Biometrics

A biometric punch clock can help to alleviate a lot of stress, time, and effort for your payroll team. It can also save you hundreds, or thousands, of dollars per year on time clock materials and accessories, depending on your company size. The biometric punch clock is also a great solution for the "employee favor punch." This refers to when an employee gets a co-worker to punch in or out for them. With the biometric punch clock, the employee must be present.

There are several different types of biometric punch clock systems available. One type of biometric time clock uses a regular personal computer with keyboard and monitor, combined with a special biometric punch clock reader. This biometric punch clock comes with a complete software package for employee scheduling, payroll calculations, and reporting.

With this biometric punch clock, the employee uses the reader, which connects to the computer using a USB port, after entering a password on the computer using the keyboard. The employees time is logged into the system, which can be networked into payroll computers for easy time calculations and reconciling with schedules. This is an all inclusive system.

The other type of biometric punch clock is one that looks like a card swipe time clock. Instead of swiping a card, the employee submits a fingerprint or hand print scan. This scan is matched with the employee in the computer, and the time is logged. This type of biometric punch clock can be networked into the payroll systems. Using software included with the biometric punch clock, payroll can be calculated using viewable and printable reports.

A nice twist on this type of biometric punch clock is the portable model. These time clocks are great for construction crews that never see an office. The fingerprint scans are the same, and the time information is stored in the memory. When taken back to the office, it can be connected with a USB port to a computer to pull information into reports that are used to calculate payroll.

As biometric punch clocks become more popular and advanced, software will be more readily available to integrate the biometric punch clock with existing employee scheduling and payroll systems. Until then, the reporting available with the biometric punch clock software can be saved in many different formats, allowing upload into existing systems easy and painless.

Different biometric punch clocks come at different prices. The biometric punch clock with comprehensive software is the most expensive type of biometric punch clock, and runs at around seven to eight hundred dollars per system. Considering the cost of time cards, swipe cards, and the time of your payroll office, this is relatively inexpensive. Most companies will discover that they have recovered their investment within the first year. In subsequent years, the savings are very substantial.