subject: How Better Data Capture Is Improving Time And Attendance Systems [print this page] The benefits of using a modern time and attendance system go far beyond merely helping business to operate more efficiently and more accurately, avoiding paying for hours not actually worked, and providing different departments with the ability to access data in a more streamlined, accurate and cost-effective fashion.
Modern time and attendance systems also help businesses to adapt to changing circumstances more quickly and effectively, as well as helping to provide a more accurate cost analysis of separate projects or jobs currently being undertaken. Whether you consider replacing old-fashioned, manual attendance systems with technologically streamlined and accurate ones for the purpose of cost, speed, efficiency, accuracy or versatility, the benefits are very clear to see.
One of the biggest challenges for any business as far as monitoring staff attendance is concerned, or time spent on a particular job or projects, is data capture. No one would deny that modern computer technology has revolutionised the way in which data can be handled, transferred, transmitted or used for a wide variety of purposes. But in every case the data needs to have been captured and imported at the start, and this is often where businesses have fallen down in more than simply operating time and attendance systems.
Incredibly there are still many businesses today who have a sophisticated computer-based data management system for staff attendance, holiday leave, overtime, time spent on particular projects for cost analysis or producing data for disciplinary procedures where necessary, but which are coupled with a data capture system which is no more sophisticated or advanced than those used before the discovery of electricity.
Paper-based data capture systems are inherently time-consuming and flawed, as well as being prone to inaccuracies. Often paper-based data capture methods for staff attendance tend to be filled in either in advance, which is always going to be inaccurate unless staff are blessed with the gift of premonition, or after staff have finished the day, in which case a certain amount of guesswork takes place, often with a rather optimistic view.
For staff who may be working off-site, such as in mobile units, paper-based attendance sheets are rarely likely to be fully accurate, and are only handed in once a member of staff returns on site, which may be several days after the period of time to which the data refers.
Modern time and attendance systems incorporate sophisticated data capture methods which helps to bring the entire system fully up-to-date, reducing the chance of inaccuracies or optimistic embellishment of working hours, as well as providing a range of solutions to enable data to be captured and submitted remotely in real time.
Modern data capture systems also help to provide a more versatile and responsive system for collecting data relating to the attendance of new staff, or temporary staff, which in the past has often been a particularly weak area for many businesses in terms of accurate data capture and data consolidation.
Whether through biometric data capture devices, magnetic strip cards or other data capture devices, a modern time and attendance system need no longer be a lopsided, inefficient and inaccurate solution which so many businesses have accepted as being inevitable for far too long.
