When the first employee punch clock was invented in 1888, its only purpose was to record the time employees entered and left the factory. The date and time information stamped on the original timecard gave the factory owner an official record of the time worked by each employee. Today, punch clocks are expensive to buy, difficult to maintain, reduce employee accountability, are inefficient, and make payroll processing difficult. In our current technologically advanced business environment, computer time clock software is the best choice for punch clock replacement.
Punch Clocks Are Expensive to Buy
You can expect to pay well over 0 for a simple mechanical time clock. Electric digital time clocks are significantly more. By the time you add magnetic card swiping capabilities, proximity badges, or biometric stations to your new time and attendance system the cost can quickly add up to thousands of dollars just to track time for a few employees. If you want to keep your business organized and your staff connected, then you will also need to purchase a separate In/Out board to keep track of employee availability. You can keep initial costs to a minimum by using computer time clock software as a punch clock replacement.
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Punch Clocks Are Difficult to Maintain
Once you bring your new punch clock back to the office, it is not long before the first unexpected maintenance costs arrive. You will need to purchase employee timecards, ribbons, and badges. The cost to replace mechanical time clock motors, gears, stamp assemblies, and extra access keys can add up quickly. Unexpected time clock repairs and regular maintenance service can be costly and terribly inconvenient. Most of the time, you have to ship your time clock back to the manufacturer or their authorized representative for repairs or service. You can eliminate ongoing maintenance costs by using computer time clock software as a punch clock replacement.
Punch Clocks Reduce Employee Accountability
Are you sure you are paying your employees for the time they actually work? With a mechanical time clock, it is easy for employees to punch in and out for each other. You may be paying wages for employees arriving late or leaving early. When employees know buddy punching is going on, it creates an office environment of distrust, frustration, and reduced productivity. Time and attendance software will instantly, accurately, and impartially record every employee punch time so you can have confidence employees are being paid for all hours they have worked. Save money and increase worker morale by finding a punch clock replacement to hold employees accountable for their reported time worked.
Punch Clocks Are Inefficient
A mechanical punch clock may not take up much room, but this makes it limited in its application. Most employers place a time clock in a central location like a break room or employee entrance. Employees using alternate entrances or working in a large building may have a difficult time accessing the clock in a timely manner. It is easy for lines to quickly form around the time clock during busy times of the day. This can be frustrating for workers who are now late to lunch, or arrived to work on time but their timecards show that they punched in late. Your time clock may be small, but it likely has a storage rack nearby to hold the employee timecards or badges. These storage racks can be bulky and unsightly. You will also need someplace to store all of the old timecards to confirm historic payroll records, not to mention all the extra time clock supplies you will have to keep on hand to make sure you do not run out. Using computer time clock software as a punch clock replacement can help your office staff be more efficient.
Punch Clocks Make Payroll Processing Difficult
It is easy for employee timecards to become misaligned. This makes them extremely difficult to read as punches begin to overprint one another. Failing clock ribbons also make timecards hard to read or leave timecards with missing information. Missing employee timecards further add to the frustration. Timecards can be full of hand written notes explaining missed or late punches. All of those notes have to be deciphered, interpreted, and corrected before payroll can be processed. This just increases the time and effort required to prepare payroll for input into your payroll software, or sent to your accountant or payroll service. When regular hours and overtime must be manually calculated, the chance of making an error increases and it is difficult to determine which payroll rules apply to which employees. Using computer time clock software as a punch clock replacement can help you avoid such labor intensive payroll processing.
Jeffery Morrow is a computer time clock technical support specialist at Redcort Software. Redcort Software has been developing, publishing and supporting time and attendance software since 1986 and on the Internet since 1997. Tens of thousands of workers at businesses in nearly two dozen countries rely on Virtual TimeClock software every business day. Virtual TimeClock software is so easy to install and configure that it can be affordably deployed on any PC or Mac computer at your business.