As well as the typewriter was replaced by the computer, time clocks started to move away from mechanical to computer based, electronic time and attendance systems because of the lack of information and automated payroll processing.

¿How many hours does your administrative spend in tracking the hours of the employees and do the payroll processing manually?

¿Where is the technology going for time and attendance systems?

Today is not enough to track and process employees hours but to know who clocks in / out is also needed.

In many companies the employees don't work the agreed hours in their employment contract.

A 3% of the worked hours has to be assumed by the companies because of the time spent by the employees. This percentage was calculated from a study made by the spanish consulting company "Inology" about control time and verification technologies applied in companies.

In electronic time clocks basically there are 2 types: systems that uses a card to clock in / out and the biometrics.

The advantage of time clocks that uses cards (bar code, magnetic stripe or proximity) is the speed for clock in / out that is a basic need for companies with big number of employees, but they have the disadvantage of being vulnerable to "Buddy Punching".

Respecting biometric time clocks the advantage is that prevents "Buddy Punching" but the disadvantage is that only works in "clean environments" where the employees have administrative functions, also they are expensive to purchase.

To avoid "Buddy Punching" for industrial companies without giving up the speed and practicity of the cards TcSoft launched "Virtual Clock" (Magnetic stripe or Proximity Option), an anti fraud system with unique attributes because it has a card reader, a lcd display to check clocks in / out and a webcam that takes a picture of the employees when they clock in / out being easily to check if each employee is using his / her own card.

And for service companies TcSoft recently launched "Virtual Clock" (Fingerprint Option), a biometric system that verify automatically the employee's identity through his / her fingerprint and includes a fingerprint reader and a lcd display to check clocks in / out.

Also it has a lower cost thinked specially for small and medium-sized business because it works connected to any PC using the resources like Time, Date and Hard Disk but not keeps dedicated only for collecting records therefore the user can be working as usual.