., writing 8:15 instead of 8:05). It’s also easy with this method for employees to lie about the hours they worked.

And while the auto-calculation function of a spreadsheet can definitely make life easier, it’s prone to error. You can still enter information incorrectly, which will make your calculations wrong, and it’s really easy to unintentionally make a change to your spreadsheet that messes up all of your calculations without you even realizing it.

If using spreadsheets for time tracking seems like the right option for your business, we have 12 time tracking spreadsheet templates you can use to get started quickly and easily.

Mountable time clocks

Mountable time clocks are a modern update on physical punch clocks. These tools have features that make them more attractive, such as facial recognition, fingerprint scanning, or RFID card readers for clocking in/out.

Pros

• They’re more flexible and less manipulatable than their mechanical counterparts.
• They can integrate directly with time tracking software.

Cons

• These time clocks are expensive, costing hundreds or thousands of dollars per device.
• Many of these devices have monthly subscription costs in addition to the cost of the device.

Portable time clocks

Portable time clocks can be set up in different locations at will, allowing them to be moved from location to location. Often, they’re designed for certain applications like being used on construction sites.

Pros

• They offer flexibility in how they’re used and where.
• They’re built to be durable, with many being waterproof and shatter-resistant.
• They can integrate directly with time tracking software.

Cons

• They can be lost or forgotten on job sites.
• Like mountable time clocks, portable time clocks are also expensive, in some cases costing hundreds/thousands of dollars.
• Many of these devices have monthly subscription costs in addition to the cost of the device.

Time tracking apps

The most common way businesses track employee hours these days is with time tracking apps. These applications let employees clock in and out using a computer, tablet, mobile phone, or kiosk.

Pros

• All clock in/out data is collated into timesheets, and employee regular and overtime hours are calculated automatically, eliminating payroll errors.
• Punch times are recorded in real-time, ensuring precise tracking of hours worked, breaks taken, and overtime accrued.
• Most time tracking apps offer integrations with popular payroll providers, simplifying the transfer of data between the two systems and reducing the time it takes to run payroll.
• These systems can generate detailed reports on employee attendance, hours worked, overtime, and patterns of tardiness or absenteeism.
• Many time tracking apps come with features that keep employees accountable and reduce time theft, such as facial recognition, GPS tracking, and geofencing. 
• Most include features that simplify other administrative tasks, such as automatically calculating PTO accruals, tracking time-off requests, and creating employee schedules.
• If you do still need an on-site way for employees to clock in that mimics the old punch clocks, most time tracking apps can be used to create a kiosk. Some providers sell physical devices, some integrate with point-of-sale (POS) systems, and most can be downloaded onto an iOS or Android tablet.

Cons

The only downside of using a time tracking app is the cost. While there are some time tracking apps that offer free plans, those are typically very limited in functionality. On average, the cost of using a time tracking app ranges from $3 to $15 per employee per month.

Determining which time tracking method is right for your business

Hopefully, our descriptions and the pros and cons lists above helped you get closer to determining which method for tracking employees’ hours is right for your business. However, if you’re still on the fence and need some more help deciding, here are some additional things to consider.

In general, time tracking apps are the best option. They’re the most accurate and least time-consuming, and they offer the most advanced features of all of the different options. If you can afford the cost, a subscription-based time tracking app should be your number-one pick.

If you can’t afford the cost of a subscription-based time tracking app, look into the free options. These will not have as many features as the paid options, but if you only have very basic time-tracking needs or a small team, they’ll probably do everything you need them to.

If you’re on a tight budget and the free time clocks won’t do what you need them to do, opt for one of the more manual time-tracking options:

• Spreadsheets are the best of the three manual options because of their ability to calculate hours for you automatically, but they’re only better than the other options if you can have your employees enter their hours into the spreadsheet themselves.
• Mechanical punch clocks are better than paper timesheets because they prevent employees from falsifying their hours, but they do come with the added costs of buying the machine, timecards, and ink.
• Paper timesheets offer the fewest benefits but are the lowest-cost option. If you really can’t afford to spend anything on time tracking, it’s the right option for you.

What are the different types of time tracking apps?

There are hundreds of different time tracking apps on the market that can be used to create a system for tracking employees’ hours, but not all of the options are right for every employer. 

The right app for your team will have features catered to 1) how your employees work, 2) the systems you want to streamline and automate, and 3) the data you care most about collecting.

Here are the main types of time tracking apps.

Location-tracking apps

GPS time clocks are great for businesses with traveling employees and/or field workers who may or may not come into the office at the beginning and end of their shifts. Employees can use an app on their mobile phones to clock in and out of work from anywhere.

These apps come with features like GPS tracking and geofencing that let you ensure employees are at the right job sites when they clock in and out. Some also include real-time GPS tracking that will track employees’ locations over the entire day and show you all employees’ locations at any time on a map.

Productivity-tracking apps

Time tracking apps with productivity tracking features are designed for businesses with employees who do most or all of their work on computers. 

In addition to tracking time, these apps have features that monitor what employees are doing on their computers over the course of a shift so you can identify who’s spending time on non-work activities.

Some of the features included in productivity-tracking apps include: 

• Screenshots: Capture pictures of employees’ computer screens at random intervals.
• App and website tracking: See how much time employees spend on specific work- or non-work-related websites and apps.
• Idle detection: Track how much time employees spend logging time but not moving their mouse or using their keyboard to do any work.

Biometric apps

Biometric time tracking apps come with features like facial recognition, fingerprint scanning, and/or voice recognition that prevent employees from either clocking in and out or accessing a work area when the system can’t validate their identities.

There are two main use cases for biometric time clock apps:

• When buddy punching is a major problem: Biometric identification ensures that employees can never clock in and out for one another.
• When you want to speed up clocking in and out at a kiosk: Employees having to enter usernames and passwords at a kiosk can create long lines for clocking in and out. Using biometrics speeds up this process significantly.

Industry-specific apps

Some time tracking apps are designed to only be used by companies in specific industries. They have features that wouldn’t be useful to companies in other industries, such as DCAA compliance for government contractors, equipment tracking for construction companies, or LEDES invoice formats for lawyers.

If time tracking is more complex in your industry and you’re finding that the more general time tracking apps are missing the features you need, looking for an option that caters solely to your industry may solve the problems you’re running into.

Project tracking apps 

Some apps function as a combined time tracking and project management system. In addition to tracking employees’ hours overall, these apps can track hours spent on specific tasks or projects — and on billable and non-billable activities.

These apps may integrate with popular project management systems, or they may bring project management and time-tracking into one consolidated system, offering features like: 

• Project planning, budgeting, and tracking
• Team collaboration features like commenting and assigning
• Gantt charts, Kanban boards, to-do lists, etc.

Additionally, many of these apps offer invoicing services, allowing you to create client invoices quickly and easily using your time-tracking data.

Time tracking and payroll software

All time tracking apps will let you download reports that you can send to an existing payroll provider. Most also offer integrations with existing payroll providers where you can connect the two systems to pass timesheet reports to payroll either automatically or manually.

However, some time tracking apps offer both time tracking and payroll services, eliminating the need to pass data between two systems. Instead, you track employee hours and run payroll using the same application, saving you the extra step of transferring time data to your payroll provider. 

HR systems with time tracking

For businesses looking to run all of their HR functions through the same system, you may want to look for a human capital management (HCM) system — also commonly referred to as a human resources information system (HRIS) or human resources management system (HRMS).

These systems bring all HR functions under one roof. In addition to time tracking, you’ll get access to features that help you hire and onboard new employees, run payroll, document policies and procedures, offboard employees, manage performance reviews, run employee surveys, manage benefits, and more.

These systems are generally significantly more expensive than time tracking software but can be worth the added expense if it helps you consolidate multiple software subscriptions into one.

Time tracking and team communication apps

Finally, there are systems that combine time tracking and team communication features. This allows you to use the system to track employees’ hours, communicate with your team, and enable communication between your team members (think time tracking plus Slack, Microsoft Teams, Google Chat, WhatsApp, or Discord).

The 9 best apps for tracking employee time

With hundreds of time tracking apps available on the market, finding the right one for your business can be challenging. Many options offer the exact same features as the others, making it difficult to create a shortlist of options to demo or test.

To help, we’ve compiled this list of the nine best apps for tracking employee time. Below, we share what types of business each app is best for, what unique features each offers, and how they compare on price.

1. Buddy Punch

Buddy Punch sits at the top of our list due to its ease of use for both employers and employees, its wide range of features that make it useful for employers in many different industries, and its competitive pricing in the space. In terms of features, it has all of the basic and more advanced features you need to manage hours and track your team’s time.

Key features

• Time tracking: Employees can easily clock in/out using Buddy Punch’s web and mobile apps. You can then run reports for things like employee attendance and work hours.
• Employee scheduling: Use Buddy Punch’s drag-and-drop work schedule maker to easily create shift patterns and get full control over your employees’ work schedules.
• PTO tracking: Buddy Punch automatically calculates PTO accruals. Employees can submit time off requests that are sent to managers for approval or rejection.
• Overtime tracking: Create custom rules to calculate overtime based on location, work week, or policies. Plus, get notifications when employees are nearing overtime.
• Payroll integrations: Send timesheets directly to your payroll provider. Buddy Punch integrates with platforms like QuickBooks, ADP, Gusto, Paychex, Workday, and more.
• GPS tracking and geofencing: Log employee GPS locations on clock in/out, track employees in real-time, or set up geofences to prevent clocking in or out when not on location.
• Time theft prevention: Capture a picture of employees when they clock in and out to prevent buddy punching, or use Face ID to enable facial recognition identification.
• Job costing: Create jobs, companies, or any type of label to assign employee time toward. Time spent at each job will be reflected on employee time cards and reports.
• Break tracking: Set up customizable break rules, and Buddy Punch will automatically deduct the unpaid break times from employees’ timesheets.

The variety of simple and more complex features in Buddy Punch makes it ideal for both single-location businesses with a handful of employees and client-based businesses with hundreds of employees working in different locations.

Buddy Punch also has one of the highest customer ratings in the entire time clock software category, with an overall 4.8 out of 5-star rating on Capterra across more than 1,000 reviews.

Pricing

Buddy Punch’s plans start at $4.49 per user per month, plus a $19 per month base fee.

2. QuickBooks Time

QuickBooks Time gives you basic features like employee hours and attendance tracking, employee scheduling, PTO/leave tracking, and overtime calculations, plus more advanced features like geofencing, photo attachments, and mileage tracking.

Another big feature of QuickBooks’ time clock software is that it integrates natively with Intuit’s QuickBooks Payroll product. This eliminates the need to install a separate integration to connect your employee time-tracking tool to your accounting software — the data automatically syncs between the two systems.

With that said, QuickBooks Time comes with a much larger price tag than many of the other options on this list, so if you’re looking for a standalone online time clock app, it might not make the most sense for your budget.

Pricing

QuickBooks Time’s plans start at $8 per user per month plus a $20 per month base fee.

3. ADP Workforce Now

If security is a major concern for your business — or if employee time theft is a serious problem — ADP offers several unique biometric clock-in/out options that can prevent anyone other than your employees from accessing your building or clocking time.

Using an on-site ADP kiosk, iPad, or Android tablet, ADP’s time clock system can use technologies like facial recognition, fingerprint scanning, and even voice recognition to give employees access to locations or the ability to punch in and out for work shifts.

Additionally, if you’re already using ADP for HR and payroll processing, your ADP time clock software will integrate seamlessly with the other ADP tools you use.

In general, though, ADP is designed to be used by large businesses with complex needs. Its time clock software is part of a full workforce management suite that includes employee time tracking, payroll processing, human resources management, and tax solutions.

Pricing

No public pricing is available; contact ADP for a quote.

4. Time Doctor

Time Doctor is more of a productivity tracking tool than traditional time clock software, helping businesses that employ salaried knowledge workers keep a pulse on how employee hours are being spent.

Employers can use Time Doctor to see things like how much time employees are spending on specific types of tasks, which apps they use for work most often, and which websites they’re spending the most time on.

This helps them identify where time is being wasted, where more help is needed, which apps are not used often and can be removed/canceled, how often hardware or connectivity issues are causing dips in productivity, and which employees struggle with work-life balance by working too many hours or not taking breaks.

This all makes Time Doctor a great option for software and other fully remote companies that are less concerned with tracking the specific hours employees work and more concerned with how employees spend their time while they’re working.

Pricing

Time Doctor’s plans start at $6.70 per user per month when paid for annually.

5. Clockify

If you’re looking for a simple, free way to track employees’ hours, Clockify might be the right option.

Its forever-free plan comes with unlimited users and projects and provides basic features like employee time tracking, timesheets, Pomodoro timers, and team activity reports and exports. This makes it a viable option for small businesses with very basic needs.

Other common time clock software features — like GPS tracking, PTO management, payroll system integrations, forecasting, and kiosks — are also available, though only on Clockify’s premium plans.

Overall, Clockify can be used as a combined time-tracking and project-management tool. You can create projects and tasks in Clockify, then when employees clock in, they can select which project/task they’re working on. This helps you connect employee time to tasks and projects easily for accurate invoicing and billing.

Pricing

Limited functionality is available on Clockify’s free-forever plan; paid plans start at $3.99 per user/month.

6. Timely

Time tracking for agencies and consulting businesses can get very complex because employees may be spending time on multiple clients over the course of the day — and sometimes from minute to minute.

Timely helps solve this problem by capturing every second of your employees’ work days, ensuring no billable time goes unbilled. Employees can select which project, client, or task that each recorded section of time belongs to.

However, Timely also has AI features that limit the amount of manual work employees have to do to track their time. Over time, it learns which projects/clients specific meetings and activities belong to and automatically sorts them into the right categories.

Finally, if an employee forgets what they spent their time on that day, Timely’s memory tracker can be used to see what apps or URLs they were viewing during specific times of the day, allowing them to quickly identify how long they spent on different clients and projects.

Pricing

Timely’s plans start at $9 per user per month when paid for annually.

7. Toggl Track

All of the time clock apps on this list offer web-based apps, which means they’ll work on any device that has an internet connection. However, if you have employees using devices that don’t have internet access, you may need to opt for a tool that offers desktop app options.

Toggl Track may be the right option for you as it’s one of the few time clock systems that offers a Windows desktop app. It can be used whether employees are connected to the internet or not, ensuring they’re able to clock in and out and track their time regardless of where they’re working.

As far as time-tracking features, Toggl Track is another app that’s designed to track employee time and productivity. It has an idle detection feature that can determine when employees are clocked in but not working, as well as alerts that will remind employees to clock in and out when they’re working/not working.

These features can help you reduce labor costs and avoid making manual changes to time cards. You can track employee work hours automatically, attach employee time entries to specific tasks and projects, and integrate your time-tracking data with tools like Trello, Asana, Slack, and Google Calendar.

Pricing

Free plan available for up to five users; paid plans start at $9 per user/month.

8. Paymo

If what your business needs most is a single tool you can use to manage projects and track time, Paymo might be just the thing. It comes with all of the project management features you’d expect — Gantt charts, Kanban boards, to-do lists, and task calendars — as well as time-tracking, team scheduling, and timesheets.

Paymo is really a great all-in-one time tracking tool for agencies and consulting businesses. In addition to time tracking and project management, you can send online invoices, create estimates from project plans, track expenses, measure employee performance, and see which of your clients is the most profitable.

And if you run a very small professional services business, Paymo’s free plan may include everything you need from your employee time clock software. On it, you can add unlimited employees and tasks for up to five clients and 10 projects, which may be sufficient for small agencies and consultancies.

Pricing

Paymo has a free plan that’s available for up to five clients and 10 projects; paid plans start at $3.90 per user/month.

9. BusyBusy

BusyBusy is built specifically for off-site construction businesses and has lots of features designed to help you manage employee time, keep track of project progress, prevent buddy punching, and reduce labor costs.

Real-time GPS features can show you where all of your employees and equipment are on a map. Geofencing is available to prevent employees from clocking in before they’re on job sites. And location-based reminders will notify employees if they’ve left a job site without clocking out.

BusyBusy can also house documents and pictures. Documents keep all of your critical project files in one place, and pictures let you keep track of the progress of a project.

Your employees can clock in and clock out using an app on their mobile devices (iOS and Android apps are both available), or you can set up a device as a kiosk for punching in and out. Kiosk mode also allows you to set up facial recognition that will notify an admin if an employee clocks in for someone else.

Pricing

BusyBusy’s free forever plan includes GPS time tracking, job costing, and equipment tracking for unlimited users. Its paid plans start at $9.99 per user/month and include scheduling, photos, notes, and supervisor tools.

Choosing the right employee time tracking app

In addition to the information provided above, you may want to consider these factors to ensure you select the right employee time tracking software for your needs:

• Features: Look for essential features such as clock-in/clock-out functionality, timesheet management, overtime tracking, and reporting capabilities. Additionally, consider if you need more advanced features like geolocation tracking, biometric authentication, or integration with payroll systems.
• Ease of use: The software should be intuitive and user-friendly for both administrators and employees. A clean interface and easy navigation can save time and reduce errors in employee time tracking.
• Scalability: Consider whether the software can scale with your business as it grows. It should be able to accommodate an increasing number of employees and locations if necessary.
• Compatibility: Ensure that the software is compatible with your existing hardware (e.g., computers, tablets, smartphones) and operating systems. Additionally, if you’re planning to integrate it with other systems like payroll or HR software, direct integrations are crucial.
• Mobile accessibility: If your employees work remotely or in the field, mobile accessibility is essential. Look for software that offers mobile apps or responsive web interfaces for convenient employee time tracking on the go.
• Security: Time clock data contains sensitive information, so security is paramount. Make sure the software offers robust security measures such as encryption, role-based access control, and regular data backups to protect employee data.
• Compliance: Ensure that the software complies with relevant labor laws and regulations in your jurisdiction, especially regarding overtime, breaks, and record-keeping requirements.

Finally, make sure you consider both the short-term and long-term costs of any software you’re evaluating. Free products can be tempting at first, but once you outgrow the free plan, the paid version may cost more than other comparable solutions.

Instead of settling for a quick fix now, invest in a tool that meets your future needs so you don’t have to rebuild your entire system later on. If you need even more flexibility, like tracking hours by project or task, check out our time card app recommendations.

Best practices for tracking employees’ hours

Implementing employee time tracking can be as beneficial for both you and your team members, but there are some common concerns and best practices to consider in the process.

• Make it clear that this is not about micromanagement. No employee wants to feel like you’re going to be hanging over their shoulder, constantly pressuring them to optimize every second they spend on the clock. Time tracking is just about getting deeper insight into your business, adhering to the law, and enforcing your attendance policy.
• Make it clear this is not invasive. Employees have very understandable privacy concerns when it comes to time clocks that monitor them throughout the day. For example, GPS tracking on mobile devices can make employees fear they’ll be constantly monitored. The truth is that time clocks only monitor while on the clock and completely cease monitoring outside of that timeframe.
• For longevity, find the intersection between simplicity and functionality. You don’t want to pick a method of tracking time that is incredibly effective but requires a ton of training and troubleshooting for your team members. Try to find a method that’s intuitive without losing effectiveness.
• Play around with customization. Many of these various time tracking methods have different features that you can enable at will. Try them out and see what new technique might be worth adding to your time tracking arsenal.
• Be open to feedback. What do your team members like about these tools? What do they dislike? What are their concerns? Ultimately, you want to find a time tracking method that works best for everyone.
• Update your attendance policy. Your chosen method of tracking employee time should be outlined in official company documents, including a description of how you expect team members to use it. 

Regardless of what method you pick for tracking employees’ hours, it’s important to ensure it’s something that is actively helping you optimize your workforce and attain greater profitability. There are too many effective options for tracking employee hours to settle for anything less.