Let's impress my new boss! Tell me what Time & Attendance apps are best
July 7, 2020 6:46 AM Subscribe
I just started working for a small (5 Person) electrical company that does mainly residential work. They currently use HOMEBASE for their time attendance system. It is not working for the owner. Help me be a ROCKSTAR and give him the best app possible.
He finds that he has to type in daily the schedule for the following day even if it is the same as the day before. There is no way to track which jobs/clients we are sending the electrians to. For example a drop down with client name or address or purchase order. His biggest compaint is that there is NO WAY TO RUN A REPORT FOR ANY GIVEN TIME PERIOD THAT SHOWS WHERE & WHEN HIS employees were working. Or any reports for that matter.
This means when I have to enter the labor cost for each project I have to go in and open each employees schedule for eachd day and then figure out the hours attached to each project. Each day the employee has a schedule of visits and what they are supposed to do at them. Typing this out is time consuming each day and he would like an easier method. He is willing to spend a reasonable amount of money for the right time & attendance system, but it can't break the bank. He is a small business. Tell me what works best for you or your company & why! Tell me what you use and what doesn't work well with that specific app.
Some of the below would make a perfect time & attendance system.
1. Have a GPS check-in so that he knows where they are when they clock-in.
2. Be able to clock-in and clock-out of multiple jobs in a given day.
3. If it interfaces with Quickbooks that would be AWESOME!
4. Be able to run reports the tell what job employees were on so that we can charge the right hours to a client without having to go back and open each individual day. Or the ability to run different types of reports.
5. If there was a drop down to choose a client that would be great. Another drop down option would be by Purchase Order. But, it would only be really great if there is a reporting function.
6. It must be able to work on iPhone & Android. We run on a non-Apple system in the office so it would have to interface.
7. If there is a way for employees to send notes back to my boss from the system it would be great. Again, if we could run a report of those notes.
8. An even bigger win would be if employees could take a picture of or scan receipts into the app and attatch it to a specific client or job.
9. I would love a decent customer service help line.
Tell me what is good & bad about web based time, attentance, and job programs. I really need a win to look good.
Any help is appreciated!
He finds that he has to type in daily the schedule for the following day even if it is the same as the day before. There is no way to track which jobs/clients we are sending the electrians to. For example a drop down with client name or address or purchase order. His biggest compaint is that there is NO WAY TO RUN A REPORT FOR ANY GIVEN TIME PERIOD THAT SHOWS WHERE & WHEN HIS employees were working. Or any reports for that matter.
This means when I have to enter the labor cost for each project I have to go in and open each employees schedule for eachd day and then figure out the hours attached to each project. Each day the employee has a schedule of visits and what they are supposed to do at them. Typing this out is time consuming each day and he would like an easier method. He is willing to spend a reasonable amount of money for the right time & attendance system, but it can't break the bank. He is a small business. Tell me what works best for you or your company & why! Tell me what you use and what doesn't work well with that specific app.
Some of the below would make a perfect time & attendance system.
1. Have a GPS check-in so that he knows where they are when they clock-in.
2. Be able to clock-in and clock-out of multiple jobs in a given day.
3. If it interfaces with Quickbooks that would be AWESOME!
4. Be able to run reports the tell what job employees were on so that we can charge the right hours to a client without having to go back and open each individual day. Or the ability to run different types of reports.
5. If there was a drop down to choose a client that would be great. Another drop down option would be by Purchase Order. But, it would only be really great if there is a reporting function.
6. It must be able to work on iPhone & Android. We run on a non-Apple system in the office so it would have to interface.
7. If there is a way for employees to send notes back to my boss from the system it would be great. Again, if we could run a report of those notes.
8. An even bigger win would be if employees could take a picture of or scan receipts into the app and attatch it to a specific client or job.
9. I would love a decent customer service help line.
Tell me what is good & bad about web based time, attentance, and job programs. I really need a win to look good.
Any help is appreciated!
You want T Sheets. It's made by quickbooks, its inexpensive, and once you set up the jobs and subtasks, employees simply pick from the menu as they clock in. There's a mobile app as well, so they don't have to be in front of a computer to switch jobs or tasks.
posted by ananci at 7:24 AM on July 7, 2020
posted by ananci at 7:24 AM on July 7, 2020
I'm hearing that you need not just a time entry system but a Field Service Management system. You need work order scheduling that does job costing, and then the time entry is done against the work orders. No picking clients, basically no decision-making required at the technician end: they have a list of work orders to work, they work them, they enter time and expenses to the work order.
Intuit partners with Corrigo on a field service solution, and it looks like most types of accounts have one free seat so you can look at it. You'll probably have to talk to Corrigo on pricing for additional seats.
There are other third-party solutions, and I have implemented FSM solutions but never for Quickbooks so I can't speak to the quality, I'm just saying that's the terminology for what I think you're trying to get to. Time Entry and Project Time Entry are only going to get you part of the way.
posted by Lyn Never at 9:41 AM on July 7, 2020
Intuit partners with Corrigo on a field service solution, and it looks like most types of accounts have one free seat so you can look at it. You'll probably have to talk to Corrigo on pricing for additional seats.
There are other third-party solutions, and I have implemented FSM solutions but never for Quickbooks so I can't speak to the quality, I'm just saying that's the terminology for what I think you're trying to get to. Time Entry and Project Time Entry are only going to get you part of the way.
posted by Lyn Never at 9:41 AM on July 7, 2020
This thread is closed to new comments.
I am not sure if it would be helpful to you, but it does interface with quickbooks. It allows each employee to choose customer, then service item (we use this for job - we don't have lot of customers but each customer has multiple jobs) then class. theres space for hours worked at each location and a description. you can pull reports by all employees, select several at at time or one by one. Or by customer or by job. you can look for yourself to see if it would work for you.
you have to manually sync with quick books, which might get annoying if you try to bill each day.
One problem i could see is what info pulls to your invoice but that might be customizable.
runs us 75 a month.
posted by domino at 7:06 AM on July 7, 2020