6 Tips to Say Goodbye to Constant Timesheet Reminders

Managers hate to nag about an employee’s timecard with ongoing timesheet reminders. It can feel like a power struggle with a bunch of five-year-olds. You hire competent professionals. You don’t want to think of them as kids who refuse to pick up their toys.

Getting employees to turn in timecards is a problem that has plagued employers since the Industrial Revolution.

But many companies have solved the late timecard dilemma. You can too.

How to Eliminate Timesheet Reminders

1. Find out why
2. Solve the problems
3. Hold managers accountable
4. Create a discipline policy
5. Train employees and managers
6. Use an employee timekeeping system

Find out why employees aren’t turning in timesheets

Maybe your team members don’t understand the system or appreciate the importance of tracking work hours. (This is a head-scratcher because most employees want to get paid.)

If they don’t understand the system, it’s time for basic employee timecard training. First, create a process with deadlines. Second, add the policy to your onboarding documents. Then, periodically give everyone a refresher course. Last, have all employees sign a document acknowledging that they understand the process and agree to follow it.

Automate timesheet reminders (no more manual work)

Do they forget? Try email reminders or texts. Automated employee timekeeping systems have built-in timesheet reminders. Sync them to your payroll schedule so employees have fair warning to turn in their timesheet.

Can’t access the system? If you have paper timecards, this puts mobile employees at a disadvantage. Inexpensive web-based time tracking apps can help. That way, your remote employees can punch in with their phone.

Employee time reporting systems synced to time clocks create timecards automatically. You might have to remind your employees to punch in, but you can say goodbye to manual timesheet reminders for good.

Hold your managers accountable

The timecard burden shouldn’t fall on the HR director or payroll manager. Turning in timecards is a primary job function. As an essential job role, managers should hold employees accountable.

Certainly, your managers are in a better position to know what’s really going on. If your managers are competent, they can solve your late timecard problem.

However, if they can’t, you have more than late timecards to worry about.

Create a disciplinary policy

Progressive discipline policies start with a warning. For repeat infractions, the penalties increase in severity.

Here’s an example:

1. First offense: verbal warning
2. Second offense: written warning
3. Third offense: suspension
4. Fourth offense: termination

Some companies skip the suspension step because it brings its own problems.

Offer additional timecard training

Unified HR portals make it easy to create training programs. They provide electronic document management that simplifies training and onboarding. With electronic signature, employees can verify they understand and agree to your time and attendance policy.

Taking time to explain the big picture of timekeeping can also be part of the training. It’s no mystery why payroll needs timesheets. Whether your employees are hourly or salaried, you can’t cut checks without hours. Furthermore, you can’t bill clients.

A secondary reason (but no less important) is that you can’t plan projects. Billable time records show how employee hours break down per project or client. Finally, you can’t stay on the good side of the DOL without accurate timesheets.

Explain the importance of accurate time records. Make sure your teams know that the data is vital for the company to be able to:

• Pay employees
• Track costs
• Maintain compliance
• Bill clients

Get an employee timekeeping system

Automated employee timekeeping combined with a straightforward process is the best solution.

Consider the advantages of automated employee time tracking:

1. Digital timecards
   • Managers can access anytime from a mobile device
   • Employees can access anytime from a mobile device
   • Import employee time data automatically to payroll
2. Alerts and reminders (no need for manual timesheet reminders every pay period)
3. Syncs to a physical or web-based time clock

Those are the must-haves for automated employee time tracking.

Here are the nice-to-haves:

• Breaks and meals tracking
• ‘Employee-aware’ prompts
• Schedule lockouts
• Syncing with employee scheduling
• Shift trade board

If you are planning to get a timekeeping app, you might as well solve other problems with these valuable features.

Mobile Time Tracking Apps Solve Manager Timesheet Delays

Mobile time tracking apps help managers approve timecards on time without having to send out timesheet reminders. When timecards live online, managers can approve them from their mobile phones or computers. A mobile timekeeping app can help companies provide hybrid working opportunities while keeping tabs on labor costs.

Online Timecards Are Never Late

Employee time tracking apps make sure employees turn in timecards because the app does it for them. As each staff member punches in with a physical or web-based clock, the software creates timecards and updates work hours in real time.

Solve the End-of-Pay-Period Timecard Scramble

1. The system creates online timecards
2. Supervisors can approve them from anywhere
3. The payroll manager imports the timesheets into your payroll system without manual keying

Timecard Compliance FAQ

Timecards have many compliance implications. Here are answers to important legal questions:

Do I Have to Pay When an Employee Doesn’t Turn in a Timesheet?

Yes. You can’t withhold pay. Under the Fair Labor Standards Act (FLSA), it’s the employer’s responsibility to keep records of the employee’s hours.

What Should I Do if an Employee Doesn’t Turn in Their Timecard?

Estimate from past pay periods either with timesheets or project hours. Note that you will have to correct any discrepancies on their next paycheck. Document your efforts to get the information and create a paper trail to protect you in case of a Department of Labor (DOL) audit. HR portals simplify recordkeeping requirements, while timekeeping software ensures accuracy.

If an Employee Agrees to Work Off-The Clock, Can I Make it up Next Paycheck?

No. Some employers try to avoid paying overtime by off-the-clock work and plan to make it up to the employee when the deadline crunch is over. (Hopefully.)

Nice try. Whether you are planning to pay overtime next paycheck — or straight time — this is illegal.

3 Things You Can Do Right Now

Are you ready to eliminate manual work from your day-to-day? Implement these three tips to get rid of timecard reminders.

1. Automate Time and Attendance

If you haven’t upgraded your time and attendance system, the time is now. You are losing money.

Automated time and attendance will save you more than it costs. WorkforceHub is an automated time and labor system that runs in the cloud, is easy to install, and saves time and money.

To use WorkforceHub, all you need is a web browser. Your employees can clock in with any internet-connected device. It’s cloud-based, so the infrastructure is already in place.

WorkforceHub uses employee punches to create a digital timecard for each worker. There’s no need to fill out paper timecards; everything is automated and paperless. The system brings simplicity and efficiency to timecard processing. It can be set up quickly, so you don’t have to worry about a bumpy transition period. Implementing this solution is something you can do right now to start saving money.

Do you have several locations or mobile employees? No sweat. WorkforceHub ideal for organizations with geographically-dispersed teams. Employees can access the system anytime, and anywhere with the mobile timecard app.

It also integrates with your payroll system — whether in-house or outsourced. Fast timecard approval ensures that everyone gets their paychecks on time.

Solution to do now: Get WorkforceHub.

2. Streamline Approvals

With WorkforceHub, you are on the automation train heading for efficiency nirvana.

The next step is to use the mobile timecard app. (Don’t worry, it’s included)

You are now capturing clock-ins and employee hours for each shift. WorkforceHub adds each punch time to the appropriate employee’s timecard. It never mistakes a 3 for a 5. It never makes mathematical errors. And it has stunning penmanship.

These timecards are now living securely in the cloud. Centralized digital storage lets your managers do all sorts of things.

First off, workforce managers can see every timecard in one place. They can compare by department or team, or filter by part-time vs full-time. Managers can view employees with overtime hours.

The WorkforceHub timecard app puts HR in your pocket. Not only can your managers now approve timecards in minutes, they can do it anywhere they want, around the clock.

As you grow, you won’t need to hire as many supervisors or payroll administrators. With WorkforceHub, one manager can approve timecards for dozens of employees.

Centralization makes life better for your employees, as well. They will never have to remember to write down a punch time. They can look at their timecard any time of day with the mobile timecard app. They won’t even have to add up hours. Your employees will love you. Especially those who are arithmetic-challenged.

Solution to do now: Simplify approvals with the WorkforceHub timecard app.

3. Enforce Schedules

There are two big reasons to enforce schedules: accuracy and error reduction. They go hand-in-hand.

Managers shouldn’t have to police shifts. Clearly, it’s a waste of resources for high-paid employees. Even worse is the time it takes to watch over mistakes made when time is recorded.

But if no one makes sure that employees are clocking in and out at the right times, your labor budget balloons. Often, it’s not the employee’s fault. Employees work more than 40 hours and move into time-and-a-half. No one tells them to clock out, so they keep working. Can you blame them?

Busy employees goof up paper timecards. Suppose your best phone rep forgets to write down her shift start time because there are calls in the queue. This happens day after day. At the end of the pay period, she has to recall all those punch times. As a result, she makes unintentional timecard errors.

A busy manager also makes mistakes. Here is a common scenario: The payroll processor needed employee hours yesterday. The manager has 30 timecards on her desk. Some are sloppy, incomplete, or have math errors. The manager has ten minutes to approve them or checks will be late. It’s not exactly a recipe for accuracy.

Indeed, these common situations are expensive. You either lose money in overtime, hour padding, or timecard math errors. WorkforceHub is your solution.

The Leading Solution for Timesheet Reminders

WorkforceHub integrates with several ‘intelligent’ employee time clocks. ‘Intelligent’ means that they are aware of the employee’s punch status and only present logical options. In addition, you can create custom prompts to collect information at punch-in. For example, job codes or health status. Plus, they can enforce schedules with clock lockout.

Pair WorkforceHub with a hardware clock with advanced features. Then, set schedule rules in the software. You can set them for each employee, team, location, or position.

An intelligent clock is your iron-fisted schedule enforcer that never sleeps. They send your managers alerts when employees approach overtime. Then the manager can make a decision before you start paying time-and-a-half.

Moreover, use schedule enforcement to prevent employees from punching in outside of authorized shifts. This protects you from time theft, meals/breaks violations, and punch errors.

Accuracy allows for better forecasting. Make strategic resource allocation decisions based on solid numbers.

When your managers don’t have to correct timecard errors or police shifts, they have more hours to get things done. Those hours can be used to grow your business. Productivity just went from zero to sixty in 3.5 seconds.

Solution to do now: Add an intelligent clock with schedule enforcement.

Get It Done Now

Time is money, as we’ve already established. Every minute you wait to implement WorkforceHub is money down the drain.

To speed up payroll, expedite timecard approvals with WorkforceHub.

Updated May 14, 2024