5 Best Timekeeping Software for Employees (In-Depth Look)
A great timekeeping software for employees allows you to:
- Save hours on payroll (through features that automatically calculate regular hours, overtime, time off, and other information that’s needed at the end of each payroll period).
- Increase employee accountability (through features that restrict employee punches to specific locations).
In addition, the timekeeping software you choose should be:
- Easy-to-use for employees (so there’s minimal training and onboarding time required on your end).
- Provide a great customer support experience (if you have any questions, they should be answered promptly and by a knowledgeable rep who knows the ins and outs of the software).
In this article, we’ll start by discussing how Buddy Punch (our employee timekeeping software) excels in the above areas. Then, to help you make a more informed decision, we’ll list other timekeeping apps for employees.
Note: Sign up for a free trial of Buddy Punch or request a 1-on-1 demo to learn more.
Table of Contents
1. Buddy Punch
Brief Overview: How Does Our Employee Timekeeping Software Work?
While you can see a detailed breakdown Buddy Punch’s features in this 11 minute demo video, here’s a brief overview of how our timekeeping software for employees works:
1. Your employees can clock in and out through the device of their choice: whether it be a mobile app (iPhone or Android), tablet, or desktop.
2. At the end of each pay period, you can download an Excel report that includes regular hours worked per employee, overtime, PTO, and any piece of information that’s needed to run payroll.
Instead of doing manual calculations, everything is automatically added up for you, which saves hours of work and makes the payroll process more accurate (since human error is out of the equation).
Detailed Overview: See a Demo Video of Buddy Punch
Above, we briefly covered how Buddy Punch works. However, for a more detailed look at key features, see this 11 minute demo video:
Features Built to Increase the Speed and Accuracy of Payroll
Buddy Punch was built to help you avoid the seemingly endless amount of time and inaccuracies that come with running payroll manually. We did this by building out these integrations and features:
Integrations with Payroll Providers
To make payroll as easy as possible, we’ve integrated Buddy Punch with practically every major payroll and accounting provider. That includes:
- ADP
- QuickBooks
- Paychex
- Paylocity
- Gusto
- PayPlus
- SurePayroll
- WorkDay
- And any others you can think of, utilizing Zapier connections with over 3,000 apps.
It only takes a few clicks to grab a payroll summary from Buddy Punch and move it to the payroll provider of your choice — including automatically populating employee PTO and hours.
Click here to get instructions for integrating your payroll provider with Buddy Punch.
On-Demand Payroll Reports
While our payroll provider integrations can save you a lot of time, you can also download an on-demand payroll report in the form of an Excel file, as shown above.
This report includes regular hours worked per employee, overtime, PTO, and any piece of information that’s needed to run payroll.
Time Off Tracking
Because of Buddy Punch’s built-in Time Off Tracking, it’s easy for employees and employers to keep track of time off, paid or unpaid, within the Buddy Punch app (iOS or Android).
Correspondingly, administrators on the platform (employers or managers) can immediately see time off requests as they’re submitted.
From their administrator dashboards, they can then reject or approve them as they come in:
If employers need more details about an employee’s time off, Buddy Punch also offers a summary of time off within the app:
Tracking Employee Hours by Locations, Projects, or Jobs
For even more detailed reporting, employee hours and reports can be run and segmented by position, department, or location.
If this is something you’re interested in, click here to watch our video to learn how to set it up.
Accruals
Buddy Punch makes it easy to manage time off accruals. In just a few clicks, you can create accrual rules based on a specific pay period and number of hours worked, or you can set them up based on an annual period of accrual.
Features Built to Increase Employee Accountability
Employee accountability is a common struggle across many businesses and teams, which adds up to a lot of wasted money. To solve this, we created the following features:
Geofencing
Geofencing allows you to create a radius around the physical area where you’d like employees to punch in and out. Employees are then served an error message if they attempt to punch in or out from outside of that geofence.
This feature is useful for managing employees that typically punch in at the same location each time.
GPS Tracking
Unlike Geofencing, the GPS Tracking feature is best for employees who are constantly on the move from place to place (i.e. salespeople).
Administrators can see the location stamps of where employees were each time they submitted a punch. This allows easy location-based verification of punches even if your employees are never in the same place twice.
IP Address Locking
The IP Address Locking feature is best suited for in-office employees.
By setting up Buddy Punch to only allow clocking in and out from a specific IP address, any attempts to punch in by employees when not connected to the Wi-Fi network or device of your choice will serve an error.
Photos on Punch
With Photos on Punch, employees take a photo of themselves on each punch in and punch out, whether they’re on a tablet, desktop computer, or mobile device.
These images are then time stamped and available for administrators to view from their dashboards in Buddy Punch, which allows them to ensure it was the intended employee doing the punching (and not one of their coworkers).
Additional Buddy Punch Features
Buddy Punch offers many other featuresthat aren’t listed above. That includes:
- Scheduling
- Overtime Calculations
- Alerts & Notifications
- Multiple Punch and Login Options
- Adding, Editing or Deleting Punches
- Job Codes / Project Tracking
- Time Card Approvals
- And more — view our full list of features here.
Online Reviews
At the time of writing, Buddy Punch has garnered 641 reviews and 4.8/5 stars on Capterra (a widely-used online software review service).
And if you read through our reviews, Buddy Punch is commonly known for its:
- Ease of use.
- Customer support.
That’s because we set out to excel in those specific areas, and it makes us both grateful and proud to know we’re getting noticed for those efforts.
How Is Our Customer Support Different?
Buddy Punch uses live chat as its main channel for customer support communication, and we maintain a median first response time of 54 seconds during business hours, so you can expect a very quick response.
In contrast, as one of our customers stated in a review: “Some companies have no chat or phone number, and you wait days to hear back through email.”
Additionally, we place a major emphasis on training, so our customer service team has an extremely intuitive, deep understanding of how the software works and how to help customers navigate it. These reviews allude to this:
Why Buddy Punch Is So Easy to Use
Here are some of the most commonly asked questions we get about Buddy Punch:
- Could someone who isn’t tech-proficient easily use Buddy Punch?
- Is it going to take a large time investment on my part to get employees trained on it?
We created Buddy Punch with those concerns in mind from the outset.
To use Buddy Punch, employees log in and are greeted with a “Punch In” or “Punch Out” button (which changes depending on their current status). They can also view their current timecard.
Because what employees see on login (the option to punch in or out) is so simple and distraction free, it’s much easier and more intuitive to use.
This is in contrast to many other time clock apps, which often have very cluttered homepages that make the punch button difficult to find.
For employees who aren’t great with technology, this can make something as simple as clocking in and out of work confusing and overwhelming.
The ease-of-use theme was applied throughout the software, and we’re thankful and proud to see reviewers mention this:
Learn More About Buddy Punch
If you’re interested in seeing for yourself how Buddy Punch can increase employee accountability and save hours on payroll, sign up for a free trial here, or request a one-on-one demo.
2. Connecteam
Connecteam has a total of 124 reviews on Capterra, with an average rating of 4.8/5 stars (at the time of writing).
Here are a few of its key features:
- Employee Time Clock
- Employee Scheduling
- Checklists & Forms
- Employee Communication
- Employee Training
- Employee Task Management
3. Clockify
Clockify has a total of 1580 reviews on Capterra, with an average rating of 4.7/5 stars (at the time of writing).
Here are a few of its time management features:
4. When I Work
When I Work has a total of 880 reviews on Capterra, with an average rating of 4.5/5 stars (at the time of writing).
Here are a few of its key features:
5. DeskTime
Desktime has a total of 238 reviews on Capterra, with an average rating of 4.5/5 stars (the time of writing).
Here are a few of its key features:
- Shift Scheduling
- Automatic Time Tracking
- Invoicing
- URL and App Tracking
- Absence Calendar
- Document Title Tracking
- Idle Time Tracking
- Automatic Screenshots
- Project Time Tracking
Note: If you would like to know more about Buddy Punch, you can click here and schedule a demo or sign up for a free trial. If you’d like to know more about our pricing options, go here.
You May Also Like…
- 6 Best Employee Timesheet Apps & Software [In-Depth Breakdown]
- 13 Best Employee Time Tracking Software & Apps for Small Business Owners
- 7 TSheets Alternatives for Tracking Employee Time (Pricing, Functionality, How Each Tool Fits Into Your Workflow, etc.)
- 7 Best Time Tracking Tools for Construction and Field Crews (With Real-Time Reports)
- 10 Best Clock In Clock Out Apps to Track Employee Time
- Employee Time Tracking App That Integrates With QuickBooks (Easily Sync Your Employees’ Time Entries)
- 9 Best Employee Time and Attendance Software to Save Time on Payroll (Mobile and Desktop App)
- 6 Best Online Time Tracking Systems (With Features Such as Facial Recognition Punching)
- Project Management Software to Keep Your Employees On Track (Easily Track Billable Hours)
- 8 Best Simple Time Clock Apps for Tracking Team Member Work Hours
- Employee Time Tracking Using Excel Spreadsheets: Templates, Downsides & Alternatives
- 6 Best Employee Timesheet Apps & Software (Great for In-Person & Remote Teams)
- 4 Best Ways to Track Hours and Employee Attendance
- 8 Best Mobile Time Clocking Solutions (In-Depth Post)
