An essential part of running a profitable business, managing your timesheet compliance can be a nightmare for administrators and employees alike.

However making sure that they’re generated, completed and processed correctly can be incredibly useful.

So, what exactly is timesheet compliance and how can you embed it throughout your organisation?

What is timesheet compliance?

Simply put, timesheet compliance incorporates correctly completing and processing a timesheet in line with clearly defined industry standards.

For those completing the document, it means ensuring your hours are tracked correctly and they are entered and submitted on time.

Once in the system, it is tracked and then reconciled by processors – guaranteeing the correct time is billed to each client and payment proceeds as planned.

Why is it essential?

Unfortunately, the cost of failing to comply with timesheets can be extremely high.

Some key issues include:

Poor quality reporting: Payroll is hugely important when taking the temperature of your business, allowing you to make accurate business decisions and ensure you not only stay afloat, but also prosper. Poor quality timekeeping renders those figures unreliable and can have a knock-on effect on other reporting, making your information unreliable across the board.

Project disruption: Timesheets are an essential part of management and are critical in understanding how much resource needs to be allocated to projects. Failure to track them correctly can lead to under or overbudgeting, which risks delays to the work or derailing it entirely. Failing to understand or truthfully track expenditure is a significant and often overlooked problem and can cause considerable problems that are only noticed when it is too late.

Client and employee dissatisfaction: When it comes to finance, it’s important to get things right first time. Under or overcharging clients can jeopardise your professional relationship or result in unrealistic expectations. Employees can also become disillusioned or risk burnout with timesheets often acting as a barometer for the effort an employee is putting in.

How can software help?

Using a dedicated timesheet software platform can not only take the sting out of payroll processing but ensure compliance at every stage of the process.

Reliable platforms allow employees to submit their timesheets online or as needed, removing any obstacles to completing them successfully through a quality user experience.

Once tendered, automation can take the effort out of reviewing or uploading the information – with enforced validation ensuring the forms are of the highest quality.

After completion, clients can be discretely billed and employees tendered with an email payslip – ensuring a light touch and highly compliant approach.