Background How Does Hubstaff Pays
When picking a time tracking tool, it’s important to understand the many different types of tools available. Tools like Mavenlink, Wrike, and Zoho Projects all include robust time tracking features for professional services companies. However, the time monitoring features in such tools are available only as part of larger project management (PM) suites. Because of this, you’re paying much more money for things like file storage, in-app discussion, progress reports, and shift management. On the opposite end of the spectrum, you will discover pure play time tracking tools like Hubstaff (which starts at $5 a month per user) and TSheets, our Editors’ Choice tool for time tracking. How Does Hubstaff Pays
Attributes and Utilization
Hubstaff’s user interface (UI) is designed with a appealing left-rail blue navigation bar which leaves lots of room around the right-hand side of your screen for data entry and analysis. When you first log into the system, you will be taken to the main dashboard, which gives you an summary of how many hours your employees have worked this day and the number of hours they’ve worked over the previous seven days. You’ll also see a list of every member, their most recent jobs, and how busy they’ve been over the last week. This is a strong PM data visualization which allows you immediately differentiate between workhorses and do-nothings, and it instantly calls to attention projects which are getting more than enough attention and projects that are being disregarded.
There are two methods to add time in Hubstaff: You are able to construct manual timesheets with past hours worked, or you may use the stopwatch feature on Hubstaff’s native desktop program. Together with the timesheet attribute, you log in your hours since you probably did with pencil and paper through the analog age of time monitoring. Basically, if you work your change, you add time to your timesheet, and you also sign off on it. This is a fairly standard method of monitoring time. Unfortunately, because Hubstaff doesn’t allow you to add future time, you can not use the platform as a shift organizer. Administrators can let users manually edit previously submitted timesheets, and they can induce users to need a reason to guarantee they’re actually adding hours that they worked. Admins can also set up the system to remind users to start monitoring time should they haven’t clocked into the machine in a little while.
The second, and most bothersome, way of monitoring moment in Hubstaff is using the stopwatch feature. In every solution we analyzed, this component can be found within the confines of your web browser–every solution that is, except for Hubstaff. With Hubstaff, you are expected to download a native desktop application that resides within a separate window. In it, you can select your project, press Start, along with your own timer will begin counting. When you’re done, your action and your screenshots will be transmitted to the principal hub. The native program is going to take a picture at random periods of up to 3 shots per hour depending on how often the admin wants to spy on employees. Screenshots can be partly blurred to not record sensitive information on every grab, but a lot of the display is left unsullied you’ll still get a feeling of if the screen is on work-related or play-related content. This is an annoyingly complex and complicated way to manually monitor time, especially if you’re jumping from task to task throughout the day. Hubstaff must discover a way to add the stopwatch and also screengrab elements to the cloud-based architecture to simplify ease of use.
Tracking time in real time on Hubstaff’s Android and iOS apps is precisely the same as it’s on the desktop program. The mobile apps let admins monitor motions via GPS monitoring. This gives you an summary of how much motion was done by your employee by capturing location information at different stages.
The Schedules tab lets you assign dates and times for employees to do the job. You can put a minimum number of hours to operate, a lunch break duration, and you’ll be able to allow it to be a recurring change. The tool’s reporting software is terribly basic: You’ll receive access to weekly, daily, project, and penis view reports in addition to a”habit” report which allows you filter information from the above reports. In comparison to the PM options in this class, Hubstaff’s coverage is downright embarrassing so, if your goal is to understand and evolve based on when and how your employees handle time, you would be better off working with Zoho Projects, our Editors’ Choice for PM.
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Admins receive notifications when they have reached weekly staffing and budget limitations. Invoices are automatically calculated and made based on the time each worker worked, as well as his or her associated pay rate. It is possible to set up automatic payroll through PayPal, which lets you automate payments based on time monitored inside the application. Remember: Users do not have to send time for acceptance, therefore automatic payments will be made whether workers were wrong or right concerning the amount of hours that they worked. There is not any reminder for supervisors to double-check each timesheet before automatic payments go out so, if you are worried about making bogus payments, then you can set PayPal payments to manual. How Does Hubstaff Pays
Cost And Options
Hubstaff was constructed to provide you with Big Brother-level oversight into when employees are working, what they are doing while they operate, and what you want to pay them when the job is done. The Fundamental $5-per-month plan gives you access to easy time tracking tools, a worker payment schedule supervisor, 24/7 support, and user settings that can be handled in an employee-by-employee basis. Moreover, this program enables you to keep tabs on whether your employees are working by allowing you record screenshots while they work as well as monitor mouse and keyboard activity during shifts. Of the five tools we analyzed, Hubstaff is the only instrument that provided this amount of insight into the way that employees are progressing. Although keyboard and screen monitoring are useful (albeit over-reaching) attributes for a shift monitor, Hubstaff’s implementation leaves much to be desired (more about this later).
The 9-per-user-per-month Premium program includes all you’ll find in the Basic program, but you will also have access to Hubstaff’s application programming interface (API) to integrate the application with other third party software. The Premium package also has a lightweight schedulingtool that gives administrators the capability to assign shifts and delegate tasks from within the console. Premium clients may also use the tool to make invoices and create PayPal payments automatically. Customers that pay annually will get two months free (for both cost tiers).
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Compared to TSheets, its closest competition in our roundup, Hubstaff is fairly priced, especially given the extra monitoring features that are unavailable in competitive tools. TSheets offers a basic free account, as well as a $4-per-user-per-month account that charges a $16 base fee a month for groups who have fewer than 100 users, and an $80 base fee per month for groups with more than a hundred users. The base fee, which Hubstaff doesn’t charge, makes TSheets slightly more expensive than Hubstaff, even in Hubstaff’s Premium level.
If you’re more interested in these hulky PM alternatives, then you’ll want to pony up a bit more money. Mavenlink’s cheapest plan that includes time monitoring prices $39 per user per month. Zoho’s cheapest time tracking plan is $25 per month for an unlimited number of consumers (that is a fairly good deal if you want all of the extra PM attributes ). Wrike’s cheapest time monitoring plan prices $24.80 per user per month.
What Should Be Added
Editor’s note: Since our original review of Hubstaff, the company has released a major update in late 2018 that specifically addressed specific feature flaws or omissions, such as adding a web timer, fleshing out coverage choices, and adding action levels and monitor monitoring. We’ll be testing these features shortly and you will see the results in an upcoming update to this review.
Besides its draconian screengrab and keystroke monitoring, Hubstaff doesn’t do an excellent job allowing for deeper shift supervision. For instance, Hubstaff does not allow advanced monitoring. If you operate a trucking company and you are less concerned about the number of hours each trucker drove than the distance driven, then there’s no way to manage that in Hubstaff. Users can add notes to an empty text area, but that information won’t be mixed into accounts. This means you can’t use it to learn about who is functioning, how they’re working, and what they are generating (other than the amount of hours monitored ). TSheets not only gives you this option, it gives you the ability to create six extra customizable advanced tracking fields. You might also add a question for every single clock-out (i.e.,”Was there an incident? Yes. No.”) And the system forces the user to respond to the questions at the close of every change or they won’t have the ability to clock out.
As hardcore as Hubstaff is all about monitoring work, the application doesn’t allow for IP address restrictions, so your workers can say they’re working from the office but they could actually be operating from a cruise ship in the Bahamas (unless they’re using the mobile app to track time). This is a standard feature that’s available in almost every other tool we analyzed. Hubstaff also doesn’t enable admins to require users to snap a photograph when they report to work. I suppose it is overkill to generate somebody take a selfie right before you get started recording their screen and monitoring their keystrokes, but TSheets lets you place this as a requirement (which makes sense, particularly if you’re monitoring tasks done outside of a computer, like retail, building, or amusement work). The software also does not allow users clock in via a phone call, which is a component TSheets along with other service providers make available for employees who do not have a smartphone.
Monitoring Employee Work
We have touched on how a number of Hubstaff’s more Big Brother-like features factor into time tracking. However, the platform also offers a lot of the hallmarks of worker tracking tools. Hubstaff’s employee monitoring features include keystroke logging, URL and application tracking, GPS and place tracking, and action screenshots.
Once you set your users and they download the timer app onto their machine, the desktop program not only monitors time but will take screenshots randomly or in custom intervals, such as three screenshots each minute. This applies not only to the user’s main display but any connected monitors too. Hubstaff does not log keys but it will track the action provided via the mouse and keyboard, providing employers a calculation of how active the worker is. This data all winds up around the Hubstaff dashboard in the Activity tab. This is where you can then pick a user from the drop-down menu to see their screenshots correlated with activity data.
If it comes to application and URL tracking, Hubstaff goes beyond just tracking time to learn what websites and programs an employee opened or visited and how long they were there. The Reports module can subsequently run custom questions on vectors such as program usage mapped against time and action. Hubstaff integrates with job and job management tools such as Asana and Trello to filter reports by particular projects or tasks to track productivity.
One unique employee monitoring feature supplied is GPS location monitoring through Hubstaff’s mobile program. While the mobile app can’t take screenshots or capture mobile app and site activity, it lets you track and log place for workers working in the area. While the thickness of monitoring data and surveillance features can not step up to a grid application such as Teramind, our Editors’ Choice for worker monitoring, Hubstaff includes a useful choice of features for companies that want a bit more oversight. How Does Hubstaff Pays
Summary
Hubstaff is an easy-to-administer, feature-rich, time tracking tool. If you are diligent about monitoring employee behavior while on the clockthen there is no better software available than Hubstaff. You’ll have the ability to log screenshots, track keystroke volume, and route movements via GPS monitoring.
Regrettably, if you’re looking for a platform that goes the excess mile to enable customization, irregular data entry, or even a more advanced reporting structure, then Hubstaff won’t be right for you. In addition, in case you choose a different program, your employees will thank you for not needing them to download a secondary app for monitoring time–particularly when you consider that every other tool we examined makes this possible within the confines of their online UI. How Does Hubstaff Pays
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