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July 24, 2008
Vista Time Clock MTS
Did you know Time Clock MTS is 100% compatible with the new Microsoft operating system Windows Vista? Vista brings all sorts of new features to the Windows user and Time Clock MTS operates happily with all of them. The one and only difference with the Vista Time Clock MTS is where the software stores it's configuration files and the default database location.
In Windows XP all of the program data was stored in this directory:
C:\Documents and Settings\All Users\Application Data\Time Clock MTS\
Windows Vista changes the location where program data is stored and when using Time Clock MTS on Windows Vista you'll find all of your program information here:
c:\Program Data\Time Clock MTS\
That's really all there is to know about Vista and Time Clock MTS, just download and install Time Clock MTS onto Vista as normal from our website and you'll be up and running in no time.
Posted by mnemtsas at 7:32 AM | Comments (0)
July 23, 2008
Free Punch Clock System
Did you know that Time Clock MTS can be downloaded and installed and then used by you completely free of charge and without restriction for 30 days? Time Clock MTS can be trialled on one or many PC's using the the multiple client version. The trial version of Time Clock MTS can use the normal database backend (MS Access) or the advanced database options MS SQL Server or MySQL.
If you have not purchased Time Clock MTS when the trial period expires then it will switch to the Free Mode, which given that you operate within certain restrictions will give you a free punch clock system forever!
Operating in free mode, Time Clock MTS is still a very capable and useful free punch clock system, and during the startup phase of a business or for very small businesses it may be the only punch clock system you ever need. When operating in free mode Time Clock MTS has the following restrictions:
- You are only allowed three active employee records. If this condition is ever exceeded the software will not allow you do anything except delete employee records.
- Time Clock MTS is restricted to being used in single computer mode when operating as your free punch clock system.
The free mode of Time Clock MTS will continue forever without charge as long as you never need more than three active employees in the system. If at some later point you need more than this it's a simple matter to purchase a license for the software and to keep working without interruption!
Posted by mnemtsas at 7:23 AM | Comments (0)
July 20, 2008
Online Time Clock MTS
The real benefit of time clock software lays in the productivity savings you gain from gathering and processing time and attendance information efficiently, and the costs savings you gain from removing employee fraud and calculation errors. Time Clock MTS gives you these benefits in one simple to use piece of software, given that you want to collect all of your information on the one network and using MS Windows based PC's. However, if you have geographically separated locations or dont run MS Windows based PC's then it's a little more difficult to use Time Clock MTS. You can use it through the use of remote desktop tools (such as Windows Terminal Services) and Windows emulators (such as WiNe) but these add a layer of complexity that is not really desireable.
The best solution to these problems is by the use of an online time clock. I'm happy to announce that the online version of Time Clock MTS is under development and will be released within the next 12 weeks. The online Time Clock MTS is a completely hosted solution (we hold all your information and host the software) meaning you dont need to install anything on your PC's. All you'll need to do is log into your online Time Clock MTS account and clock in and out, run reports, and configure the software in the same way you do now with the desktop version. And this can be done from anywhere, using any computer that has a web browser!
Stay tuned, I'll be posting screenshots here as they become available.
Posted by mnemtsas at 8:52 AM | Comments (0)
July 18, 2008
What Happens to Deleted Employees?
Time Clock MTS allows you to track attendance of employees that work for you. However, as employees leave your organization you may wish to either delete or disable an employee's record in Time Clock MTS. You may want to do this to declutter the employee list or to prevent the employee from recording any more attendance information. When you Disable an employee you can restore the employee while logged in as the administrator and using the Employee Maintenance->Re-Enable An Employee menu item. However, when you Delete an employee there's no way of undeleting that employee from within Time Clock MTS.
However, the deletion is not permanent. The actual employee data and all of their employee attendance information is actually still present in the Time Clock MTS database. All you need to do is email us your Time Clock MTS database and let us know which employee you want undeleted. We'll do it for you and email your database promptly and you'll find that the employee record is now visible again.
Posted by mnemtsas at 1:47 PM | Comments (0)
July 17, 2008
Customizing Time Clock MTS Reports Part 2
In part 1 of customizing Time Clock MTS Reports I covered the basic structure of reports and how you could customize them. In this second part I'll cover some of the Report Sections and the Data Fields that are available to each. If you dont know what a Report Section or Data Field is then go back and take a look at Part 1 of this topic.
Report Header Section
- Report Name - the name of the report that is being run
- Period Start - the report start date
- Period End - the report end date
- Report Time - the date and time the report is run
- Shift Filter - the shift the report is filtered on (if applicable)
- Employee Filter - the employee(s) the report is filtered on (if applicable)
- Department Filter - the department the report is filtered on (if applicable)
- T - inserts a TAB space, used for alignment and formatting purposes
Company Header Section
- Company Name - the company name as set on the Display Settings page
- Company Address - the company address as set on the Display Settings page
- T - inserts a TAB space, used for alignment and formatting purposes
Employee Details Section
- Full Name - the name of the employee as set on the Employee Information Screen
- Badge ID - the badge ID / employee ID of the employee as set on the Employee Information Screen
- PIN - the PIN of the employee as set on the Employee Information Screen
- SSN - the social security number of the employee as set on the Payroll Information Screen
- Shift - the shift of the employee as set on the Employee Information Screen
- Department - the department of the employee as set on the Employee Information Screen
- Hire Date - the hire date of the employee as set on the Employee Information Screen
- Employment Type - the employment type of the employee as set on the Payroll Information Screen
- Address - the address of the employee as set on the Contact Information Screen
- Home Phone - the home phone number of the employee as set on the Contact Information Screen
- Cell Phone - the cell phone number of the employee as set on the Contact Information Screen
- Exemptions - the tax exemptions for the employee as set on the Tax Information Screen
- T - inserts a TAB space, used for alignment and formatting purposes
Employee Header Section
- Full Name - the name of the employee as set on the Employee Information Screen
- Badge ID - the badge ID / employee ID of the employee as set on the Employee Information Screen
- Shift - the shift of the employee as set on the Employee Information Screen
- Department - the department of the employee as set on the Employee Information Screen
- T - inserts a TAB space, used for alignment and formatting purposes
In Part 3 of this series I'll cover the remaining report sections.
Posted by mnemtsas at 11:39 AM | Comments (0)
July 9, 2008
Customizing Time Clock MTS Reports Part 1
Version 2 of Time Clock MTS included a complete re-work of the way reports functioned, and allowed you do configure the appearance of reports to suit your requirements. In this weblog entry I'll cover the basic elements of customizing reports, in subsequent entries I'll take a look in detail each aspect of doing so.
Report Structure
Each Time Clock MTS report has the same basic structure, this is best illustrated by the following simple diagram.
<Report Header>
<Company Header>
<Employee Header>
<Employee Details>
<Report Data>
<Employee Summary>
<Employee Accruals>
<Payroll Information>
The first 2 report sections are displayed once per report, the last 6 sections are displayed for each employee you choose to run the report on. All of these report sections except the <Report Data> section can be customized to your requirements. The report data section contains the data for the report that you are currently running.
How Are Report Sections Customized?
Reports are customized by configuring each report section using the Tools->Options->Report Settings page.
You can read more about this page in the Report Settings help topic. In basic terms you use this screen to customize report sections by selecting a report section, and configuring the section template using either free text or by inserting data fields using the Add Field button and drop down.
What is a Section Template?
A section template is simply the text that defines the format of a Report Section. A section template can contain any text you like and can contain Data Fields. Each section template has a number of Data Fields that can be added to it.
What is a Data Field?
A Data Field is text that can be included in a section template that is automatically replaced by Time Clock MTS when reports are generated. For example, if you include the Data Field
Next time I'll cover some of the report sections and the data fields that are available to each.
Posted by mnemtsas at 9:10 AM | Comments (0)
July 2, 2008
How Does Payroll Time Rounding Work
A common question I get is how exactly does payroll time rounding work? So I thought it would be worthwhile to cover it in some more detail to help Time Clock MTS users.
How is Report Rounding Turned On?
You can turn on report rounding on the Tools->Options->Payroll Settings page. For more information take a look at the Time Clock MTS Payroll Settings help topic.
How Does Rounding Work?
Rounding is applied to time information at report time only. The rounding used is just normal arithmetic rounding. Here's an example, let's say we have the time rounding set to 15 minutes and the normal clock in time for your employees is 7:30 AM. In this example, anything on or before 7:37:29 AM is rounded down to 7:30 AM, and anything on or after 7:37:30 is rounded up to 7:45 AM.
What Does the Least Quantity Checkbox Do?
Checking this box over-rides the rounding scheme as shown above. The most basic way of explaining it is that all clock ins are ROUNDED UP and all clock outs are ROUNDED DOWN. So, in our example above any employee clocking in after 7:30:00 AM will have their time rounded up to 7:45:00 AM. Let's say the normal clock out time for the above example is 4:30:00 PM. When the Least Quantity check box is marked, any employee clocking out between 4:30:01 PM and 4:44:59 PM will have their clock out time rounded down to 4:30:00 PM. The practical effect of the Least Quantity check box is that the hours worked are minimized.
What Effect Does Rounding Have on Stored Time Information?
None, clock in and clock out data is still stored to the nearest second, the rounding takes effect when you run a report. In fact, you can now generate reports and suppress the rounding so you can view your raw time information. To do this all you need to do is check the Turn Off Rounding checkbox on the Report Configuration screen.
Why Would you use Time Rounding?
To comply with either your workplace payroll rules or government payroll regulations. A lot of workplaces have a minimum amount of payable overtime, so rounding can be easily used to prevent employees accumulating small amounts of overtime by clocking in slightly early, or clocking out slightly late. Another reason could be to allow for some leeway in clocking in or out, clearly not everyone can clock in exactly on time so time rounding allows for this. For example, Californian labor law allows for some leeway in rounding of time, allowing employers to not pay overtime for employees who clock in slightly early or out slightly late (provided they are not actually working of course). For more information on this take a look at the Department of Labor Website.
That about sums it all up, if you have any questions, as always post a comment or email us.
Posted by mnemtsas at 10:16 AM | Comments (0)