Benefits of Time and Attendance Automation in Healthcare Management

The COVID-19 pandemic has overwhelmed the healthcare sector due to the high burden of cases and the highly infectious nature of the virus. Hospitals have realized that manually performing administrative tasks is preventing them from giving enough time and care to their patients.

24/7 shifts, ad-hoc employment of staff, rescheduling during crises--such unique demands in hospitals give rise to complicated situations with respect to payroll management, budgeting, and time management.

An automated time and attendance management system can help hospitals reduce manual drudgery, maintain accuracy and data security, and focus on delivering patient-centric services.

Here are 5 practical benefits of automating hospital employee time and attendance:

1. Streamlined schedules

Creating schedules by hand is a time-consuming and labor-intensive task. When rescheduling requests due to absence of staff or change in shift timings have to be accommodated, the task becomes even more complex.

A time and attendance software streamlines the work of scheduling and rescheduling based on staff availability, skillset, and hospital demands. By automatically shuffling the roster based on availability and demand, the system can ensure that unnecessary overtime is avoided.

Hospitals can run their administrative tasks efficiently and without overstraining the workforce.

2. Simplify payroll calculations

Manually recording in-times and out-times of staff in time sheets is a laborious, time-consuming, and error-prone task. It is also difficult to accurately calculate payroll when staff is enlisted ad-hoc, especially during times of high demand.

An employee tracking system simplifies payroll processing by automating timekeeping, preventing time card theft, and reducing the workload of hospital administrators.

3. Approve shift timings and leaves

Hospital capacity management has become more important in the face of the COVID-19 pandemic.

Scheduling and managing shifts and leaves manually is inefficient and an oversight can cause mismanagement in staffing distribution.

When a time and attendance management system is used to manage shifts and leaves, managers can approve or deny requests based on real-time staff availability.

Employees with appropriate permissions can also get visibility into their leave request statuses and shift reschedule requests using such a system.

4. Reduce payroll errors

When payroll is calculated manually by reconciling data from various spreadsheets or logbooks, human error is bound to creep in. Also, a lot of time is wasted cross-checking for possible errors.

Payroll errors are costly, not just in terms of money but also in terms of staff satisfaction, motivation to work, and productivity.

Read how payroll boosts employee satisfaction.

A time and attendance management system offers complete visibility and transparency into employee movement, thus reducing errors in payroll processing.

5. Stop attendance fraud

Another disadvantage of maintaining attendance using registers or logbooks is the prevalence of cheating. It is easier to falsify entries on paper than it is on an employee attendance software.

Attendance fraud can be minimized using a biometric attendance software that performs identity verification and prevents proxy attendance. It can also provide detailed insights on employee activity such as holidays, sick leaves, paid leaves, and so on.

Conclusion

The primary job of hospitals is to provide good-quality care for their patients. Manual processing of time, attendance, and payroll data gets in the way of quality healthcare and staff satisfaction. A time and attendance management system like Perk Payroll can streamline processes, ease the administrative burden on hospitals, and boost workforce optimization.