Top Features to Look for in a Good Paid Time-Off Tracking System
How do your managers currently track PTO? Do they still fill out Excel sheets, calendars, or are they still mainly paper-based? Then, you are not alone! Many enterprises have yet to implement the correct paid-time-off tracking system.
For instance, your employees need to remain organized but may not have an easy way of handling every worker’s time-off requests or leave balances. It is a big struggle impacting overall productivity. Also, it may lead to headaches for your employees and the HR department, whenever an employee wants to take a day off.
Today, more than 20% of managers admit to feeling overwhelmed by the large volume of employee vacation requests. About 90% of professionals report that their staff tends to make mistakes while tracking their time. The good news is, there are simple options for a time-off tracking system that can address these challenges for your HR team, payroll leaders, and managers as well.
Read on to learn how the best paid-time-off tracking solution can help you handle every workers’ vacation time more effectively while also facilitating a hassle-free and streamlined process.
1. Self-Service Dashboard for Employee Time Tracking
Do employees often visit your HR department to learn how much vacation time they have left, or to submit a request? It can be challenging to answer these questions without effective useful and up-to-date approval tracking tool, a PTO system.
Many businesses have started to invest in time tracking solutions that include self-service applications that provide quick access to all employees. It helps them to view and manage their leave balances, report sick or casual days off, submit requests, and some even allow them to trade or swap shifts with other employees, from a suitable mobile device.
2. Reporting
The correct time tracking solution will aid you in decisions about staffing quickly with proper reports. Managers must manage their departments properly to maximize overall productivity.
A PTO system should allow each manager to take a quick look into their team member’s productivity and total time-off to fully understand how their workforce functions. The system will help you answer these questions like which team members have the possibility of burnout based on never taking time off? When do leave requests peak during the year?
3. Handle Requests Seamlessly
Handling time-off requests through Excel sheets and countless emails is just too time-consuming with your staff, never knowing when a request has been approved. Even then, managers seem astonished to hear their team member is taking a day off.
HR technology aids in centralizing all necessary information on staff requests, so managers can develop the best way to manage sick leaves, vacations, paid time-off, employee vacation accruals, and more all within a single integrated system.
Hence, there is no more need to try and piece together different spreadsheets, email threads, or notes to handle every employee time-off request. The system will make sure there is ample coverage of time and resources when an employee is out for vacation or only for a day.
4. Prevent Calendar Confusion
Handling PTO requests are more than maintaining proper accrual balances and approving leave requests, even though these might be the most time-consuming.
However, many managers struggle with the crucial gap in knowing how paid-time-off affects daily, weekly, and monthly schedules. They require this critical information to ensure they have proper coverage during the day, so the organization never misses a step when a team member is out.
When a solution syncs schedules and employee calendars together, you will no longer be astonished by an unexpected absence. Automated time-off tracking software also provides the manager’s a granular insight into specific details, like when an employee is in the office and out.
5. Reliable Accrual Balances
Do you know what the total cost of your current time-off tracking process is? It could be more than you think.
Without an effective PTO solution, there is a higher chance of HR leaders spending a lot of their valuable time calculating every employee’s leave balances, counting accrued hours, and comparing them to payroll reports. On top of hard work, manual time-tracking solutions cost organizations thousands of dollars each year in lost productivity, errors, and incorrect PTO approvals.
But the good news is human resource management systems provide robust time-off tracking solutions to help you overcome all these challenges.
For instance, leave balances are updated automatically. Employee time-off requests, along with approvals, are routed via the PTO feature within the software. It helps HR departments save time and minimizes expenses with the utilization of accurate vacation accrual balances.
The Bottom Line
The right PTO solution can do more than help make time-tracking more effective. It also helps promote a happier labor force with the ability to handle their time-off and save money with the appropriate accrual and less oversight needed from HR executives and managers.
