Buddy Punch Review

If you spend over an hour working on a client project but have no way to track it, then how will you prove that you even did any work?

As a freelancer, I’m responsible for my entire business, from client work to admin and record-keeping. So, keeping a record of my time is very important to avoid overbooking my schedule. But even if you are an office-going person, knowing how you spend your time gives you important insights and gives you control over where you spend your energy.

Time tracking apps allow you to easily record billable hours and swiftly work with your business processes to streamline your business productivity. In this article, I’ll cover one of the top time-tracking tools- Buddy Punch, which allowed me to efficiently streamline and track the time I take on each project. Let me explain more about this below.

What is Buddy Punch?

Buddy Punch is a cloud-based time-tracking tool that focuses on simplicity and is designed for businesses of all sizes. The tool allows you to streamline the time taken to perform a given task as well as take attendance of your employees. It has an online time clock with apps that work on your browsers and mobile devices. This allows organizations to be ahead on their attendance, time off, and any overtime in real-time.

Click Here To Try Buddy Punch

In addition to capturing the actual hours worked, Buddy Punch has scheduling, GPS tracking, and paid time off tools. It has a user-friendly interface and offers a cost-effective solution for businesses that are looking to simplify their time and attendance while increasing their productivity and efficiency.

Buddy Punch Review

1. Ease of Use

Buddy Punch has an intuitive interface, which is great for time-tracking and scheduling software. If you are new to time-tracking tools, then this feature is a great plus, which makes it easy to learn and use.

As an employer, you can use the software following these few steps.

• Add your staff members to Buddy Punch
• Email your employees their usernames and passwords
• Next, log in to the clock in and out
• Finally, you can log in and collect their time for efficient payroll processing

It offers robust control and automation features that make the entire time tracking and scheduling process as swift as a breeze for users. This will help save you time and avoid any costly errors with its automated overall calculation and payroll exports.

2. Job Codes

The Job Codes feature is a valuable asset that allows users to easily keep track of employee hours based on each project or task. You can track your employee clock in and out using your different job codes. This allows you to easily track the hours you have spent on specific tasks or projects.

The feature lets you generate detailed reports to get valuable insights into your employee productivity and project costs. This is great as you can identify areas which you require to improve.

The setup of Job Codes with Buddy Punch is easy. Users can easily create custom job codes for every project or task and assign them to a single employee or group of employees. The employees can select their desired job code when they clock in or out. The software is quite efficient in tracking time spent on each task or project automatically.

3. Online Time Clocks

Android and iOS devices have mobile apps that have time clocks, but with Buddy Punch, you can access time clocks on your computer or laptop through a web browser. However, the browser recommended by the tool is Google Chrome. There is also an option to turn your computer or phone into a centralized time clock by simply activating its kiosk function.

The online time clocks require a web connection as they don’t provide an offline mode compared to other providers. Its webcam feature allows you to capture your facial expressions to recognize the scans of clocking-in employees, which works on Android devices, Windows, or Mac computers only if the device has a webcam or in-built camera.

4. Flexible Clock-in/out Options

Buddy Punch has time clocks that accept employee punch-ins and outs, which is quite different from other time-tracking tools in the market. You can allow its time clocks to accept the punch-in/out through QR codes, facial recognition, a 4-digit PIN code, and a username with a password. It is very effective if you have the right to enter Buddy Punch through its Google Chrome Internet Browser. Apart from this, you have an option to establish a digital digicam, in which you can experiment with QR codes.

These are the four primary options that are accessible to you; however, you also have the option to capture the attendance of your employees through SMS. This is a great feature for field staff who don’t have a stable internet connection or those who require clock-in/out. Using this feature, employees can simply send a text message to their specified number and punch in or out. This is possible with the integration with Zapier. However, you may have to pay some SMS messaging fees, depending on the selected provider.

5. Geofences

Buddy Punch has a vast selection of time-tracking control tools that allow you to efficiently monitor where and how your employees are clocking in or out. It offers great geolocation and geofencing to create virtual boundaries around specific areas, like job sites and office buildings. Here, the software records clock-in and out times when an employee leaves or enters the designated area.

The time tracking controls feature is quite useful for businesses having remote or mobile workers as it allows you to avoid time theft and ensure that you give accurate payment for the hours worked.

The feature works well through its IP lock feature, which restricts clocking in a certain location or device, which makes it easier for users who are constantly on the road. It has multiple radius option that ranges from 150 feet up to 5,000 feet.

I discovered that Buddy Punch would only clock me in when I was in the specified radius. If I went outside the geofenced area, I would get an error, and I was not able to track time. To access it, you will need to come back to the area to be clocked out.

The feature also gives you an idea of the productivity of your employees and job costing, which is great as you can identify areas you want to improve for your business. You can easily customize the virtual boundaries based on different job sites or locations, which makes it a great tool for businesses operating in multiple locations.

6. Punch Limiting

Punch Limiting is a robust feature of Buddy Punch that allows businesses to limit the number of punches an individual employee can make in a day or given pay period. If you are a business that is looking to prevent employees from clocking in early or late while also preventing time theft, then it is a great feature. For example, businesses can limit employees to a single clock-in or clock-out each day or limit the number of punches for a specific week or pay period.

The interesting thing is that you can use the feature with scheduling or without scheduling. The major difference between the two is that with scheduling; you will need to specify how many minutes before or after shift employees are allowed to punch each time. Without scheduling, you’ll have to specify the timeframe wherein an employee is allowed to punch time. For each of the scenarios, an employee will get an error message when they punch in outside the set timeframe.

7. PTO Management

The PTO (Paid Time Off) management feature is crucial for businesses to keep track of their employee’s time off, allowing you to have accurate payroll processing. With this feature, businesses are easily able to manage and track employee time off requests, sick leave, vacation time, and other paid time off.

Using the feature, employees have the option to directly request time off through the software. Managers can easily review their requests and approve or deny them, ensuring that your employee schedules are managed properly and sufficient coverage is maintained.

The PTO management feature provides real-time updates, which give employees the option to check their time off balances and enable managers to keep track of and monitor employee absences. This is a great feature for organizations as they can ensure that employees are taking appropriate time off while also minimizing any disruptions in their workflow.

8. Single Sign ON (SSO)

The Single Sign On (SSO) feature helps simplify the login process for users who want access to multiple applications and platforms. This helps improve your automation, enabling customized workflow and streamlining user authentication without sacrificing its safety. Buddy Punch gives you access to multiple SSO providers and applications with a single set of login credentials.

This feature allows you to access the tool across other platforms, like Google, Microsoft, or Okta, to save users time and reduce the risk of password fatigue or account lockouts. This not only helps increase your productivity by reducing the amount of time a user would spend signing in or out but also improves your security by limiting the number of times employees have to sign in from Android or iOS apps.

9. Employee Scheduling

Scheduling is a key component for efficient employee management, and Buddy Punch doesn’t disappoint in this aspect. The platform gives you access to a drag and drop scheduler that allows you to easily create, edit, assign, or share employee work shifts. Using it, you can create multiple schedules and send them to your employees with a simple click of a button. There are also options to add specific jobs, locations, codes, track times, or swift shifts.

Buddy Punch has an automatic punch-out function that allows you to automatically clock out an employee after their schedules end. This is a great feature for managers whose staff have a problem with timekeeping and for users who forget to clock out. Apart from this, it will also ensure that all employees clock out at the end of their shift.

As Buddy Punch is designed for managers, staff, and employees, they can easily view their schedules anytime to help them plan their tasks. Managers are also able to send notifications to either one person, a department, or the entire staff at the click of a button.

10. Facial Recognition

The facial recognition feature, as we have talked about above, is an innovative tool offered by Buddy Punch. For businesses, this feature gives them a high level of accuracy and security when time tracking their employees. It uses a webcam to capture your employee’s faces when they clock in or out, wherein it compares the face to a previously saved image to verify their identity.

For a person who is bad with passwords, the advanced feature eliminates the need to remember login credentials, thereby streamlining my clocking-in process. Another great advantage of this feature is that only authorized employees have the right to clock in or out. This helps prevent buddy punching, wherein an employee clocks in for another individual who is not really present.

If you are a manager, then you will get real-time notifications when an employee attempts to clock in or out without having the right verifications. This will help you avoid time theft, ensuring employees are paid correctly for the hours that they have worked.

The facial recognition feature of Buddy Punch allows you to customize the level of security that is required for clocking in and out. Here, you can set precise locations or specify a time when an employee can clock in or out. Overall, the feature gives businesses great control over their time-tracking processes.

11. Automatic Calculations

Buddy Punch helps you automatically calculate and manage breaks or overtime of your employees. The automatic breaks feature allows you to set up break rules and specify the hours an employee needs to work before it deducts the applicable break time automatically directly from the time cards of your workers.

On the other hand, the overtime alerts feature lets you decide how the overtime has to be computed by Buddy Punch. Here, you can set up different overtime hours for your employees.

If you have not set any limit on your overtime, then you will be sent an alert email with important information about the employee. The alert will give you insights into how many hours you have worked and whether the employee is currently punched in or out. The alert is included directly in the subject of email marketing, making it great to use in situations like reminding an employee of a lunch break or the punch-out at the end of the day. You can use this feature where you see the best fit for your business.

12. Notifications

Buddy Punch has built-in notifications for administrators and managers when an employee performs a certain action. This may be anything from an employee requesting a change in time card or if they are clocking in or out, so you are always in the loop. This gives you access to automatic attendance tracking even for remote employees, so business owners are able to ensure their team is on the clock.

Once the pay period closes, Buddy Punch sends an email where you can check and download the timesheets for payroll. Apart from this, any important action that needs to be taken for your account is sent by them. However, all this is quite user-friendly, and you won’t be spammed by emails or messages.

In addition to the system notifications, employees, administrators, and managers can enable certain alerts from Buddy Punch.

As an employee, you can enable the following notifications”

• PTO changes
• Punch change emails
• Time card approval status
• Email alerts when approaching overtime

The features allow employees to remain more accountable for managing their schedules while boosting their efficiency and productivity.

Managers can enable the following notifications:

• Notifications on each punch-in or out
• Punch change emails
• PTO requests or changes
• Time approval status changes
• Alerts when employees approach overtime

The scheduling features give managers real-time control over their employee hours and streamline the process of making adjustments by keeping a close eye on the business operations.

13. Reporting Tools

Buddy Punch has 10+ forms of reports that allow you to monitor devices, time cards, schedules, clock-in/out activities, daily hours worked, position, and job. Its Deleted Time Report is quite intuitive, and it will help capture all the time entries that have been deleted and by whom.

Its in/out activity report is the real-time tracker that shows the in and out for every employee during a set time period. You can check that in the work logs of your team. The PTO Summary lets you specify the date range, and you can check the time taken off by your employee. Finally, you can get details of each employee through the Employee Detail Reports PDF, where you will get the in/out activity and total hours for the date range.

The Payroll Export feature gives you a detailed view of your employees, their hours, locations, overtime, and departments. Here, you can easily select prior pay periods when required. Its hours summary feature gives you a report on the total hours and you get accurate invoicing for all the billable hours.

The platform also lets you generate custom reports based on specific fields and data ranges to fit all your business needs. You can also easily export it in different formats, which include PDF, CSV, and Excel files.

Buddy Punch also has real-time updates, which allow businesses to monitor employee hours to ensure they are meeting their productivity goals. This is a great feature to identify issues, like time theft and excessive overtime, or address them quickly.

The reporting tool provides valuable insights into the costs and profitability of the project that allow you to identify areas where you can reduce costs and improve efficiency to enhance your profitability. Overall, you get detailed insights into employee productivity and project costs to streamline your payroll processes.

14. Integrations

Buddy Punch works seamlessly with some tools to help you and your team on a daily basis. This is possible with third-party apps that integrate and enhance the offering of the tool. Some of its integrations include:

• Intuit QuickBooks
• ADP Workforce
• PayPlus
• Workday
• SurePayroll
• Asana
• Zapier
• Gusto
• Paychex
• Paylocity
• And more

15. Customer Support

Customer support is a key component in any software in the market. One thing from the reviews I checked online is that their customer support is great and is always around to help you when you require it.

The platform has a rich knowledge base that has all the articles and resources that you need if you run into any issues. These articles are great if you have some minor issues using the tool.

Buddy Punch has a contact form where you can contact them and ask for any issues you might be having. This is great if you want assistance from real humans. If you want live chat support, they also provide that, which is quite exceptional. You get answers to your queries within little to no time through this feature 24/7, 365 days.

Pricing

Buddy Punch has 4 plans, whose price depends on the number of active employees you have and whether you will need time tracking and scheduling features. Its standard 3 plans come with a 14-day trial period to check its features. The plans in detail are:

1. Standard Plan

The Standard plan is an ideal tool for time tracking. The plan is ideal for those who are starting out and is priced at $3.99 per user/month annually with a $19 base fee each month. The features of the plan include

• Unlimited Free Administrators
• Mobile Apps
• GPS on Punches
• Time Off Tracking
• Time Tracking
• Alerts & Reminders
• Payroll Integrations
• Job Tracking
• Break Planning
• Multi-channel support
• Reporting

2. Pro Plan

The Pro plan is ideal for time tracking and scheduling. The plan is priced at $4.99 per user/month annually with a $19 base fee each month. It has all the features of the Standard plan plus:

• Employee Scheduling
• Shift Trades & Covers
• Schedule Templates
• Schedule Notifications
• Availability Management
• Early/Late/Absent Reporting

3. Premium Plan

The Premium plan offers real-time GPS with Pro features, which is great for users who want higher-end features and functionality. The plan is priced at $6.99 per user/month annually with a $19 base fee each month. It has all the features of the Pro plan plus:

• Real Time GPS tracking
• Real-time location dashboard
• GPS activity reporting

4. Enterprise Plan

The Enterprise plan has everything you want in a time tracking software. It has top-end features having custom pricing and functionality. The plan has all the features of the Premium plan plus:

• Single Sign on (SSO)
• API Access

Pros and Cons

Is Buddy Punch Worth the Hype?

Buddy Punch is an intuitive time-tracking software that has some versatile features that help streamline employee management to enhance your business operations. It has some advanced functions, like facial recognition, PTO tracking, and geofencing, that allow businesses to efficiently keep track of their employee attendance, manage their schedules, and monitor their productivity.

The Buddy Punch software is highly customizable while being quite user-friendly, and compatible with different mobile devices, which is suitable for businesses of all sizes. Overall, it is one of the most reliable and affordable solutions in the market that helps improve your time-tracking process, thereby increasing the efficiency of your business and minimizing your payroll errors.

Buddy Punch FAQs

1. How does Buddy Punch help in time tracking?

Buddy Punch is a time-tracking software designed for employees to clock their time, breaks and track hours accurately. In simple terms, the tool is a centralized platform that allows you to efficiently manage attendance and generate reliable timesheets.

2. Is Buddy Punch accessible on mobile devices?

Yes, Buddy Punch is available on browsers as well as mobile devices to clock in and out their timesheets while also requesting time off directly from their smartphone. This offers easy accessibility and convenience for employees and its users.

3. Does Buddy Punch have a free trial?

Buddy Punch has a 14-day trial period for new users. During the trial period, users have the option to test and explore any features or capabilities of their attendance management and time-tracking software. Most users are satisfied with its free trial and go ahead to purchase one of its plans.

4. Can you customize the time-tracking settings of Buddy Punch?

Buddy Punch has flexible time-tracking settings that are fully customizable to suit your business requirements. The tool lets you set up different time shifts, permissions, and overtime rules based on the policies of your company.