Timesheets Galore!

The next timesheet application I found was http://www.timesheets.com.  It is quite easy to sign up to  and you get a decent amount of time to evaluate for free.  Other than the fact you can sign up and rent webcams and finger print log ins – big brother is really watching you and I don’t mean Davina McCall (the host of Big Brother for non-brits) – this is quite a good solid piece of kit and keeps a good eye on your time.

Quick Setup?

When you first log in, you get sent to the settings wizard.  This is great and a very overlooked issue when using new software, especially software with tonnes of features.  On the first screen you can choose to have all features enabled or not – why you’d pay for all this and not enbale all sections or even 1 of them is strange.  So leaving them all enabled then.  The company tab is also a good way to get the first user to set up the system correctly.  It’s true the users would never fill in the correct details for their own company if it wasn’t handed to them on a plate.  And the feature of a comic strip inside the software is for me genius, but for standard users that only want to enter time and piss off to the pub, is it really worth the computing power?

The next section along is Hourly, I think I need to get a degree from Mensa to understand it properly, but I think it basically allows you to lock down the system so users can either do everything they want or just enter time and if they make mistakes tough!  But I go back to the reason am researching all these timesheet apps, is for freelance or small offices.  Would you really require the person sitting behind you in the small office to approve timesheets?  Or is this another system that works perfectly in medium to large companies, trying to be sold to smaller companies that don’t know any better…?  I will jump the next two options – project and expense as they look like standard configurations again and go on to what I think is the amazing features of this system, if not a little scary :)   You can lock this timesheet app (I don’t know what name to use anymore btw) to finger prints, IP addresses, and times that it can be used.  WOW.  The first and last options are a bit odd and not sure about.  But the IP address one is actually quite interesting.  “I want to limit my staff from entering time on certain computers…” which means if you have staff that travel about and who would get a new IP address each time they turned on their wifi out in the world, wouldn’t be able to enter time, if this was enabled.  So why make it a web based system if you want to lock it down to certain machines?  Ok web based but running internally, fine, I completely understand.  Although I have to say I have run into companies in the past that have wanted to stop their staff from doing so much with software, that I bet there is a massive market out there for that – I personally think a company that doesn’t trust their staff has serious internal issues and needs to sort that out before buying lots of software…

Ease of Use

So through all that, and it was pretty painless if a lot to take in on the first step.  I thought the best way to look at this software is again to create a basic user and log in as them.  It is real easy to create new users, and you can have new staff members up and running instantly.   Logging in as this new user, I need to click a few options before I can start entering time.  What could be nice is the timesheet entry being the default screen the user sees – well thats what the software is all about.  That aside, and if you choose it, there are 2 ways to enter time.  A user can have 1 or both options.  Again am not sure why you’d have that as a possible option however am sure its been called for else it wouldn’t be in there?

Entering time

Entering time in the hourly screen is quite easy, and not much can go wrong here.  The dropdowns for the time are pretty complicated though and would be better to see actual drop down boxes.  You can also type you time in but its not easy to see this option if you don’t click around and start typing.  All in all pretty good.

The second option is a project based timesheet entry.  You have 2 options here, manual and timer.  Both of which are real simple to use and this shows that the guys here have had experience of building timesheets.  However the timer option can be dangerous and lead to mistakes being made – you can start the timer and come back to it later, if you remember that is.

Conclusions?

Playing with timesheets.com properly, and taking away the security features that scare me, this is not a bad timesheet app.  In fact I would give it 4 out of 5 stars if I had a rating system.  You may actually find timesheets.com through one of there many affiliates schemes (but it wouldn’t be called timesheets.com).  I personally believe the company needs to kill off this scheme, and go with a standard banner on someone else website style of affiliate scheme, which would make their brand more prominent – its all about brand identity on the web is it not?

The main downside is for the single user – and this is a tiny downside.  The number of clicks you need to make to before you have to enter time is a lot.  If this was setup in a factory am sure people would get a bit annoyed when all they want to do is start and finish their shifts?  There maybe quicker options, but the online documentation didn’t seem to work in my browser.

Something else that let it down, I am a picky bastard on this one, is the look and feel.  It’s very 90s feel.  Come on!  People want to use something that looks nice…Apple Mac users hands up if you would be Apple Mac users if it didn’t look nice?

So great app for a medium to large office in my opinion, but again for the freelancer or small 5 man office, maybe a bit of overkill.  But over all good work http://www.timesheets.com :)