Did you know that in addition to our amazing live phone support line we offer online chat support as well?  The chat experience is designed to provide quick answers and speedy solutions  to get you on your way fast .  In other words don’t hit it up expecting help with a server migration because we’d get bogged down in a back and forth that would make the US Congress proud.  Think of it as a WebMD where the phones would be an actual hospital.  Chat can patch you up but if you need surgery, take it to a doctor.  For example, through chat we can help you get account ID’s, answer how to’s, help with navigation, etc.  Call in with more complex issues like scheduling, accruals, and installations.

To access chat, simply go to your admin tab in Timeforce and click on the chat support link in the lower right hand portion of the screen.

So before you call us, consider there might be a quick and easy way to get the fast answers you need.  Chat support is a great way to get around our very entertaining hold program.  Though I can’t imagine why you’d want to get around our hold program…  Its pretty good.

Not to wax too emotional about the reporting functions within TimeForce, but reports are near and dear to our hearts. Ok, that might be a little much, but they are pretty cool. Here are a few tips to make them work even better for you.

I. Don’t be afraid to look around, there are tons of reports to choose from. Some are variations on at theme, others are completely unique. The idea is to get exactly what you need and want in a concise and easy to read format. So if something is not working for you, just look around, it’s likely there.

II. The filter fiend. The section of dropdowns between “Date Range” and “Sort by” are filters, meaning they limit what (mostly who) is displayed in the report. It is a great feature that larger organizations use all the time, for smaller companies it causes a call to support, because it often creates a “Nothing to Report” error on the report. Your best bet is to bypass it completely and leave them all at “Select an XXXX”

III.When you are selecting the employees you want the report to run on, if you select nobody, it will display everybody. This will save you from over clicking.

IV. If you can’t get the format of a report just right, you can save it to a CSV format and open it in your spreadsheet software and format it to your heart’s content. Just click the “Save” button next to the print button on the completed report.

For the most part reports are the end result of what TimeForce does, and we want that to be easy to use, exactly the information you need, and in a format that’s concise and easy to recognize. As always if you’re not getting results you’re looking for, we are just phone call away.

This tip of the month is a simple but often overlooked one.  The Recalculate time card button.  What’s that you say? Your punches do not show up?  Your punches are not rounding like they should?  Holiday hours not populating automatically?  You can pull your hair out (in my case what’s left of it) or hit that recalculate button.  It is on the Timecard tab on the lower right hand side of the page.

I estimate that 1/3 of the calls or chats I take with the above issues are resolved by recalculating the timecard.  Just think of it as a refresh button.  In essence it takes into consideration any of the new policies you have put into place or changed and refreshes the timecard to reflect those changes.  It can also trigger the refresh needed to display punches that may be in your database but have not yet been populated onto the timecard.  Keep in mind, Timeforce is a web based application so unless you refresh (in this case recalc) the page you’re looking at, the information will be out of date.  In addition, from a payroll or audit perspective, I’d say it’s a best practice to recalculate your timecards before you begin reviewing them to ensure that everything is up to snuff.

For Timeforce II there is a Recalculate Employee List and Recalculate Employee button.  The list button will recalculate all timecards for that pay period and the Employee button will recalculate only the card you’re looking at.

For Timeforce 1, the Recalculate Employee button is on the bottom right corner of the timecard page.  If you want to recalculate all of the timecards for the pay period, it’s a little more tricky.  You need to enter the daily details section.  To do so, simply click on the Daily Details link at the top of the page and you’ll see a Recalculate Pay Period button on the top right.

You hear that?  That beautiful hum of the office?  It is Mozart compared to hold music.  And you may have just spared yourself the call and some time to boot.  Of course if Recalculate does not resolve your issue, we’re here for you.  And we’ll do our best to get to you as quickly as possible.