Release Notes – June 2024: Time Off Flexibility, Scheduling Enhancements & Workforce Controls

We take customer feedback very seriously here at VeriClock and we are thrilled to announce a number of product updates that have been requested by many of our customers. 

This update delivers expanded PTO tracking flexibility, enhanced scheduling tools, clickable job address navigation, refined rounding rules, and improved supervisory controls. These enhancements provide administrators with greater control over time tracking and compliance management.

Updates to Time Off Tracking

• You can now track time off in either days or hours, making it simpler to manage full days off for time off such as sick days. This flexibility ensures time off tracking fits your needs perfectly.
• Individual jobs can be set as exempt from PTO, meaning that hours paid out for time off, or specific jobs won't count towards accruals. This feature gives you more control over how PTO is managed within your organization.
• Time off requests can now be viewed directly from the schedule. This shows you on the calendar when each employee has requested time off and when their request has been approved. It's a convenient way to keep track of everyone's time off.

• A new simulator feature helps you anticipate employee accruals. This tool allows you to simulate what employees could accrue for different time off types within a specified date range and lists the dates of any accruals. It's a helpful way to plan ahead and manage time off effectively.

Scheduling Updates

• We've made an exciting update to Team View! Employees can now see scheduled shifts for their team members, in addition to the existing options to view everyone's schedule or just their own. If Team View is enabled, employees can also see all time-off requests based on the Team View settings in the account.
• Introducing a new repeating shift option! Now, you can set shifts to repeat daily, weekly, monthly, or yearly, with the option to end after a certain number of occurrences, on a specific date, or with no end date. This makes building flexible employee schedules easier than ever.

• We've made it easier to navigate to job locations! Addresses added to jobs are now clickable directly from the scheduled shift, so you can get directions right from the schedule.

• Now, employees can clock in directly from the schedule. Simply click on the scheduled shift, then click Clock In, and you’ll be taken to the clock-in screen with all the shift details filled in and ready to go.

• Expanded schedule shift notifications are available for employees, managers, and administrators. Here is the full list of options you can enable:

  • Notify when publishing a schedule.
  • Notify about any schedule changes.
  • Send shift reminders.
  • Notify if an employee or all employees no-show for a scheduled shift.
  • Notify if an employee or all employees haven't clocked in before a shift is scheduled to end.
  • Notify if an employee forgets to clock out.
  • Notify if an employee triggers an auto-clock out after forgetting to clock out.
  • Notify when a timeguard and auto-clock out triggers.

  These updates help everyone stay on top of their schedules effortlessly.

• Schedule print options have been added to make it easier for everyone to see their work schedules. Now, you can easily print and share your shifts with your team.
• Additional options for viewing the schedule have been added. Now, you can customize and set your default view, making it even easier to manage shifts..

Lunch Exemptions for Jobs and Service Items 

We’re thrilled to announce that, based on your requests, you can now disable lunch deductions for specific jobs and service items! This means hours paid for holidays, vacation, sick days, lunch jobs, and other tasks can be exempt from deductions. You can set this exemption per job or service item to fit your needs.

Timeguard Alert

The Timeguard Alert has been updated so users can now be auto-clocked out without flagging the event and zeroing out the duration. This means you can use the auto-clock out time for payroll without needing administrators to correct the stop time first. Simply set it to use the auto-clock out time, and there's no need to flag or zero the hours.

Enhanced Manager Permissions

We've added new manager permissions to give you more flexibility in assigning and limiting supervisor roles. Here are the updates:

• Managers can now create clock events without needing to fill in required fields like a job or service item.
• The permission to edit timesheets is now separate from the permission to approve time events.
• Managers can have read-only access to the schedule by disabling the schedule edit permission.
• Job access for managers can be limited to managed groups, managed employees, or full job access.
• Audit trail access can be restricted to managed employees and jobs, or full access can be granted.
• Global employee job assignment access can be set on the manager permission page.

These changes provide more control and customization to fit your specific management needs.

Round First Clock In and Last Clock Out of the Day Only

Rounding can now be set to only round the first clock in time of the day and/or the last clock out of the day. This setting ensures that switching jobs or tasks during the day captures the exact start/stop times while still rounding the first and last clock events of the day. Instead of rounding all start/stop times, now it can be set to round only the first clock in of the day and the last clock out of the day. 

Shift Minimums

Our new feature allows you to set shift minimums for employees, groups, jobs, or service items, ensuring a shift that doesn't meet the guaranteed minimum hours set in the rule will automatically adjust to meet that minimum. Employees will still see their actual punch hours, but when exporting the hours for payroll, the shift minimums will be reflected. Please note, this only applies to clock in and out events, not the total duration. Contact VeriClock support to have shift minimums enabled in your account.

The VeriClock team is dedicated to continuing to make significant improvements to our system! Keep an eye out for more updates coming soon.