The jury is out on whether workers should clock in and out when they go for a cigarette break in working hours. An increasing number of companies are being made to do just this as managers look to maximise their productivity and get the most from their workers. As well as this it is a very pragmatic view and may help to put people off smoking as the population look to save money.
The idea arose when staff at different companies felt there was an issue of unfairness going on where some people went for a smoke and others didn't, yet being paid for the same duration. But the smoking staff themselves state that the idea is 'unfair, prejudicial to pick on smokers and implies that they are slackers or take too many breaks.'
My personal opinion is that workers should clock on and off when they go puffing outside. Why? As explained above companies are losing valuable productivity whilst still paying these employees even though they are not doing work or in the office. Although only 5 minutes will be lost, the amount of times that some go for a smoke all adds up and a simple clock off when they go outside and clock on when they arrive back to do work.
What would be best for this is issue is a easyaccessiblemonitoring system that records this information.U-CLOCK fitsthe bill for this perfectly where a coded box to let the managers know which office or site they are on, changes every 30 seconds and allows the employee to clock in, out, or simply clock a check to make others aware of their whereabouts.