Digitalising time tracking: from paper and Excel to automatic check-in

Almost every company starts with time records on paper or in Excel. It works — until the team grows, shifts appear, a second work site is added or an inspection turns up. Here is why Excel becomes a risk at some point, and how to make the transition without bringing work to a halt.

The problem is not Excel, it is what Excel cannot do

Excel is an excellent calculation tool. As a register of working time, however, it has four structural limits:

• It has no single source of truth. Versions circulate, someone works on an old copy, and in the end nobody knows which file is “the right one”.
• It has no audit trail. You cannot prove who changed an hour, or when. An editable file, filled in at the end of the month, is hard to defend as a genuine daily record.
• It is filled in retroactively. Article 119 of the Labour Code (Codul Muncii) requires a daily record of hours, with the start and end time. A summary reconstructed from memory at the end of the month is not the same thing.
• Errors spread silently. A broken formula or an overwritten cell goes straight into the payroll, and therefore into people’s pay.

Add to that the GDPR side: attendance data is personal data. A file that circulates by email, with no access control and no deletion deadline, is hard to defend.

What digital time tracking actually means

It does not mean “the same Excel file, but in the cloud”. It means that check-in happens at the actual moment, done by the employee, and the system builds the record on its own:

• the employee records the start and end of the working schedule through a method suited to the workplace;
• absences (leave, sick leave, time off) go into the same record, not into another file;
• overtime, night, weekend and public holiday hours are calculated automatically, according to rules;
• the monthly total is generated, not assembled by hand;
• every change stays in the history, with author and timestamp.

Choose the method to fit the ground

This is the decision that determines whether digitalisation succeeds or fails. People use whatever is simple:

• Kiosk with a rotating QR code — a tablet at the entrance; the code regenerates periodically, so it cannot be photographed and used from somewhere else. Ideal for factory floors and fixed points with high volume.
• NFC card — for those who do not have (or do not want to use) a personal phone at work. Tap the card and you are done.
• Web / mobile — for the office and hybrid teams.
• GPS with a perimeter — for the field and construction sites, with check-in valid only inside the defined area.

The classic problem that real-time check-in solves is buddy punching — someone clocking in on behalf of somebody else. A static QR code stuck on the wall is photographed once; a rotating one is not.

The transition, in five steps

1. Take stock of reality. How many work sites, which shifts, how many people without a smartphone, which premiums you apply.
2. Choose the dominant method and a fallback one (for example a QR kiosk plus NFC cards for whoever forgets their phone).
3. Run in parallel for a month. Keep both the old record and the new one. Compare the totals at the end — that is how you catch configuration differences before they reach salaries.
4. Configure the rules for overtime, night, weekend and public holiday work once, and correctly.
5. Communicate simply. A poster at the kiosk and two minutes of explanation at the start of the shift do more than a 20-page manual.

What you gain, measurably

• Administrative time — the monthly hours spent filling in, checking and reconciling almost disappear.
• Fewer payroll errors — data is no longer copied by hand from one file into another.
• Instant proof at an inspection — the record ITM asks for is exported in seconds, not reconstructed.
• Transparency for the employee — everyone sees their own hours and balances, so questions to HR go down.

Frequently asked questions

How do I move from paper time records to electronic ones? Run in parallel for a month: keep the old record and start the new one, then compare the totals. That way you find configuration differences with no risk to the payroll.

What advantages does digital time tracking have over Excel? Real-time check-in (not retroactive), a single data source, an audit trail, automatic calculation of premiums and direct export to payroll — plus access control and retention for GDPR.

How does time tracking with geolocation or IP restriction work? A check-in is accepted only if the employee is inside a defined perimeter (GPS) or on an allowed network (IP). Useful for field work and for preventing check-ins from home.

Is time tracking by phone or app legal? Yes. The law requires a daily record of hours, not a particular format. You only need to observe the data protection rules: informing employees, minimising the data collected and setting a retention period.

How much time do you save with automated time tracking? It depends on size and complexity, but the biggest saving does not come from filling things in — it comes from eliminating the reconciliation between time records, leave and the payroll, plus the questions employees now answer for themselves.

See also common mistakes in filling in the timesheet and how to choose time tracking software.

How Workly helps

Workly covers exactly the scenarios in which Excel gives up. A physical kiosk with a rotating QR code and NFC cards for factory floors, production and teams without smartphones; web and mobile for the office and the field, with a geographic perimeter where it is needed. Check-in is real, timestamped and backed by an auditable history — the record required by art. 119, available instantly at an inspection.

Leave and time off go into the same record, with balances calculated automatically and a digital approval flow. Overtime, night shifts and public holidays are calculated according to rules configured once, and then flow deterministically into the payroll module, with export in SAGA format to your accountant — with no manual re-entry. Personal data is encrypted, with automatic purging when the retention period expires, in line with GDPR.

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Informational article, accurate at the date of publication. Not legal advice. The obligations on working time records and data protection may change — always check the framework in force or consult a specialist.