we use a time card with 25 field classifications… naturally it’s a bear trying to keep everyone filling it out correctly…
and then there is the inevitable time slippage… 10-15 minutes in the morning…
10-15 minutes at lunch…
forgetting what you wre doing … or how long you were doing it..
but we all know we live or die by the numbers we generate.. so it is very important in terms of job costing..
i just saw an add in FHB for “job clock”
http://www.exaktime.com/software.asp
anyone know anything about it… or have your own experiences in tracking time ?
like we uster say, playing doctor,……you show me yours , i’ll show you mine
Mike Smith Rhode Island : Design / Build / Repair / Restore
Replies
Hi Mike,
Having experienced your tracking system <G> I'd say that this software would be a waste of your time and money.
All it does for you is to tell you what time the worker got to the site and what time he left. Nothing in between to record those 25 classifications. Therefore nothing to gauge the efficiency and planning and execution of each job. If you are still going to track the classifications then the start/stop times are already there - somewhere.
I know the hardest part of record keeping is to remember to write down, accurately, the time spent on each activity for each job. Sometimes, when I have a particular tool setup, I'm creating a product for more than one customer, so that I don't have to set up again on the proper site. That saves a lot of time but when it comes to apportioning that time - Huh?
It would probably be a nice gadget if you had a large number of employees. Would pinpoint those who had a tardiness problem or took long lunches or quit early on your dime. Just a higher tech way to replace the old punch card clock.
thanks ,ralph..
their illustration showed a pretty sophisticated breakdown on the printed time sheet for the sample employee... without calling them for a quote .. i was wondering if anyone knew them first hand...
i mean they imply that they are tracking numerous tasksMike Smith Rhode Island : Design / Build / Repair / Restore
Sounds to me kind of like trading a yellow legal pad for a white one.
So what ? You still have to write down and track all the same info you do now.
The only thing this will do is to give you accurate times.... if the employee is accurate.
6 of one, half a dozen of the other
If I survive, I have survived.
But if I have enriched someone else's life, I have succeeded.
quittintime
that is not their claim..
they claim .. no more writing.. and their time card shows a very detailed breakdownMike Smith Rhode Island : Design / Build / Repair / Restore
Semantics.
How does the info get in there ?
Does it follow everyone around for you and take notes ?
The info still has to be entered by someone.
I still say it is exchanging yellow paper for white.
Hey, waitaminnit !
This is about hustifying a new toy, isn't it ?
Hrmmmmm
Disregard all the previous. This is obviously a very vital and needed piece of equipment. Of course !!
; )
If I survive, I have survived.
But if I have enriched someone else's life, I have succeeded.
quittintime
luka ... it's just like golf... you can get a better game by practising..
or you can buy a better game with new clubs.... hah, hah, hahMike Smith Rhode Island : Design / Build / Repair / Restore
I went back and reread the info on the site. Looks like it's still going to be a manual system to track the classifications with the employee touching the keytabs to the recorder for in and out and back in again and out for every job change.
It would then still be a paper chase to assign whatever is being done to the recorded times.
In your (our) type of work, the employees, as well as yourself, are constantly changing job descriptions. Unless there is something more you can glean from a face to face with a company rep I think the examples given are only manual inserts by the record keeper (you) to go along with the exact times generated by the system.
I'll bet Jerrald Hayes already has something on tap that would blow this system out of the water.
Hmmnn, Thanks Ralph, I do appreciate your confidence. I am working on a new TimeKeeping application that I hopefully expect to have released or at least in beta testing by the end of April based on the new FileMaker7. Since it is so new (it just came out March 9th) and it's so very different than it predecessors it has me rethinking the architecture of all the applications we've developed or are working on. Therefore since it is so different I decided the other week to make the older version 1 of 360-Timekeeping Freeware so anyone here can download the 30 day demo and if it's something they can use they can email me and I send them a full working version. I do plan to replace the time-bombed download demo versions with a full working versions but I just haven't gotten around to it just yet.
At any rate the application is set up with 41 timecard categories (34 billable and 7 non-billable) and each of those categories has several sub categories too so you can record and organize time records for 182 different possible events and that's just the way it comes out of the box. The user can actually edit, add, delete, change, or move those categories around too.
The individual event records are then tied to Jobs to see just how you're doing.
In my company employees use FileMaker Mobile on Palm Pilots to keep our TimeKeeping records but that only works with the FileMaker powered version not the Runtime versions. And it also requires the user to purchase FileMaker Mobile too. I don't know for sure at this time if FileMaker Mobile will work with Runtime versions built with FM7 since that hasn't been announced or released yet but there are rumors that it will. But the version 1 Timekeeping program does generate a printed our time sheet that employees can fill out and then that data is entered pretty easily at a keyboard. That's actually the way most of the people already using the application do it right now anyway. Very few actually use Palm and we even have one employee who uses the paper timecard.
There is a lot of new better stuff I have planned for the next version in the way of feature which are based on both improvements I already have had in the works from our two years of experience with version 1 and now with some of the new tools and capabilities that come as part of FM7 there is probably going to be even more ahead but I would be very interested in hearing from everyone just what they would like to see in a TimeKeeping application and then I can possibly work those ideas into future versions.
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For some reason, that sounds more like a billing system than a time-recording system. You know: travel time; billable action "x"; travel time; lunch (non-billable); travel time; ....
Phill Giles
The Unionville Woodwright
Unionville, Ontario
Phill Giles-"For some reason, that sounds more like a billing system than a time-recording system. You know: travel time; billable action "x"; travel time; lunch (non-billable); travel time; ..."
Huh? Ya lost me there Phill. I'm not at all sure what ya mean or what you're getting at. Yes the actual "time-recording" really takes place on the Palm Pilot or on the paper timesheet so the TimeKeeping application so to speak is just where it all get collected, organized, and assigned to a categories as part of job costing. So in that respect it literally isn't necessarily a time-recording system. But isn't that sort of like saying a hammer isn't a nail driving system because sometimes we use hammers for demolition?
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Well, there are difference among billings, task time recording, and project costing - which is your's ?.
Phill Giles
The Unionville Woodwright
Unionville, Ontario
Really, Phill I have no idea what you're getting at or asking here. People in a company work. Those tasks can be broken down into two major divisions billable tasks ( tasks that can be assigned to specific client projects) and non-billable tasks (tasks that cannot such as accounting, clerical , administrative, internal projects etc.) that are generally part of overhead.
The reality is no field employee actually ever spends 100% of their time on billable activities.
The table saw breaks down and needs to be fixed the guy fixing it is then not working generating billable hours but he still needs to be paid.
The three guys waiting two hours one morning for the drywall truck stuck in traffic to show up are not working billable hours but they still need to be paid.
The guy spending an hour traveling between two different job venues is not working generating a billable hour but he still needs to be paid
Company meetings are not billable hours but the employees still need to be paid.
Training and education time are not billable hours
And with respect to management activities time keeping is a worthwhile procedure there too (not for pay check calculations since management is usually paid with a salary) but to see just how management is spending their time so areas for improvement or adjustment can be spotted and worked on and internal overhead budgets and projects can be really evaluated as part of "job costing" too.
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So it's a billing system. Thanks for confirming that..
Phill Giles
The Unionville Woodwright
Unionville, Ontario
Phill there is nothing in it involving dollars, there is nothing in it to create invoices, it about processing, organizing, and accounting for time information so it's a TimeKeeping system. It's not a billing system in that there is nothing in it for sending out bills of any kind. And I think you would have been far better off taking an actual look at it to determine what it is or is not rather than playing this game in a dialog.
Edited 3/21/2004 12:13 am ET by Jerrald Hayes
Sorry Jerrald ...
adventures in semantics is what Phill does.
JeffBuck Construction Pittsburgh,PA
Artistry in Carpentry
No game, I used to design and write these systems, I thought you had the expertise to have a discussion at that level - my mistake, closed..
Phill Giles
The Unionville Woodwright
Unionville, Ontario
jerrald .. pretty interesting system.. but we only have computers in the office... i can see where you opertion can really get your use out of it...Mike Smith Rhode Island : Design / Build / Repair / Restore
Mike most of the other companies that use my software use it with paper timeheets and then someone enters the data off of them into the computer system. In fact only two other companies using it use Palm (or Laptops) like we do. The thing is it's really an organizing tool.
One of the things we already do now that going to be part of the next 2.0 release is instead of giving out a generalized or generic timesheet that has all those categories listed on it individualized list of tasks and categories can be printed out so the employee only has to provide data for the tasks currently at hand or even just what they have been assigned to do. They can still make entries for tasks they haven't been assigned or weren't planned for (such as repairing the broken down table saw) but they then also essential have a personalized Do List of activities you want, need, or expect them to work on.
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SEE! I was right. You do have your sh!t together.
Well it not really "having it all together". It's more about having a continuing process or set of processes that work toward gettting it all together. The more I learn the more I discover how stupid I really am and just how much there is out there I still have to learn and get my "####" together on.
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"I know the hardest part of record keeping is to remember to write down, accurately, the time spent on each activity for each job"
Ralph,
Ain't that the truth. (Is ain't a word yet?) That's a problem we encounter often. Sloppy record keeping, when it comes to record keeping. Often it's just "guestimates"
BTW, did you receive that granite sample yet?
Also, I looked for your post about that fireplace surround you did, but couldn't find it. What year and folder was it in?
Jon
I havent used a time clock in 20 years and hope I never do . And wont ask anyone to do anything im not willing to do myself.
Part of my freedom act. dogboy
dogboy.. me neither... last time i punched a clock was working in a fiberglass sailboat company.... since i also keep a timecard.. i would also punch the same clock...
if it means we can be a better , more efficient company.. and that means i can pay better and offer more benefits... then that is what i would do...and i would punch the same clock
now .. the end of the day on Friday involves about 15 - 30 minutes recapitulating the time cards.. but without the numbers i might as well throw darts at the estimates...
no numbers.. means bad estimates... bad estimates = cost overruns or bidding too high to get the job...
running all of this data thru a computer still amounts to the same thing.....
garbage in = garbage out... so.. we either keep accurate time cards or none..
if i thought this system was going to help.. i'd buy it in a NY minuteMike Smith Rhode Island : Design / Build / Repair / Restore
I have a LOT of experience with tracking systems (my major was industrial engineering/wrote systems to analyze tracking for my employer early in my career).
It works extremely well when people do one task (or repeat the same discreet task over and over) for a significant period of time. E.g. someone producing widgets on a lathe for a shift/week and only has to indicate start, stop, and down time (for maint/adjustment/tooling change/...). It also works extremely well when there are mechanical tracking aids (badge-doors, sign-in sheets, passwords on machines, telephony systems, etc.
It begins to break down when you have a few workers doing many varied tasks for short periods of time - in these case it was far more usefull to have a technician do a T&M observation than to have the employees try and record it on their own.
Phill Giles
The Unionville Woodwright
Unionville, Ontario
There's a thread on the JLC forum right now about electronic timekeeping. One contractor there uses exaktime and it sounded like he wasn't too thrilled... his guys were punching in first thing then going to read the paper in their trucks, something like that.
I worked in a plant where the production employees all had electronic timecards. They wore them on their belts on small retractable reels. Everytime they moved to a new job or new machine they would swipe their card and key in the job number. At the end of the week the computer would write their checks and give the manager his job cost reports. No doubt a lot of those folks forgot to swipe when changing machines and forgot to enter job numbers correctly... but if you had employees motivated to use such a system it would give you a lot of good information.
MIke ...
if my scanner worked ... I'd post the timecard from my last place of employ ...
nice and detailed ... right up till the moment you actually tried to fill it out.
Just seemed the catagories .. while on the surface was self explanatory ... never really seemd to fit exactly what ya just did.
Windows ...
Trim.
OK ... I just trimmed out a window ... is that windows or trim.
ask one person .. windows .. the other .. trim.
The "fault" came when they'd bid the window schedule ... a "window install" was priced at a turnkey process ... both the install and trimming ...
so techinically .. it would have fallen under window ...
but everyone was told to put trim ... as we were in the trim stage at that time.
Plus ... they had no place for stocking materials or accepting materials ...
I remember one big fight about doors ...
I was to hang al the doors on a whole house remodel/addition ...
I show up ... no door ... the delivery is late ... I'm supposed to wait for the doors ...
Get things out of the van .. laid out to start working ...
Then the delivery shows ... just a driver .. no helpers ... so me and him unload the 20 some odd doors out of the truck and into the driveway ...
Looks like rain ... so I hump all the soild core doors onto the proch first ...
OK .. better I take the time and scatter them where they belong ...
Some in the basement ... some on the first floor .. some on the second .. some in the attic ...
oh yeah ... the knobs didn't show up on that order ...
so later that afternoon ... as I'm starting to hang the very first door ... the owner shows ... wants to know why we're so behind on the doors ...
After all .. he sent me first thing to "start hanging those doors" ...
in his mind .. each door was already setting right next to each plumb and level RO ...
with the lockset sitting there too ....
At the end of that week .. I was called in to explain why my time for setting "one door" .. divided out .. was 4 times above what the Means Estimator said!
I know U actually work in the field ... and know what happens ...
But my advice .. go thru the timesheets with the guys .. see what works and whats missing.
I nearly quit on the spot as he said I was wrong ... and it simply too me 4 times too long to hang one door ... must be true ... it's right here on the time sheet.
And they wondered why guys cheated on the sheets!
I just scanned the "codes" on the back of their sheet ...
another big complaint was CLN ...
which was for clean up and hauling
dumpster
final clean up ...
would get questioned any time you put it down if it wasn't the day before a holiday break .. or the last day on a job ...
they didn't want to hear that you actually cleaned at any other time ...
I started putting CLN .25 at the end of each day .. just to piss them off!
A good time sheet and idiots in the office don't mix.
Another thing missing was drive time ... they couldn't understand when things didn't add up to 8 yrs .. yet U made them 8 hrs ... on days when they'd send ya to 3 different jobs ... or make you go run to another job to pick something up.
Jeff
Buck Construction Pittsburgh,PA
Artistry in Carpentry
jeff... i think our system should work pretty good.. we use a fairly standard 25 classifications modified to suit our bidding and building process....
in the office we have another 7 classes ...
i think the key is that i have just taken one of our apprentices and brought him into the office for an hour each monday after work to log the time... monday is still fresh enough to review our previous week (which ends on Saturday )
also.. since he's one of the system users it should help to show the kinds of misclassifications you were describing...
as to the door order you described.. i would have logged all of that time on doors... there is only one reason you were getting charged to the job.. and it was doors..
to me .. remodeling and job costing has to find all of the anomalies.. like a bad delivery throwing off the labor charged to "doors"...
just like red cedar shingle siding.... everything you do BECAUSE of the shingle siding, which is not a seperate operation, has to be charged to "shingling" (siding).. which is one of the reasons i have always used 1/2 sq/ man/ day as a production figure... because square after square that is all we really get.. but if you ask a carpenter how many squares he can install.. he'll usually say ONE... or ONE & an HALF...
hell ..i even used to ask one of my guys who roofed for about ten years to estimate roofing jobs for me... always lost my shirt with his bids .. they never included staging , clean up .. associated trim... yada , yada yada..
anyways we keep trying ...Mike Smith Rhode Island : Design / Build / Repair / Restore
back to the original post...
We purchased and implemented the exaktime system Jan 1 of this year. I was tired of all the timecard issues - sloppy, late, wrinkled, muddy, rounding "errors", time written on a 2x4 etc etc. We do primarily framing and generally have our manpower split about three ways.
For the first few weeks we were pretty forgiving if they forgot to clock in or out, but as time goes on they are held more responsible. no time, no pay. Acceptance has been great, some guys were actually excited at the idea of not having to remember what they did the last week, cuz of course in reality only perhaps 10% of the guys filled out their card daily.
Problems/shortcomings: This wouldnt work well for those of you tracking 25 classifications. I decided to have the trim carpenters continue with the old paper system, since their tasks are more varied. This is only two guys tho, and their timecards were/are not the problem. If a framer has time that cannot be recorded, we are developing sort-of a "shortform timecard" that can be used.
The records are collected via a palm-pilot. I bought one for each super, they're only $40 on ebay. The super is responsible for getting the palm pilot to the office by monday PM each week, picks it back up w/checks on weds morn.
Cost up front is a little steep. We got the software, palms, 5 jobclox, lots of keytabs for about 3K I think.
This has saved probably 3 - 4 hours of time weekly for our payroll dept. (my wife.. ) It has helped on the lunch issue too - I was getting eaten alive by elongated lunches - now if they choose to take 45-50 mins, its not my pocketbook. It is also very nice for the occasional T&M job.
Whew, that got long. I'll be glad to answer any more questions.
chip.... thanks a bunch ... looks like exactime is one level above where i want to be in terms of overhead / administration...
our time cards in theory should work well....i went to our present system about 6 years ago after a seminar with that red headed guy that does all of the JLC shows... i think his name is Kriner...
we're just about thru our first batch of 500.. so i've ordered the 2d generation from our printer.. should pick them up this week... i'll post the timecards and wait for the critiqueMike Smith Rhode Island : Design / Build / Repair / Restore
I think if you have every employee filling out time cards with classifications( reguardless of the system), the information is never going to be to accurate- one guy will alot time to one thing, and another will alot ithe same to another.
I have only 3 employees and I work with them, at the end of each day I get in the truck ,pull out the laptop,and record the days labor.( takes 5-10 mins).
If you have more employees ,you must also have leads or supers- I would have that as their responsabilities. Then there is a chance cost tracking is realistic.
jay... you must be a lot younger than me... i can't remember what i was doing three hours ago.. never mind what my 3 guys were doing on two or three different job sites...
no.. they have to keep the time... each individual.. it wold all fall apart fast if i made one guy responsible for everyone'e time..
Mike Smith Rhode Island : Design / Build / Repair / Restore
I was going with the Palm Pilot method for awhile, in terms of entering general daily summary. I found that I started recording what was included in a specific task and the amount of time it took(ie. not down to the minute but in quarters of a day more likely). I found what was more helpful to me was breaking down the steps in the day's tasks, finding out if there always seemed to be a tool/fasterner/material missing, or customer talking to someone, etc..the more I looked at records the more the worker's impact on production was always what it should be and that external issues were the result of any dramatic time slowdown.
The thing that has suprised me in this thread is the couple of comments on lunch times, I just can't imagine that a guy taking 10 extra minutes for lunch is that big of a deal. I don't mean if an employee takes 45minutes every single day but I just figure it's a morale issue as much as anything, just always seemed greedy to me when employer's harped on employees down to the minute on things. We often will go grab lunch for an hour on a given day, we usually go out to eat instead of packing a lunch..if someone brings something it always goes quicker but it doesn't bother me if someone spends an extra 10minutes finishing the sports section while they wrap up lunch.
-Ray
ray... what are your working hours ? we work 7 to 3:30.. with a coffee break on the clock and a half hour for lunch off the clock.....
it's a small crew... if someone is late... it screws things up.... the day can't really start until everyone gets there.... if we're running two or three jobs.. people end up waiting for the late guy... a dollar waiting on a nickel..
same thing after lunch....
guys want to take an hour for lunch .. it's ok by me... but they also want to leave at 3:30...
after they go home i go back to the office for another two hours... so ... what's with the greedy comment?
me ... i don't harp on nobody.. i'm harping to you...if it gets to be a habit with my guys , i take em aside and tell them how they're screwing things up... and yeah.. they are screwing things up...
see... they want time off.. all they gotta do is tell me.. so i can PLAN...
the biggest deal we do is LABOR.. figure it out...
10 minutes in the morning... 10 minutes at lunch... 20 minutes x 250 days = 83 manhours.... that's a two week paid vacation... Mike Smith Rhode Island : Design / Build / Repair / Restore
Our work hours aren't really consistent in terms of start/finish time and lunch breaks in the same way yours are, that's contributes to me having some greater flexibility in the amount of time for a meal break. Oftentimes on commercial jobs it might be a 6:30PM(that's when setup, etc. starts) to 2:00AM day, meal would probably be about 45 minutes when we take it though we'll often skip because everyone wants to go home earlier. All the residential stuff we do is in apartments/rowhouses and 7AM never seems to workout as a start time due to noise/parking concerns, if it were up to me I'd start at 6AM or even 5:30A on days I was motivated and always be done at 2PM sharp w/ a 5minute breakfast and 45minute lunch.
I can definitely see where you are coming from on the long lunch + wanting to home early point, though I've found that everyone moans about wanting to stop early regardless of whether we even take a meal break that day, most annoying part of the job when you have a guy who asked for overtime begging to leave early after 30minutes of extra work.
Doing a upcoming job with one buddy and just figured an hour lunch into my bid, I know we'll probably go out everyday, I never have the motivation to pack something to bring from home, nor does it ever taste as good anyway.
-Ray
ray.... i can certainly see where you're comming from.. when we're on an away job.. it's different.. we all eat together.. we mostly arrive together.. we all leave at the same time...
these jobs around town... we might be running three.. i gotta know where they are..
i depend on them .. they depend on me..
trying to keep everyone focused on the big picture ...
and the best part comes when i can disappear for a day.. or a week .. and have the trust that everyone will still function wether i'm there or not
as to lunch... if we're going to a resaturant.. that screws us for the half hour lunch.. no can do...but grabbing something at the deli... yes.. half hour is fineMike Smith Rhode Island : Design / Build / Repair / Restore