Time attendance devices are required to effectively monitor employee attendance. The need for a time attendance monitoring system grows with the number of employees you manage. But choosing the right devices may be a difficult task, unless you are an expert.

Let's go through a few points that will help you with choosing the right time attendance devices for your requirement.

1. What type of time attendance devices are you looking for?

a. Proximity Card Readers (RFID Devices)
b. Biometric Devices (Fingerprint, Retina scan devices)
c. Hand Punch Devices

A proximity card reader identifies a user when an RFID card registered against the user is flashed on the device. A fingerprint device identifies an employee by matching the fingerprint pattern with a database or registered fingerprints. A hand geometry reader identifies users by the shape and size of their hands.

2. Do you also require access control?
Time attendance devices can also work as
access control devices. In this case, the devices will control entry/exit to your company, thereby providing accurate data for tracking employees. In this case, you will need a device for each door that is used for entry/exit. So, the number of doors used for entry/exit is to be determined. Also, you may need only access control to certain area in your company, a server room, for example.

3. How many employees are expected to be punching at the same time?

If you have too many employees punching at the same time, you require a device that is fast in identifying. Some biometric devices may consume a few seconds for the identification process, which may result in a long queue if you have too many employees rushing in at the last minute.

4. Storage Capacity of the device.

Time attendance devices can store only a limited number of transactions. If you have lots of employees, you should choose a device with large transaction storage capacity.

For eg. If you have 1000 employees, and on an average your employees punch 5 times a day, there are 5000 transactions in a day. So if you choose a device with a storage capacity of 50000 transactions, you will have data for 10 recent days.

5. How many locations/branches do you have?

If you have different locations and you want to monitor employees from a centralized location, then you need devices that support TCP/IP communication. In this case, you also need a software system like 'Attend HRM' to collect all the attendance data into one centralized location for processing.