Making payroll is among the most fundamental functions of any business. There are several ways to track employee hours. Arguably, the most convenient and accurate way to accomplish this task is to employ the best time card software available. ShopClock by Pacific Rim Software is an excellent candidate. This top-tier application earns our TopTenREVIEWS Bronze award for time attendance software.
ShopClock's reports can be quickly and easily exported to Quicken, CheckMark or a CSV file. Pay periods are flexible, and you can change the date range of your reports as well. The print proof feature allows you to preview your reports for mistakes before you close out the pay period.
In addition to computers on the LAN, ShopClock can be used across a VPN connection, which means that satellite stores, offices, branches and so forth can be located anywhere with internet access. Usually, each store or branch office is set up as a separate department. Since each ShopClock client can be configured to show only the employees belonging to a particular department, the ShopClock client at each location only lists the employees who work at that location.
Using ShopClock, employees can clock in with just two mouse clicks. Each day, the employees' working hours are totaled and displayed. The weekly total is shown at the bottom of the time card, thus helping employees avoid unauthorized overtime. Vacation and sick time is awarded in hours but dispensed in days.
An optional Finger Print Reader can be used instead of a password. This requires administrator assistance to ensure that the fingerprint belongs to the employee. The fingerprint is used only for identity verification, such as with fingerprint scanners.
ShopClock does accrue and track PTO time, sick leave and vacation days. Any number of hours of vacation, sick, PTO and more can be allocated to any day. A journal for type of Managed Time is kept, which can be viewed by both administrators and employees. It records when benefit hours are accrued and allocated.
Employees have the ability to request time off by clicking on the request calendar. The software also tracks, but doesn't accrue, uncompensated time off, holidays and bereavement. The percentage of employees working each day can be shown in an interactive calendar within the program. All you have to do is click on a date to see a list of who worked and the hours they worked. You can also look at the hours any employee worked through the same list. If an employee is early or tardy, the attendance calendar can tell you who they are and to what degree they were early or tardy. These are measured based on whether they were to start work on the hour or the half hour.
There is a new accrual system that can accrue vacation, sick and PTO hours based either on a fixed-number per pay period or a fraction of an hour for each hour worked. The accrual year can be a calendar year starting on January 1 or a year starting on each employee's hire date. Eligibility dates and max amounts per year can be applied. Most of these settings can be unique for each employee. The accrual system feeds the managed time journals so that employees can easily keep track of time remaining and allocated.
Administrators can add TimeWorked in addition to editing the time card. This is treated the same way as HoursWorked via the Managed Time calendar. With this feature, administrators can easily account for time their employees spent working outside of the office.
ShopClock can produce payroll reports that show regular time, overtime, vacation and sick time. Reports export into Quicken, CheckMark and as CSV files. You can create employee birthday and phone lists. Annual summary reports can be printed by month or quarter. All of these reports can be proofed before you actually close the pay period with the final print. All of your data can be backed up with one easy click and can be stored on any device, from a floppy disk to a USB memory stick.
ShopClock is easy to use. Employees will have no problems clocking in no matter the level of their computer skills.
ShopClock offers support via email and telephone. The help documentation is thorough, and FAQs are available on the website.
Support also includes LogMeIn – Rescue support that allows you to log in to a computer, demo the software, perform training and even set up the server and ShopClock clients. It's a nice way to do support.
ShopClock has all the features and functionality that you need to accomplish the task of tracking employee attendance and accruals. The reporting options are robust but don't have the breath of the other award winners. All in all, it's great software that you won't regret using.
