Paper Timesheets fraud is a biggest challenge that many businesses face in today’s society, employees may put in time that they did not work for and sometimes get away with it and get paid for it ,The company’s relies on your employees’ loyalty and honesty—thus, they usually give them the benefit of the doubt. But are they honest?
Lets understand about paper timesheets fraud and the ways to prevent it.
Paper Timesheets Fraud
Now days most businesses allow their employees to enter their attendance information into paper Timesheets which is approved by managers afterwards , However in some of the cases employees take this as an opportunity to manipulate the timesheets by putting wrong In and Out time and consequently getting paid for the time they haven’t worked.
The mere rounding up of the time into minutes might seem like no big deal, but these minutes gradually build up, turning into hours or even days, A simple 15-20 minutes of timesheet manipulation by employees every day can cost employer a lot
How Does Employees manipulate Time ?
- Buddy Punching
This is very commonly used practice where an employee enters time on the behalf of other employee it also involves Favoritism in which managers and supervisors favors a coworker, relative, or friend by manipulating paper timesheets, even they may also overlook the lateness of some employees.
- Entering False Time
The practice of paper timesheets and manual addition of work hours makes it easy for employees to enter incorrect arrival and leaving times. Even in some of the cases the employees take a longer time during break than the allotted one and manipulates timesheets to adjust breaks.
This practice can affects the overall productivity and cost
- Remote Work Sites
In businesses such as construction delivery services, frontline sales, field staff and remote backend support etc. The employees takes the paper Timesheet practice as an opportunity to manipulate the time by putting false information about working hours and location and obtaining money for hours not worked
How to prevent Time Theft ?
The solutions of Time thefts solely depends on the type of vivid operational attendance management problems of employers Some common practices are as follows