Security & Access Control
If It Ain’t Broke…. James Evans, Senior Account Manager at STANLEY Security, puts the case for modern Time & Attendance systems and highlights some of the less well known benefits. If it ain’t broke, don’t fix it, goes the well-worn saying. Long established companies often have long established business practices that have served them well over the years. Monitoring employees working hours using traditional clocking in/ out systems that are then recorded manually to a spreadsheet is one such case in hand. It works smoothly, so why go to the expense and endure the upheaval of implementing a Time & Attendance software based system? Yes, a Time & Attendance system does come with a cost attached, but that cost is low and the return on investment (ROI) is fast. And no, there really is no upheaval involved if you pick your system and supplier well; you won’t need to change your existing accountancy etc. software and don’t even need to change how you do your reporting. What’s more, a Time & Attendance system brings a host
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Security & Access Control
of benefits that you may not even be aware of that can have a positive impact on your business. What is a Time & Attendance System? Time and Attendance systems automatically calculate employees’ attendance hours, overtime, holidays and absences - all exportable to payroll in minutes - and provide evidence in proof of compliancy with working time regulations. A basic system will include a terminal/readers and software. The terminal/readers are used to capture the individual employee’s clocking in/out data and are available in card or fob and biometric formats, depending on your requirements and the nature of the site and activities. Biometric readers based on fingerprint and eye scanning, are increasingly popular as they avoid issues such as lost cards or tags and forgotten pin numbers, or the sharing of these with colleagues to clock them in/out in their absence. The eye scanning readers have come down dramatically in price and increased in reliability, now making them a good option
for sites prone to dirt and dust. The software, which makes all the relevant calculations, is either placed on your computers or can be browser-based. It Pays to be Accurate By far the greatest benefit of moving to a modern Time and Attendance system is accuracy. Individual employee data is monitored and calculated in real time down to the second, including hours worked, breaks, overtime, absences and allowances. Every type of work pattern and schedule can be recorded, including flexi-time. Tracking and recording such information manually opens up the potential for both false reporting and human error which can have serious consequences for a business. Furthermore, you’re never going to be able to obtain the same level of detail if you remain with a manual process. In the logistics sector, for example, drivers frequently work outside of office hours. You either have to take their word for when their shift ended (and whilst most people are honest, there’s always those few
Building & Facilities Management – March 2020
