Case Study: Custom Mobile App Module Makes Enterprise Time Tracking Effortless
The Result: All departments are seeing improvements in productivity and have accurate data for invoicing.
Atigro partnered with a large enterprise service provider to create a custom mobile time tracker for their front line employees that completely eliminates timesheet paperwork and allows all departments to improve productivity and have accurate data for invoicing .
The Opportunity: Create an auditable time tracking system which assigns labor hours to specific tasks and allows approval of leave in advance
Our client, an enterprise service provider, was experiencing challenges with time management on projects due to lack of control of and visibility into the schedules and number of hours worked by their front line employees. Lack of visibility in employee labor hours can mean that some employees are overscheduled while others don’t have enough to do.
The system was paper-based and required employees to fill out physical timesheets, relying on memory, long after the job was complete. It did not track labor hours per task which obscured what employees were accomplishing during their day. Furthermore, it required entry into spreadsheets which were then sent to HR, reentered, and required another round of checks before being approved.
The spreadsheet data, though available, did not behave as true historical data on how long it took to complete previous jobs and tasks because of the lack of specificity, and difficulty of managing data in spreadsheets. This meant that there was no information on how long similar jobs would take to complete in the future.
In order to build a well functioning system, understanding how time is spent and where extra support is needed or can be removed is key. Our client needed to:
- Eliminate timesheet paper work
- Reduce administrative effort and duplicate data entry
- Optimize workloads with clear visibility
- Automate time keeping and labor usage
- Identify and resolve payroll discrepancies before processing
- Keep accurate records for PTO, sick leave, and overtime
- Set and track pay rates for team members or projects
- Track time spent on projects and accurately bill clients
- Produce detailed reports for payroll, project management, and accounting
- Allow team members to enter data quickly and efficiently on their mobile devices
- Sync data in real time
The Solution: A single mobile application to eliminate paperwork and handle all aspects of time management for their distributed workforce
A custom-built mobile application module has been developed to overhaul the client’s outdated, paper-based tracking process. This new solution is designed to be a comprehensive time tracking tool for their distributed workforce, streamlining all aspects of labor hour tracking directly from the field. By moving time logging into a single mobile interface, the system not only eliminates tedious manual paperwork but also provides real-time visibility and control over project labor.
Integration with payroll will allow for an easy pipeline from tracking-to-approval with minimal overhead. Integration with back office systems will allow convenient timesheet approval workflows, a central calendar and database of who is working on which day and quick pay period turn over.
Built in business rules will keep tracking errors from making it past the ground floor. A time tracking tool with on-the-site updating and offline support will allow employees to track tasks as they are completed. Employees must provide accurately tracked work, with all work hours accounted for, before they can submit their timesheets for approval.
Attaching labor hours to service and work orders will allow companies to construct a complete time-cost analysis on projects and track waste; and accurate tracking on large projects will allow the back office to create accurate time estimates for jobs, which aids in scheduling and customer satisfaction.
On-site tracking ensures more accurate reporting. Employees can complete their timesheets as soon as a task or job is done, requiring less guesswork. There is a trackable log of how long jobs take to be completed which can be used to optimize scheduling and understand productivity and waste.
Employees will be able to request PTO from the app, along with reasons for the time off, and track the status of their request without lengthy email chains with the administrative team. Easy to track sick leave will ensure that all hours are accounted for and nothing slips through the system.
In addition to approving time before sending it to payroll, employees have the opportunity to correct their hours, up and until manager approval but, after approval their hours are locked and can only be changed by a manager. Finally, because the hours are recorded at the granular level of specific service or work orders, each service order and work order now shows the time spent on it and can be referenced when finalizing the costs to the end customer.
The Impact:
The complete elimination of physical timesheet paperwork and data reentry will reduce administrative overhead, create a more trackable system and greatly reduce payroll errors, which typically have occurred to the detriment of the company.
Unlike the previous cumbersome and time consuming paper process, with mobile time management physical timesheets and lengthy communication will be eliminated. Employees will be able to quickly fix mistakes through the app and the back office can quickly adjust as needed before approving hours.
Understanding the time requirements for various jobs will allow our client to have a better understanding of how long a job will take to complete, optimizing their scheduling system and bringing scalability to the business.
Custom tracking in a mobile app will simplify timesheet workflows and ensure on-time and accurate pay for employees. With the required assignment of labor hours to service and work order tasks, the back office will be able to adjust the distribution of technicians to increase productivity and guarantee on-time job completion.
The Bottom Line
Project management is being transformed because employee time can be accurately managed, tracked, and allocated across all jobs, allowing our client to have unprecedented visibility into all their front line operations in near real-time. The app’s sophisticated time tracking tool provides a final output for payroll and seamlessly integrates with service and work order modules, allowing both front line and administrative employees to work more efficiently.
Do you need to do a better job of improving office morale while increasing productivity? Atigro’s custom enterprise apps help businesses augment ERP systems to better manage services, activities, scheduling, invoicing, time tracking, customer communication, and more. Let’s talk about how we can customize an app to your team’s exact specifications.