There are three main ways that your team's hours are tracked and managed in BusyPaws: their pre-set schedules, their assigned bookings, and their clocked time entries. In this guide we will take a look at how users can track their own hours and how you can access that information to more easily manage your payroll process.

Clocking in and out is one of the easiest way to track hours for your team. When users arrive to start work they simply clock in, then clock out when they wrap up for the day. Users may also pause their clock at any time should they need to step away, then resume tracking when they come back to their shift.

Users can easily clock themselves in or out from any page of their BusyPaws account. Simply click/hover over the clock icon in the left-hand menu.

When a user is clocked out the resulting pop-up will display with a "Clock In" button. Selecting that button starts the time tracker.

Once clocked in, the system begins tracking the time for the user's shift. The running tally is listed in the pop-up any time the user clicks/hovers their mouse over the clock icon. Even when the pop-up is not open, users can easily check whether or not they are currently clocked in by looking at the clock icon in the left-hand menu. Whenever the clock is running, the clock icon will display with rotating hands.

Clicking the "Pause" button allows a user to temporarily pause the clock, then resume it later. Note that pausing then resuming the timer results in two time entries, one tracking time from clock in to pause, and another from resumption to clock out. Time entries will be saved with notes indicating the pause.

Selecting the "Stop" button ends the time entry and saves it to the user's account.

The Timesheets & Availabilities page can be found by clicking or hovering your mouse over the ellipses in the left-hand menu bar and selecting "Time Tracking and Schedules".

Note that the ellipses menu is accessible only to users with Manager or Business Owner level access. Those with Employee or Lite level accounts can access their timesheets and availability by selecting "Your Schedule" in their account menu.

After navigating to the main Timesheets & Availabilities page, users can access three different pages using the icons at the top-left: Staff Schedules, Time Entries, and Time Sheets.

Note that, though all users have access to each of these pages, those with Lite or Employee level access will be able to view and edit only their own schedules, time entries, and timesheets. Only those with Business Owner or Manager designation can view and edit items for other team members.

The Staff Schedules page lists all existing team member schedules. Managers can use this page to to edit or create schedules for themselves or any of their team members, as well as to export team member schedules. Employee and Lite level users can use this page to view/edit their own schedules or create new schedules for themselves.

The Time Entries page includes a list of all time entries, organized weekly. Managers can use this page to edit or create new time entries for themselves or any of the team members. Employee and Lite level users can use this page only to edit existing time entries for themselves.

Time entries are organized by date then by user. Each time entry is listed with the number of hours, check-in and check-out times, and any associated notes. Users can select "Edit" to make changes to an entry or click the trash can icon to delete it. Managers can use the filters at the top of the page to adjust the time entries shown based on facility and/or team member.

Time entries that have been manually edited by users will have a history of those edits displayed beneath the entry's notes. Each edit is indicated with the name of the user that made the adjustment. Hovering your mouse over the editor's name opens an info bubble with more details about the adjustment.

The Time Sheets page displays the weekly timesheets for team members. As for the other pages, Managers can view and edit timesheets for themselves and the rest of their team members, while Employee and Lite users can view and edit only their own. For businesses with more than one facility on their account, this page defaults to display the total hours across all facilities. Timesheets may only be edited once a specific facility has been chosen using the drop-down at the top of the page.

Users are listed with their name and total hours at the left-hand side of their timesheet entry. The timesheet is then broken down by day, listing the scheduled hours (from their preset user schedules), booking hours (from scheduled bookings assigned to the user), time entries (from clocking in and out), and resulting total.

It's important to note that overlapping hours are not combined. For example, if on Monday Jane Doe has a user schedule set 9:00am to 12:00pm (3hrs), bookings from 9:00am to 10:00am and 10:30am to 11:30am (2hrs), and was clocked in from 8:45am to 12:15pm (3.5hrs), their total for the day will be 3.5 hours, not 8.5 hours (3 + 2 + 3.5).

It's very likely that at some point, one or more of your team members may need to adjust their time entries. Whether a user forgot to clock in or out, or they clocked out then ended up needing to stay late, it's important to be able to make changes to time entries as needed. BusyPaws time tracking allows you and your team to easily make adjustments and track those edits for future reference.

To edit a time entry, start by navigating to the Time Entries section of your Timesheets & Availabilities page. Note that only those with Manager or Business Owner designation can view and edit time entries for other users. Employee and Lite users will be able to view and edit only their own entries.

Locate the entry that needs to be adjusted and click "Edit".

This will open a pop-up with various fields that can be used to adjust the time entry. Editable fields include the facility (for those businesses with more than one facility), the date and time of clock-in, the date and time of clock-out, and notes for the time entry.

It is generally recommended to add notes regarding any edits made to time entries, whether changes are made by the user themself or by a manager. Once the desired updates have been made, select the "Save" button to save the entry. Click the "X" at the top right of the pop-up at any time to exit without saving.

Managers have the added ability to generate new time entries from scratch. From the Time Entries page, simply click the "Actions" button in the top menu bar then select "New Time Entry" from the drop-down menu.

This opens a pop-up with fields to select the team member, facility (for those businesses with more than one facility), date and time of clock-in, and date and time of clock-out for the new entry, followed by a field for notes.

It is recommended to include notes on any manually added time entry as it can help ensure your team is able to properly track why any given manual entry needed to be created by a manager. Once the desired selections have been made and notes have been added, click the "Create" button to add the new entry to the chosen user's record.

Just as users are able to edit time entries, they may also edit timesheets as needed. To edit a time entry, start by navigating to the Time Sheets section of your Timesheets & Availabilities page. Note that only those with Manager or Business Owner designation can view and edit timesheets for other users. Employee and Lite users will be able to view and edit only their own timesheets.

Click the date range field at the top of the page to open a calendar drop-down and select a specific week or use the right/left arrows to navigate week-by-week.

Once you have navigated to the correct week, locate the date you wish to edit. Use the field next to the day's total hours to adjust the value. A new value may be typed into the field directly, or the up/down arrows at the right side of the field may be used to adjust the value in full hour increments. Adjustments are saved automatically.

When a time entry has been manually adjusted (and therefore differs from the total calculated by the system) the field will display in yellow. This colour will remain unless the field is adjusted back to the calculated total. This allows managers to easily see if any of their team member's timesheets have been edited.

Click the reset button to restore any adjusted entry back to its calculated system total.

Managers also have the ability to export weekly timesheets for their teams. From the Time Sheets page, use the date selector to navigate to the week you wish to export.

Once you have navigated to the desired timesheet, select the "Actions" button in the top menu bar.

This opens a drop-down menu with the options "Export (CSV)" and "Export (PDF)", allowing you to choose the preferred format for the export. Selecting a file type prompts the system to export timesheet data for the chosen week.

Still have any questions or concerns about using BusyPaws to track hours for your team? Don't hesitate to reach out to our team for help!