How do small businesses track employee hours accurately, without it becoming a full-time job of its own? In 2020, 14% of businesses increased their spending on time-tracking tools, largely driven by the shift to remote work. Accurate time tracking affects almost everything downstream: payroll, scheduling, and even the quality of work employees produce when deadlines and hours are managed well. Here are six practical ways to improve it.
1. Train Your Team
A time-tracking system only works if people actually understand how and why to use it. Walk employees through the tools in person, and back that up with written materials they can reference later. When people understand how their tracked hours connect to payroll, scheduling, and their own workload, they’re more likely to use the system consistently and accurately.
2. Document the Process
Write clear documentation for how time tracking works at your company: when to clock in and out, how breaks are handled, what to do if something goes wrong. Publishing it somewhere employees can access anytime (an online handbook works well) means people can check the process themselves instead of guessing or asking around.
3. Automate Your Time-Tracking System
Automating time tracking cuts down significantly on manual data entry and the errors that come with it. It also gives you an accurate, real-time record of actual hours worked. The same automation can handle PTO tracking, keeping sick leave, vacation, and other paid time off balances current without extra manual work.
4. Know the Recordkeeping Laws That Apply to You
Time-tracking recordkeeping requirements come from the Department of Labor’s enforcement of the Fair Labor Standards Act (FLSA), not the IRS. Under the FLSA, records used to compute wages, like timecards and work schedules, need to be kept for at least two years, while broader payroll records generally need three. State and local laws can add their own requirements on top of that, so it’s worth checking what applies in your area specifically. When in doubt, a lawyer familiar with your industry’s labor laws can help confirm you’re covered.
5. Make Your Time-Tracking System Mobile
A mobile-accessible time tracker makes clocking in and out possible from any location, which matters even more for remote or field employees who aren’t working from a single desk. For extra accuracy, a facial recognition time clock (compatible with Android and iOS) scans an employee’s face at clock-in and clock-out. That extra verification step helps prevent buddy punching and other inaccuracies that cost money over time.
6. Build Time Tracking Into Onboarding
Current employees usually already know your time-tracking system, but new hires are starting from zero. Include time-tracking training as a standard part of onboarding, so every employee starts with the same expectations and the same access to the system from day one.
These changes don’t need to happen overnight. Small, consistent improvements to how your team tracks time add up to fewer payroll errors and less time spent managing the process itself.
TimeTrakGO provides straightforward employee time clock software built to give your team a smooth, accurate way to track hours. Get started for free and see the difference for yourself.
About the Author: Brandon Zimmerman
