In day-to-day trade work, the focus is on technical work, while administrative tasks are often perceived as time-consuming. However, precise time recording is essential for your business for several reasons:
Even if time recording is often seen as a chore, it forms the backbone of a successful trade business.
The classic paperwork system may be familiar, but it causes more problems than it solves:
The old way - employees note their hours on paper, hand in the notes, someone types everything into Excel - is not only time-consuming, but also highly error-prone.
Calculation example: 10 employees each need 15 minutes per week for timesheets, the office another 2 hours for entering and checking. That's over 40 hours per month just for time recording!
Hand on heart: How accurate are handwritten notes on Friday afternoons for the whole week? That's right - mostly estimates. As a company, you can quickly lose 5-10% of the hours actually worked. With an hourly rate of 60 euros and ten employees, this can quickly add up to several thousand euros per month!
Missing notes, illegible handwriting, incorrect allocations - the list of potential problems is endless. Invoicing is delayed, the accounting department is desperate, and in the end your company's liquidity suffers.
In short: manual timesheets regularly cause challenges. Your team has to find their way to the office after work to hand in the documents. The accounting department then has to deal with entries that are difficult to read, make time-consuming queries and deal with missing documents. As a result, this form of time recording can have a negative impact on the profitability of your business.
Not yet fully automated, but still a good start: the timesheet as a template in PDF format. We have created a free template for you and compiled further tips.
The digital alternative offers numerous advantages that make your trade business more efficient:
A digital solution eliminates the need for manual entries and transfers. Your employees record their times directly in an app - with the tap of a finger. This data is immediately available to all authorized persons.
Digital time recording enables real-time tracking. Start of work, breaks and end of work are recorded exactly when they take place - not days later from memory. This drastically increases accuracy.
With digital time recording, you always have an overview of ongoing projects, their progress and the time invested. This allows you to take countermeasures at an early stage if necessary, instead of only realizing that a project has gotten out of hand during the post-calculation phase.
A particular advantage: the times can be assigned directly to the corresponding orders. This means you know exactly which customer is using how much of your resources - and can adjust your costing for future projects accordingly.
Test the Meisterwerk app now for 14 days free of charge and experience digital time recording!
Time recording is not only useful for economic reasons - it is now also required by law:
The Federal Labor Court ruled in September 2022: In Germany, there is an obligation to fully record working hours. This decision is based on the so-called "time clock ruling" of the European Court of Justice (ECJ) from 2019. The message is clear: the time clock is coming!
Purely digital recording is currently not mandatory. The choice of method - whether analog or digital - is currently still up to you as the boss. However, case law indicates that time recording systems must be objective, reliable and tamper-proof. According to a ruling by the Emden Labor Court, simple paper documentation no longer sufficiently meets these requirements.
In practice, mobile time recording in the skilled trades offers numerous advantages:
Whether on the construction site, in a customer meeting or on the road - with an app, your employees can record their times anywhere and at any time. Various recording methods are available:
A good time recording solution can be seamlessly integrated into your existing processes. The recorded data can be used directly for invoicing, payroll accounting or post-calculation. This saves you having to enter data twice and reduces sources of error.
By introducing digital time recording, a plumbing company with seven employees has not only done away with the weekly search for slips of paper, but has also found that it can bill an average of 1.5 hours more per team member per week - simply by recording more accurately. At an hourly rate of 65 euros, this means additional revenue of over 3,000 euros per month!
Investing in a digital time recording solution usually pays for itself quickly:
Precise time recording is also the basis for correctly calculating your hourly rate. Only those who know exactly how much time is spent on which activities can determine a profitable hourly rate.
The Meisterwerk app offers you a customized solution for digital time recording in your trade business:
With the Meisterwerk app, you can turn the chore of time recording into a competitive advantage:
All you need is a smartphone or tablet and internet access. The Meisterwerk app is easy to install and intuitive to use. Your team can start working productively with it immediately after a short briefing.
The information in this article does not constitute legal advice. Despite careful research, we cannot guarantee the completeness, accuracy and timeliness of legal information in particular. If you need legal help, please contact a lawyer.
