Tips & Tricks - AutoFluent®'s Timeclock Benefits
Tracking the time worked for your hourly employees is very important. When you have a small shop you may be able to get by with just recording those hours on a piece of paper or within a spreadsheet. But as your shop size increases, or as your free time dwindles, you may want a more automated system. With AutoFluent®’s Timeclock you can keep track of, edit and run reports on your employees’ timeclock punches. This will free up valuable time to allow you to get other important work done while AutoFluent® handles the Employee Timeclock.
Setup the AutoFluent Timeclock
You set up the Timeclock in the Employees window. In the Timeclock Employees tab you can create a timeclock user, which is only used for the Timeclock. But first, let’s understand the difference between a Login user and a Timeclock employee. You may have some employees that would need to log into AutoFluent® that would never use the Timeclock, like a Manager. Or you may have employees that would only need the Timeclock and would never actually need to log into AutoFluent®. That should help you when determining if you need to create a user in the Sales Reps / User Logins tab or just the Timeclock Employees tab. If you create a Login User in addition to a Timeclock User, keep in mind that the passwords can be unique, but it may be more convenient to make them the same. You should also make sure initials used are the same for a given person so that reporting will be easier throughout AutoFluent®.
In the Timeclock Employees tab you can create all of your timeclock employees as well as set their weekly schedules. Optionally, you can set a wage so your timeclock reports will automatically calculate what your timeclock employees earn during a period. You assign your employees to their timeclock and labor departments as well as set how the individual employees handle overtime and holidays. There is even a copy and paste schedule option if you need to assign the same schedule to multiple employees.
In the Timeclock Setup tab, you can set rules for overtime pay calculations as well as set your holidays and specify whether or not they are paid holidays. In the Sales Rep / User Logins tab, you can give your users the permission to be a Timeclock Manager, which allows them to edit and create punches. If you want to limit a timeclock manager to only be able to manage one group of timeclock employees, you can create Timeclock Departments in the Timeclock Setup tab and assign a manager to the department. This means that the manager can only manage the department he or she is assigned to. If you do not want to limit a timeclock manager to a single department, you should leave the Manager field blank in your Timeclock Departments.
Using the AutoFluent Timeclock
Once all of your timeclock employees have been setup, they can begin using the Timeclock to clock in and out! You do not have to be logged into AutoFluent® to use the Timeclock, so even employees that are not able to log into AutoFluent® can clock in. They will just click the clock icon on the main screen, select their name in the list, input their timeclock password and click the Punch In/Out button. If they forgot to punch in at the correct time they can manually type in a time and punch in, but it will show as an “Unapproved Override” until a Timeclock Manager approves it. In addition to punching in/out, Timeclock Employees can also view their punch in history and even send messages to other timeclock employees. Messages will be available to read the next time the Timeclock Employee punches in.
As a Timeclock Manager you can punch yourself in/out, view your history, and send messages as long as you are a Timeclock Employee yourself. But, you can also input Time Off for your employees, Edit their Timeclock Punches, and run Timeclock Reports. Besides printing out the employee schedules, you can run the Timeclock Report with or without showing their individual punches. There is also the Timeclock Summary Report which shows additional information such as wages, total time clocked in, commission and spiffs for Sales Reps, and labor hours for Mechanics.
As you can see, AutoFluent®’s Timeclock Manager is another feature-rich tool to help save you time and give you the information you need to do what you do best - manage your shop.