Keeping time sheets in Excel?
There's an easier way

Where Excel & paper fall short in daily use

Excel and the printed timesheet are quick to hand and cost nothing. That's exactly why many businesses start with them. In day-to-day operation, though, typical weaknesses show up:

• Transfer errors: Numbers get misread or mistyped - and often only come to light during payroll.
• Typing it up at month's end: Anyone who collects paper notes transfers them by hand into a list. That takes hours and is another source of error.
• No real-time overview: Who has how much overtime or remaining vacation can only be added up with real effort - never at a glance.
• Recording obligation often patchy: Start, end and duration aren't always recorded cleanly and promptly.
• Lost notes: A slip that never arrives is hard to reconstruct - in a dispute, it's one person's word against another's.

When Excel is (still) enough

Let's be honest: not every business needs an app right away. For very small teams - one or two people with fixed hours and little change - a clean Excel spreadsheet or a timesheet can be entirely sufficient. As long as the overview fits in your head and only a few lines come together at month-end, switching isn't necessarily worth it.

The limit usually becomes noticeable when several employees join, shifts or assignments change, or when overtime and leave have to be tracked regularly.

What good time tracking should be able to do

Anyone considering the switch should look out for a few things. A good solution takes work off your hands rather than creating more:

• Clock in mobile via app: Employees track their time with a single tap - right on site, no paper.
• Overtime & balances automatically: Plus and minus hours are tallied automatically, with no formulas to maintain.
• Export for payroll: Clean reports as PDF and Excel that you can pass on directly.
• GDPR & EU hosting: Personal working-time data belongs on servers in the EU.
• Fulfils the recording obligation: Start, end and duration are recorded promptly and without gaps.

A smooth switch

Switching doesn't have to be a big step. In two stages, it's stress-free:

• Step 1 - use the template: As long as it stays manageable, a proper template is enough. Here's a free timesheet as PDF & Excel.
• Step 2 - switch to an app: As soon as more employees, shifts or reports come into play, an app takes over the calculating and sorting.