Intro Hub Software Free Download
When picking a time tracking tool, it’s important to comprehend the various kinds of tools out there. Tools like Mavenlink, Wrike, and Zoho Projects all include robust time monitoring features for professional services companies. However, the time monitoring features in such tools are available only within bigger project management (PM) suites. As a result, you are paying much more money for things like file storage, in-app chat, progress reports, and shift management. On the opposite end of the spectrum, you’ll find pure play time monitoring tools like Hubstaff (which starts at $5 a month per user) and TSheets, our Editors’ Choice tool for time tracking. Hub Software Free Download
Characteristics and Usage
Hubstaff’s user interface (UI) was created with a appealing left-rail blue navigation bar that leaves plenty of room on the right-hand side of your display for data entry and analysis. When you log into the system, you’ll be taken to the main dashboard, which provides you an overview of how many hours your employees have worked this day and the number of hours they’ve worked over the past seven days. You’ll also find a list of each member, their latest jobs, and how busy they have been over the past week. This is a strong PM data visualization that allows you instantly differentiate between workhorses and do-nothings, and it immediately calls to focus projects that are becoming more than enough focus and jobs that are being disregarded.
There are two methods to add time in Hubstaff: You are able to build manual timesheets with previous hours worked, or you may use the stopwatch feature on Hubstaff’s native desktop program. With the timesheet attribute, you log your hours since you probably did with pen and paper during the analog era of time monitoring. Essentially, you work your change, you add the time to your timesheet, and you also sign off on it. This is a pretty standard method of tracking 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 formerly submitted timesheets, and they’re able to force users to require a reason to ensure they’re really adding hours they worked. Admins can also set up the system to remind users to begin tracking time if they haven’t clocked to the machine in a while.
The second, and most frustrating, way of monitoring moment in Hubstaff is using the stopwatch feature. In each solution we analyzed, this component is available within the boundaries of your internet browser–every alternative that’s, except for Hubstaff. With Hubstaff, you are expected to download an native desktop application that resides within a separate window. In it, you can choose your job, press Start, and your own timer will begin counting. When you’re done, your activity and your screenshots will be transmitted to the principal hub. The native app is going to take a picture at random periods of up to three shots per hour depending on how often the admin would like to spy on employees. Screenshots can be partially blurred not to capture sensitive information on every catch, but enough of this screen is left unsullied you’ll still get a feeling of if the screen is really on work-related or play-related content. This can be an annoyingly complex and convoluted means to manually monitor time, especially if you’re jumping from task to task throughout the day. Hubstaff must find a way to add the stopwatch and 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 is on the desktop program. The mobile apps let admins monitor movements via GPS monitoring. This provides you an summary of just how much movement was performed by your worker by capturing location information at different stages.
The Schedules tab lets you assign times and dates for workers to do the job. You can put a minimum number of hours to operate, a lunch break interval, and you’ll be able to allow it to be a recurring change. The program’s reporting software is terribly basic: You will get access to weekly, daily, project, and penis view reports as well as a”habit” report that allows you filter information from the above reports. In comparison to the PM options in this class, Hubstaff’s reporting is utterly embarrassing consequently, if your goal is to learn and evolve based on if and how your employees manage time, you’d 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 funding limits. Invoices are automatically calculated and created based on the time each employee worked, in addition to their related pay rate. You can set up automatic payroll through PayPal, which enables you to automate payments based on time monitored inside the application. Keep in mind: Consumers do not have to send time through for approval, so automatic payments will be made whether workers were right or wrong concerning the number of hours they worked. There’s not any reminder for managers to double-check every timesheet before automatic payments go out thus, if you are worried about making bogus payments, then you can set PayPal payments to guide. Hub Software Free Download
Cost And Options
Hubstaff was built to give you Big Brother-level oversight into when workers are working, what they are doing while they operate, and what you want to cover them as soon as the work is finished. The Basic $5-per-month program gives you access to easy time monitoring tools, an employee payment schedule manager, 24/7 support, and user preferences which can be handled in an employee-by-employee basis. Additionally, this program lets you keep tabs on whether your employees are working by letting you record screenshots while they function in addition to monitor mouse and keyboard action during changes. Of the five tools we tested, Hubstaff is the only instrument that offered this amount of insight into how workers are progressing. Although keyboard and screen tracking are helpful (albeit over-reaching) features for a shift monitor, Hubstaff’s implementation leaves much to be wanted (more on this later).
The $9-per-user-per-month Premium program includes everything you’ll find in the fundamental program, but you will also have access to Hubstaff’s application programming interface (API) to integrate the application with other third party applications. The Premium bundle also comes with a lightweight schedulingtool that provides administrators the power to assign shifts and assign tasks from inside the console. Premium clients can also use the application to make invoices and create PayPal payments mechanically. Clients that pay yearly will get two weeks 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 added monitoring features that are unavailable in competitive resources. TSheets supplies a basic free accounts, in addition to a $4-per-user-per-month accounts that costs a $16 base fee a month for groups who have fewer than 100 users, along with an $80 base fee per month for groups with more than 100 users. The base fee, which Hubstaff does not charge, makes TSheets marginally more costly than Hubstaff, even in Hubstaff’s Premium degree.
If you are more interested in these hulky PM solutions, then you will need to pony up a bit more cash. Mavenlink’s cheapest program that includes time tracking prices $39 per user per month. Zoho’s cheapest time monitoring plan is $25 a month for an infinite number of consumers (which is a fairly good deal if you want all of the extra PM attributes ). Wrike’s cheapest time tracking plan costs $24.80 per user per month.
What Should Be Added
Editor’s note: Since our first review of Hubstaff, the company has released a significant update in late 2018 that specifically addressed certain feature weaknesses or omissions, including adding a web timer, fleshing out reporting options, and adding action levels and monitor monitoring. We are going to be analyzing these features shortly and you will see the results in an upcoming update to this review.
Aside from its draconian screengrab and keystroke monitoring, Hubstaff doesn’t do a very good job allowing for deeper change supervision. By way of example, Hubstaff doesn’t allow advanced monitoring. If you operate a trucking company and you’re less concerned about how many hours each trucker drove than the distance driven, then there’s no way to handle this in Hubstaff. Users can add notes to a empty text field, but that information will not be blended into accounts. As a consequence, you can not use it to learn about who is functioning, how they are functioning, and what they’re producing (other than the amount of hours tracked). TSheets not only gives you this choice, it provides you the ability to create six extra customizable advanced monitoring fields. You might also put in a question for every single clock-out (i.e.,”Was there an incident? Yes. No.”) Along with the system forces the user to reply to the questions at the end of each change or they will not be able to clock out.
As hardcore as Hubstaff is about tracking work, the tool doesn’t allow for IP address restrictions, so your employees can say they’re working from the workplace but they could actually be working from a cruise boat in the Bahamas (unless they are using the mobile app to track time). This is a standard feature that’s available in almost every other instrument we tested. Hubstaff also doesn’t enable admins to require users to snap a photograph if they report to work. I suppose it is overkill to generate someone take a selfie before you get started recording their display and monitoring their keystrokes, but TSheets lets you place this as a requirement (which makes sense, especially if you’re monitoring tasks done out of a computer, like electronic, construction, or amusement work). The program also does not allow users clock in via a phone call, which is a component TSheets along with other service providers make readily available for workers who don’t have a smartphone.
Tracking Employee Work
We’ve touched on how a number of Hubstaff’s more Big Brother-like features factor into time tracking. But the platform also has many of the hallmarks of employee tracking tools. Hubstaff’s employee monitoring attributes include keystroke logging, URL and application tracking, GPS and place tracking, and activity screenshots.
Once you set your users and they download the timer program onto their server, the desktop app not only tracks time but will take screenshots randomly or at custom intervals, such as three screenshots each minute. This applies not only to the user’s most important display but any connected monitors too. Hubstaff doesn’t log keys but it does monitor the action provided through the mouse and computer keyboard, giving companies a calculation of how busy the worker is. This data all winds up around the Hubstaff dashboard in the Activity tab. This is where you can then pick an individual in the drop-down menu to see their screenshots connected with activity data.
When it comes to application and URL tracking, Hubstaff goes beyond just tracking time to learn what sites and apps a worker visited or opened and how long they had been there. The Reports module may subsequently run custom questions on vectors such as app usage mapped against time and action. Hubstaff integrates with project and job management tools like Asana and Trello to filter reports from particular tasks or projects to track productivity.
1 unique employee monitoring feature supplied is GPS location monitoring through Hubstaff’s mobile program. While the mobile app can’t take screenshots or catch mobile app and website activity, it lets you monitor and log location for workers working in the area. While the thickness of tracking surveillance and data features can not measure up to a grid application for example Teramind, our Editors’ Choice for employee monitoring, Hubstaff has a helpful choice of features for companies that want a bit more oversight. Hub Software Free Download
Summary
Hubstaff is a easy-to-administer, feature-rich, time tracking tool. If you’re diligent about monitoring employee behavior while on the clock, then there is no better program available than Hubstaff. You’ll have the ability to log screenshots, monitor keystroke volume, and route movements via GPS monitoring.
Regrettably, if you’re trying to find a platform which goes the extra mile to allow customization, irregular information entry, or even a more sophisticated reporting structure, then Hubstaff will not be right for you. Additionally, should you choose another system, your employees will thank you for not needing them to obtain a secondary app for tracking time–particularly when you consider that every other instrument we reviewed makes this potential within the confines of their online UI. Hub Software Free Download
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