Track Employee Attendance with Ease for Better Payroll Processing

Imagine you walk every morning to your office, and the first thing you see is scattered spreadsheets!

Before you even had your first morning coffee, your HR tells you to kindly update your attendance in the sheet.

What a way to start the morning, right?

On a serious note, this is pretty much a scenario in every organization. Employees are checking their attendance and correcting it. HRs, on the other hand, are fixing their payroll errors.

And that’s exactly why automated attendance tracking becomes important, to bring some peace in the morning. If you are also wondering how to track employee attendance, read this guide.

Why is tracking employee attendance manually not an effective strategy?

It is true that, to a certain extent, manually monitoring attendance does work, especially for small-scale businesses. The reason is that the resources are limited. But the strategy fails to deliver the moment businesses begin to scale.

Apart from this, there are other reasons why this strategy is ineffective.

• Manual maintenance is a time-consuming and tedious task
• Prone to errors. Incorrect entries become more frequent.
• The data is easy to manipulate.
• Because it is done manually, integration with a payroll becomes difficult.
• It doesn’t provide any real-time analytics.

Best ways to track employee attendance in the workplace

There are several easy ways to track employee attendance. However, some of them are extremely prominent.

• Recording through spreadsheets.
• Employee ID card.
• Biometric attendance tracking system.
• Employee attendance tracking software

What makes employee attendance tracking important?

Productivity gets improved:

With an employee attendance tracking software, it becomes easier to notice patterns that impact performance. Employee performance metrics help managers understand how attendance affects output. When these issues are addressed early, teams work more efficiently.

Brings accountability:

Attendance tracking software provides a transparent, automated record of work hours, which discourages absenteeism.

Compliance:

Having an employee attendance tracking system makes businesses compliant and audit-ready.

Employee attendance tracking software: Features

Automated time tracking:

One of the key aspects of an employee attendance tracker is that it enables employees to clock in, take breaks, clock out, apply leaves, etc., perform all this without any hassle. When the process is automated, these daily actions become smooth to track.

Leave management:

Another important element is managing the leaves of employees. Employees expect from their managers and HRs that when they apply for leave, whether it is for the full day or half-day, along with the reason, it should be addressed right away.

Payroll integration:

Ensuring accurate payroll processing becomes easy when the employee attendance tracking software integrates seamlessly with the payroll. It is important that is employee’s salary is determined based on their overtime calculations, attendance, and leaves.

Real-time notification & alerts:

The software sends notifications & alerts to managers and HRs on who is present, absent, or late. Automated notifications can be sent to employees and supervisors regarding missed entries.

Employee self-service:

The self-service feature is considered by many as a game-changing feature. With this feature, employees can check their attendance instantly, removing the dependency on HR.

Cloud-based accessibility:

Advanced solutions that track employee attendance are cloud-based in nature. This means that your team can capture attendance data anytime and from anywhere.

Employee attendance tracking: Benefits

Real-time monitoring:

Having an employee monitoring software to track employee attendance provides managers and HR with instant visibility into workforce activity.

Prevents payroll errors:

When the attendance tracking tool integrates with the payroll processing, it almost reduces the possibilities of errors that usually come from doing it manually. Attendance flows directly into payroll without anyone having to enter it manually. This means fewer errors and a smoother payout cycle.

Economical solution:

An attendance system is far more cost-effective. It cuts down maintenance costs, reduces paperwork, and eliminates the hidden expenses that come from mistakes.

Employee attendance tracking: Challenges

Modern-day employee attendance tracking tools have their own set of challenges:

Buddy punching:

This is the most common problem. Having frequent scenarios of it leads to inaccurate records and payroll discrepancies.

Reluctance toward advanced solutions:

A common challenge is getting everyone to adopt the new system. Managers may hesitate because they’re into the belief that the software will be costly or complex.

Diverse arrangements:

The rise of remote, hybrid, and flexible work schedules makes it challenging to find a single system that accommodates all scenarios fairly and consistently.

Practical tips to track attendance in the workplace

Draft an effective policy for attendance tracking:

The very first step is to establish clear communication with your workforce. There is no better way than to draft an effective policy that clearly talks about what will be monitored, along with the reasons.

Define work and shift hours:

When work hours and shift timings are clearly defined, attendance tracking becomes far more transparent for everyone. It also makes it easier for managers to manage hybrid, rotating, or remote teams, because everyone operates with the same understanding of what “on time” actually means.

Look out for an employee attendance tracking software:

Start looking for a modern attendance software with an easy dashboard, integrations, geo-fencing, real-time comprehensive reports, and leave management.

Review logs:

Check attendance logs frequently to observe attendance patterns. The data generated will provide managers a clear picture of patterns that may need attention – whether it’s repeated late entries, unusual overtime, or missed punches.

Set up automated alerts:

Even after integrating the employee attendance tracking software, there is a possibility that your employees may forget to punch in or out. To avoid this, set up auto-reminders for real-time attendance tracking.

Final Thought

Every day, employees show up with the single aim of giving their absolute best. Attendance tracking is essential as it directly relates to the payroll. The least an organisation can do is implement an advanced attendance tracking software that is simple and secure, so that it can save your time, your HR’s, and your managers. If you also want to bring this level of ease into your workplace, the best HRMS & payroll software in India, Superworks, gives you everything in one place. Try our free plan and see how effortless managing your workforce can truly be.