Employee GPS Tracking

“Okay, I get it. The military uses GPS. The aviation industry uses GPS. My car uses GPS… But what the heck does that have to do with operating my business?”

The benefits of employee GPS tracking are vast. Take a look at this list:

• Enhanced Productivity

• Simplified Time Tracking and Payroll Processes

• Unlimited Accessibility

• Optimized Workforce Management

• Empowered Workforce

• Increased Profitability

Now, if you can’t identify at least one of those things as being beneficial to your business, fine. Maybe employee GPS tracking isn’t for you. Best of luck out there.

But for those of you looking to do whatever it takes to maximize the efficiency of your business practices, let’s dive deeper into each of the items on that list.

Enhanced Productivity

Paper timesheets are the worst. Paper anything is the worst.

Job sites (and the vehicles we use to get to them) are often dirty, messy, and disorganized. Things get lost, damaged, and destroyed regularly.

Trying to keep a physical record of clock-ins and clock-outs is a nuisance - for both employees and employers. Not to mention, constantly checking in to report your location when moving between job sites can be a serious waste of time.

Maximizing the efficiency of your employees means maximizing the efficiency of your business.

Employee GPS tracking allows for the reduction of busywork for both employees and employers, so everyone can focus on doing the job they’re being paid to do.

With GPS tracking apps, no one has to bother with unnecessary phone calls or even - heaven forbid - having to pull out an actual paper map to try and locate a lost or late employee.

Many labor tracking apps now offer real-time, interactive, GPS-verified maps showing the most up-to-date location of every single employee.

And when those employees do get to the job site, GPS tracking apps can instantly confirm and verify their location, while allowing them to check in with the click of a button. No more waiting in clock-in lines or taking the time to fill out sign-in sheets.

Uncomplicated clock-in procedures mean your employees can get to work doing what you’re paying them to do, quickly, easily, efficiently, and without worry. And if an employee resents having uncompromisable time-keeping, well, that’s probably not an employee you want to keep around…

Simplified Time Tracking and Payroll Processes

Have we mentioned paper timesheets are the worst? Not just for your labor force, but especially for the payroll team tasked with keeping everything organized, honest, and compliant.

With labor tracking apps, payroll records can be automatically GPS, time, and date-stamped for all employees.

And this digitized timesheet and payroll information is significantly easier to sort, organize, and monitor than messy paper documents. Payroll processes can be additionally streamlined with easy-to-use, built-in integrations. Customizable reports can be instantly and easily exported to Quickbooks or other software. Imagine a world where payroll processing time takes minutes rather than days and comes with nearly 100% reliability.

We have a feeling it won’t be just your payroll and estimating teams celebrating.

But perhaps most importantly, GPS-verified time and location tracked records can help ensure you stay on the right side of complicated and ever-evolving workplace labor laws and requirements. Keeping accurate records of every activity your workforce performs protects you and your business. No more he-said, she-said. Every action is recorded, verifiable, and accessible at any time thanks to GPS’ seamless integration with cloud-based storage.

Unlimited Accessibility

The ability of labor tracking apps to upload data directly to the cloud currently enables unprecedented levels of accessibility and mobility within the workforce. Employers, managers, and employees have been largely freed of the dependence on physical workstations.

Gone are the days of carrying around bulging accordion folders or scouring through filofaxes scattered around the backseat of a dirty pickup truck. Employee tracking apps allow you to monitor your entire workforce with just your phone, tablet, or desktop. With some labor tracking apps allowing foremen and managers to log and monitor the activity of their entire teams using batch entries. The search functionality of this digitized information alone can bring significantly improved efficiency to job sites.

At any time, at any place, as long as you’re connected to the internet, cloud-based services allow you to access the information you need and share it without having to physically deliver it. Having a central location for all of your documents, retrievable from anywhere, is crucial for someone who works primarily on job sites.

Need we even mention how much time and money can be saved on paper, ink, and printing supplies?

Optimized Workforce Management

No one wants to pay for work that wasn’t done.

Knowing exactly when and where every member of your workforce is in real-time represents the ultimate management tool. Many employee GPS tracking apps allow you to view all of your employees in real-time, on one screen. And with the click of a button you can even watch them travel to their next destination.

With time management being a priority in the workplace, especially in industries like construction where employees regularly travel between job sites, the ability to track how and where your employees travel while on the clock is paramount.

Employee GPS tracking apps make large workforces easier to manage and keep track of.

This is especially beneficial for projects where employee hours are tied to the specific job sites they’re working at. With crews working multiple jobs during the week, or even during a single day, it can be difficult to tell how many hours were spent where. With GPS tracking, you can see exactly how many man-hours should be allocated to each job site, performing each function, with ease.

Real-time time-tracking also provides increased awareness of overall time management, such as the ability to set up notifications when overtime is approached or triggered, or how much time is being used on different equipment.

Empowered Workforce

The benefits of employee GPS tracking apps do not exclusively apply to management-levels and above. First and foremost, accurate time tracking ensures that employees are certain to get paid for the work they’ve done. Payroll disputes can be quickly and easily resolved with information instantly accessible not just to employers but to the employees themselves.

Employee tracking apps create reliable, safe, and easy-to-access records of all personal work information, including hours worked, jobs, and actions performed.

And as we might have mentioned before, no one wants to have to keep track of paper timesheets. Allowing employees to easily and reliably clock in and out of work empowers them to take charge of their work schedule. Employees can monitor their time and even performance based on the convenient information.

Additionally, some time-tracking apps (like Labor Sync) provide multilingual experiences. The benefits of being able to interact with vitally important, income-affecting software in one’s native language are often understated. Not to mention freeing employees from having to worry about being able to fill out time cards in a foreign language.

Increased Profitability

And last, but certainly not least, employee GPS tracking provides businesses with the opportunity to increase profits by ensuring your company is not wasting money.

Unreliable time tracking is a liability. Every year, companies lose thousands of dollars in overpaid wages due to misreported employee time-keeping. In fact, it’s such a common occurrence the term “time theft” has been coined to describe it. And unsurprisingly, it’s a significantly greater problem for companies that pay employees hourly wages vs. salaries.

Which means if you operate a service-based business and don’t utilize time-tracking software, chances are time theft is happening to you.

According to a 2017 study, the most common method of time theft, when one employee clocks in for another, aka “buddy punching,” cost American employers over $373 million in one year. Today, by requiring employees to use GPS time-tracking apps, this method of time theft can be all but completely eliminated.

Because time theft results in employees who show up on time getting paid the same as those who don’t, leaving the issue unaddressed risks demotivating your hardest and most reliable workers. Lack of motivation results in lowered productivity.

Unreliable time-keeping can cause a devastating ripple effect throughout your company as not only are you paying for work not being done, but your company’s reputation can suffer as clients begin to wonder why they’re paying for a full day’s work when people are regularly showing up late.

Make sure people are paid for the work they do, when they do it. Reward your employees’ honesty with the accurate payments they deserve.