Time recording in the home office: this is how it works

In Germany, there are numerous companies that have been offering their employees the opportunity to work from home for many years. Nevertheless, until recently, there were also companies that did not believe in the concept of working from home.

However, due to the challenges associated with the Corona pandemic, it quickly became clear even to them that the home office should no longer be categorically ruled out. Rather, reports were mounting that productivity in no way suffers when work is done from home. For this reason, companies today must increasingly address the issue of working from home.

Of course, there are numerous criteria to consider, such as how to continue to communicate with each other as a team or how to ensure that employees can work productively. In addition, the topic of time and attendance, i.e. the recording of working hours, also plays an important role with regard to home office work.

The following article explains how detailed recording of working time is also possible when working from home.

Different options for time recording in the home office

Basically, there are various options to choose from when it comes to recording employees’ working hours in the home office.

Manually filling in time sheets

In order to record working time in the home office, it is of course possible to fill in a timesheet manually, for example in the form of a ready-made table in Excel.

Employees then enter the start and end of their work in this. The file must then be forwarded to the HR department or the responsible manager for approval.

Time recording through chatbots

Time recording in the home office can also be implemented with the help of chatbots. Depending on how the chatbot is deployed, employees can communicate with the bots via a desktop chat or an app, for example.

Simple inputs, such as “pause”, “clock out” or “clock in”, can then be used to pause, stop or start the recording of working time. If there is a connection between the chatbot and HR software, the system thus automatically takes over the hours worked.

HR software in the cloud

Companies benefit from using HR software not only because this type of time recording can be implemented extremely quickly. Other processes can also be automated with the help of this and the work in the home office can thus be optimized in numerous areas.

The data of the employees and their shifts or weekly working hours only have to be stored in the software. Employees can then clock in and out via a web platform or app. In addition, it is also possible to manage holidays and absences in the HR software.

This provides both parties with a practical overview of the hours worked, overtime and minus hours at all times.

Online time recording – these are the advantages

No investment in new hardware is necessary to establish the modern way of time recording. The working time is recorded with the help of the software simply via an app or on the desktop – regardless of whether the employee is in the home office or on site in the office.

This means that companies always have an overview of their employees’ working hours and can initiate measures such as compensating rest periods or reducing overtime at an early stage. It is also extremely easy to record sick leave, vacation days and absences.

At the touch of a button, the respective timesheets can be downloaded and used for payroll accounting purposes, for example.