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How Does a Biometric Time Clock Reduce Labor Expenses? 4 Simple Ways To Cut Fixed Costs

Biometric time clocks reduce labor expenses for businesses with hourly workers by preventing time theft through buddy punching and hours padding, eliminating out-of-schedule punches, and improving payroll accuracy, thereby cutting payroll errors and potentially lowering payroll costs by 10% or more.

Do your clients have hourly workers? Offering them a biometric time clock is an effective way to limit labor costs for businesses with hourly employees.

4 Ways Biometric Time Clocks Lower Fixed Costs

  1. 1.Prohibit time theft by buddy punching
  2. 2.Eliminate time theft by hours padding
  3. 3.Eliminate out-of-schedule punches
  4. 4.Prevent payroll mistakes

What Is a Biometric Time Clock?

Biometric employee time clocks identify employees and track their work hours using unique biological identifiers. These clocks can sync with employee time and attendance software, such as TimeWorksPlus.

How Do Biometric Clocks Prevent Employee Time Theft?

A biometric clock identifies each staff member by their unique biological identifier, making it nearly impossible to cheat the system. With paper timesheets, employees can easily add extra minutes before or after a shift, which can accumulate to significant losses. Even small companies can lose up to four hours a week per employee due to this practice.

Employees may also engage in 'buddy clocking' or 'buddy punching,' where one employee clocks in for another who isn't present. This prevents attendance penalties and ensures the absent employee's paycheck isn't reduced. U.S. businesses lose over $370 million a year to time theft. All types of time theft increase payroll expenses, and flagrant abusers can cost employers thousands of dollars annually. A biometric time clock can reduce payroll expenses by 10% or more by preventing time theft.

How Do Biometric Clocks Improve Payroll Accuracy?

Payroll mistakes can occur unintentionally due to math errors on paper timecards, data entry mistakes, and lapses in memory. In traditional systems, multiple people handle each timecard, increasing the risk of human error. Uncorrected timecard errors can result in inaccurate paychecks, requiring additional checks and corrections to vacation calculations. Errors can also affect overtime benefits and minimum wage compliance, leading to frustration for employees, managers, and administrators.

How Does a Biometric Time Clock Sync With TimeWorksPlus?

TimeWorksPlus integrates with biometric time clocks to provide greater control and automate inefficient processes. The workflow is as follows:

  • The employee clocks in with the biometric clock.
  • The clock identifies the employee and records the punch time.
  • TimeWorksPlus adds the hours worked to the employee’s digital timecard.
  • At the end of the payroll period, TimeWorksPlus imports the hours into the payroll system.

Additional features of TimeWorksPlus include:

  • Breaks/meals management
  • PTO accruals tracking
  • Missed punch alerts
  • Overtime notifications
  • Intelligent 'employee-aware' prompts
  • Customizable compliance settings

How Does a Biometric Time Clock Synced To TimeWorksPlus Reduce Missed Punches?

The clock prompt presents only logical options to each employee. For example, if a staff member is already clocked out for a meal, upon return, the clock will only present an END MEAL option.

How Does a Biometric Time Clock Synced To TimeWorksPlus Enforce Schedules?

If an employee attempts to clock in before their scheduled shift start time, the clock will deny access and notify them of their designated start time. The employee cannot clock in until the scheduled time.

Swipeclock offers WorkforceHub, a Human Resources Management System (HRMS) that includes TimeWorksPlus, TimeSimplicity, TimeWorks Mobile, and ApplicantStack. WorkforceHub provides features such as applicant tracking, onboarding, benefits enrollment, performance reviews, and employee engagement. It is designed to help employers reduce cost-per-hire, streamline scheduling, automate time tracking, maintain regulatory compliance, and reduce labor costs.