The Advantages of Employee Time Clock Cards, Badges, & Biometrics

Let’s be honest… because not everyone else is!

Simple PIN-based time and attendance systems can easily be cheated by rogue employees. Time theft can be extremely costly to your business over time if workers get paid for hours they did not work.

The good news, though, is that there is a solution. Card, badge, and biometric systems can improve timekeeping accuracy and prevent time theft across your business.

What is time theft?

Time theft occurs when an employee takes payment for time that they were not working. In some cases, simple mistakes that anyone might make, like forgetting to clock out for your lunch break, can contribute to these inaccuracies. Time theft can also occur by intentional means, like “buddy-punching” or timecard fraud. When there is no process in place to validate hours according to an employee’s schedule or flag unusual hours for review, it can become trivial for employees to falsify hours.

The American Payroll Association (APA) reports that nearly 75% of businesses lose money to buddy-punching, which is when one employee clocks in or out for another to get paid for extra hours or to cover late starts and early leaves.

How do cards, badges, and biometrics prevent time theft?

When it comes to your workforce, if you’re using a simple PIN based system, any employee could clock in or out for another with the use of their personal identification number. When time theft is so easy, it can become a rampant problem in your workplace.

Fortunately, using better employee authentication like employee ID cards, RFID badges, and biometric time clocks can help. These validation tools make it harder for employees to clock in for each other while keeping the clock in process quick and easy.

Imagine a common scenario with an insecure PIN system. Tom is running late, so he texts Jane his PIN and asks her to clock in for him. In exchange, when Jane leaves her shift early, she asks Tom to clock out for her using her PIN. According to the clock, both employees arrived on time and left on schedule, but both really cheated the system with buddy-punching.

This scenario doesn’t play out the same if there are barriers to authentication. Without Tom’s ID card or badge, Jane can’t clock in for him. And unless Jane leaves behind her ID card or badge with Tom, he can’t clock out for her—which would leave her without a way to clock in tomorrow.

Biometric systems offer better security than paper time cards or PIN systems. Since biometric systems require the input of each employee’s unique biometric identifiers—the curves and spaces of their fingerprint or the shape of their iris—only that employee can clock in or out for themself. This means that it is impossible to clock in for another employee, preventing any buddy-punching scheme.

Journyx, the leader in time tracking software and hardware, can you help you determine what technologies might be right for your business. With multiple options for card, badge, and biometric time clocks, as well as web-based timekeeping software, we’re ready to find the best solution for you. Contact us now to get started!