CA2669645A1 - Time, attendance, and pay recorder - Google Patents

Abstract

Enable processing of employee check-in and check out through bio-metric readers and perform payroll processing functions including but not limited to wage calculations, vacation pay, deductions, and automatic payments for employee benefits such as insurance, stock-buys, or gov't bond purchases, etc.
Part of the payroll function will include the withdrawal of funds from employer's account at financial institution and deposited to employees account. Several function keys will allow for multiple employers to use the same Time, Attendance, and Pay recorder at the same work-site.
These secondary employers are expected to be temporary service companies or sub contractors at the same work-site that supply non-employees to the main employer. These secondary employers will have payroll information for these non-employees and pay them on an hourly, daily, weekly, or bi-weekly basis.
Paycheque stub information that lists hours worked, hourly wage, and deductions will be printed out for each individual employee and non-employee each time they are paid. For non-employees a function that prints invoices from secondary employers, which lists the employee's names, dates and hours worked, type of work performed, location of work-site, and employer. A copy of the invoice can be given to the clients of the secondary employer at the work-site location. Information can be sent from the Time, Attendance, and Pay recorder to the main employer's HR system for employees and non-employees.
Information about non-employees can be sent to the secondary employers own HR systems to process their payroll. Non--employees can be registered electronically from authorized secondary employers enabling the Time, Attendance, and Pay recorder to process non-employees at the work-site requiring no manual registration onsite. Registration information sent to the Time, Attendance, and Pay recorder would include employee number, bio-metric information, type of work performed, hourly wage, work-site location, payroll information and employer.

Description

SPECIFICATIONS

This invention relates to time and attendance recorders for employers who use these recorders at their workplace. This recorder keeps track of their employees work hours and totals them for the pay period.
These time and attendance recorders often store these records internally or send them electronically to an employer's database. Information stored includes but not limited to employee name, employee ID, hourly wage, type of work performed, employer names, contact, biometrics, source deductions, and calculations used in processing payrolls for each employee. It is common for these time and attendance recorders to allow employees to punch in at the beginning of the day then during the work day punch in and punch out for breaks and lunches. Several different types use magnetic card readers or biometric readers to allow employees to identify themselves. This prevents buddy punching and saves employers money by not paying employees that are late to work. The ending process would have the employee punch out at the end of the work day, total time from first punch in to the final punch out minus the breaks and lunches would be saved and then totaled for the pay period by the recorder for processing.
The time and attendance recorder if it had this capability would then send the information to a database where the payroll process would continue. Time and attendance recorders of this type are limited in their capabilities and won't continue the payroll process to its completion by depositing wages electronically to an employee's account at their financial institution.

Time and attendance can contain software that will calculate an employees wages and deductions then send it off to a payroll processor or in-house payroll staff but this adds to the costs of the employers payroll costs. Some 83% of the payroll costs is incurred even before the check is issued or deposited electronically into an employee's account. Time and attendance recorders in use on the market which use a pre-paid card to load employee payrolls onto have only 4% of the market.
These pre-paid cards are issued by one bank and require all employees of the employer to use the same bank. This forces their employees to add another financial institution to their economic plans, often employees must transfer money, at a cost to them, to their chosen financial institution. Without these transfers employees only have access to their wages at ATM's and P.O.S. they can't go to a local branch of these banks and withdraw funds. If these pre-paid cards are lost the employee must wait for a replacement card to be issued to access their pay, if the bank isn't local then time till a replacement could take days. Their process includes all payroll information be sent to one central outsourced HR
system then payroll is issued from an account administered by them in the employers name. This extra step keeps employers and employees paying fees every pay period associated with processing payrolls to Payroll processing companies that issue the debit cards. 87% of payrolls are directly deposited into employee's accounts but are administered by outsourced payroll companies that charge fees for each payroll processed. No other time and attendance recorder issues paycheque stubs listing wages, deductions, & yearly totals since pay isn't given out directly at current time and attendance recorders.
ATM type time and attendance recorders located at the work-site are cost prohibited since armoured personnel must reload the machines at an increased cost. Security of employees who leave the work-site with 2wks cash at the pay period end may also pose a problem for employers. Non-employees at the work-site who work directly for secondary employers are able to use time and attendance recorders at the work-site.
Secondary employers have many work-sites to send employees to with existing time and attendance recorders in use by the main employer. Authorized employees of the main employer do registration of the non-employee to use the time and attendance recorder at the work-site. This usually takes the authorized employee away from regular duties and is done with regularity increasing the cost of using a non-employee at the work-site. Information regarding hours worked and position worked is transferred from main employers database to the secondary employer and pay is given through the secondary employer's payroll processing at greater cost and longer times. A problem that arises from this process is theft, reports have shown that it is in-house HR staff that register ghost employees in company to steal money. If information is not transferred from the main employer to the secondary one through omission or error then the secondary employer doesn't pay the non-employee. That fact that there was an error or omission isn't known until pay is expected by then it is too late. It is too expensive to process only one employee's pay and it is policy to wait until the next pay period ends.
Employees that work for employers that have their payrolls outsourced may need to have access to funds sooner than the two weeks it takes for employers to issue payrolls. To save costs these employers may only issue payroll in two-week intervals so this leaves employees with an option, Payday loan companies. The interest associated with these types of loans has been the subject of legislation proposed by provincial governments and the subject of many articles done by the press. Also another option is overdraft on the individual employee's account at their financial institution. This cost must be paid by the employee and is the financial institutions answer to payday loans so there isn't another low-cost option for employers and their employees. Non-employees need to supply main employers with an invoice with information such as name of employee, hours worked, date worked, type of work performed, location, and employer.
These are then added to the main employers accounts payable department to be paid according to the secondary employer's policies. This invoice is the way non-employees are able to work for main employers and must carry an invoice to the work-site manually. Canadian businesses that process payrolls are by law prohibited from using the type of Time, Attendance, and Pay recorders that deposit directly into an employee's own personnel bank account. These payroll processing companies are prohibited from using the claimed invention since it will violate Canadian Business Corporations Act -Part Ten - Directors and Officers -Duty of Care of Directors and Officers- 122 (1) Every director and officer of a corporation in exercising their powers and discharging their duties shall (a) act honestly and in good faith with a view to the best interests of the corporation; and (b) exercise the care, diligence and skill that a reasonably prudent person would exercise in comparable circumstances -Duty to Comply (2) Every director and officer of a corporation shall comply with this Act, the regulations, articles, by-laws and any unanimous shareholder agreement. IF they implemented the use of these machines they would effectively remove themselves from the payroll process.

Authorized employees are the only ones that can register new users of the Time, Attendance, and Pay recorder claimed with this invention. Through the use of biometric scanners and passwords the registration process can only be accessed by these employees and eliminate the chance of employees not authorized from registering ghost employees or from receiving additional funds electronically. To prevent theft and fraud e-mail can be sent to other employees so they can click on links whenever a new user is registered to use the Time, Attendance, and Pay recorder. The feature is a security back-up to be sent to anyone specified by the main employer or secondary employer preventing theft which can occur through registering of ghost employees on the Time, Attendance, and Pay recorder. To prevent other abuses, employers may program restrictions on the amount of money transferred to employees and frequency of pay deposited. It may also limit the number of accounts that money can be deposited into to the same employees that are employed at that particular work-site.
Employers who prepare their payrolls in-house can now include employees in more steps of the payroll process. With the claimed Time, Attendance, and Pay recorder invention the employee provides the employer with time checked in, time checked out, verifies payroll information, administers the transfer of funds into their account, and receives a paycheque stub. These steps in processing of payrolls all happens while the employee is'off the clock', reducing cost of payroll processing. Features that allow multiple employers to use a single Time, Attendance, and Pay recorder at the work-site will be the inclusion of five (5) function keys onto the keypad. Each function key will be programmed to represent each employer at the work-site. By pressing the function key representing their employer the claimed Time, Attendance, and Pay recorder invention is notified that it is performing the payroll process for a different employer. A separate payroll account is then accessed to submit payroll information to and withdraw funds from. This allows information to go directly to the secondary employer and not rely on the main employer to transfer information to the secondary employer on behalf of the non-employee. If errors are made they can be corrected with assistance from authorized employees and the payroll process is taken care of immediately. The claimed Time, Attendance, and Pay recorder has pay period options ranging from every day, weekly, or bi-weekly giving the employer some flexibility without increasing the cost of providing payrolls to their employees. A feature incorporated by the claimed invention includes a magnetic card reader, which will read ATM/Debit cards; this along with PIN allows wages to be deposited into employee's own accounts. Any ongoing expense comes from the employer's financial institution in administrating the direct deposits into their employees' accounts. The claimed invention has a one-time acquisition cost for the employer and uses little maintenance costs for power and Internet hook-up costs.
To register new users the claimed time, attendance, and pay recorder can receive registrations electronically, with each registration having to be validated by a second employee. The non-employee can skip the registration process at the work-site and can check in immediately for work, saving time for both employee and employer. Time, Attendance, and Pay recorder claimed in this invention is the only recorder capable of printing out and supplying an invoice. A non-employee doesn't need to get an invoice from the secondary employer prior to starting work and need only request one from the recorder.
Upon completion of their work assignments, non-employers can have their registrations removed from the time, attendance, and pay recorder remotely as well.

The form of the list and the description is illustrated by the following:
In drawings which illustrate embodiments of the invention, 1. FIG. 1. Is the front view of the claimed Time, Attendance, and Pay recorder. It has a digital display [a], singular finger print biometrics scanner [b], Five function keypad [c], Magnetic card reader [d], and printer portal [e].

2. FIG. 2. Is the schematic of the process that the Time, Attendance, and Pay recorder claimed in the invention carries on in the completion of the payroll process.
1. [A] Employee working for the Main employer at the work-site presses F1 since this key is programmed to represent the main employer. This and all subsequent employees working for the main employer press the F 1 key. Employee then enters employee ID and places forger (palm) print on biometric reader to verify ID. Once verified employee is clocked in and starts workday. Time, Attendance, and Pay recorder clocks in and clocks out employee during breaks and lunches automatically during the day. At the end of the day the employee presses F1, enters their employee ID, and places their forger (palm) on biometric reader. Time, Attendance, and Pay recorder displays hours worked and wages to be deposited into account at financial institution. Employee verifies that calculations are correct and presses `Okay'. Time, Attendance, and Pay recorder withdraws amount from Employers payroll account. After transfer the recorder prints out a paycheque stub to employee. Calculations listing hours worked and wages paid with deductions is electronically sent to main employers HR system. When deposits are made the employee can access their funds through their local branch, ATM, or P.O.S.

2. [B] Non-employee working for a Secondary employer at the work-site presses F2 since this key represents (programmed) the secondary employer. This and all subsequent non-employees working for the secondary employer press the F2 key. Non-employee then enters employee ID and places forger (palm) print on biometric reader to verify ID. Once verified the non-employee is clocked in and starts the workday. Time, Attendance, and Pay recorder clocks in and clocks out non-employee during breaks and lunches automatically during the day. At the end of the day the non-employee presses F2, enters their employee ID, and places their finger (palm) on biometric reader. Time, Attendance, and Pay recorder displays hours worked and wages to be deposited into account at financial institution. Non-employee verifies that calculations are correct and presses `Okay'. Time, Attendance, and Pay recorder withdraws amount from Secondary Employers payroll account. After transfer the recorder prints out a paycheque stub to employee listing all deductions. Calculations listing, employees name, employee ID, employer, hours worked, wages paid with deductions is electronically sent to main employers HR system and Secondary employer's HR system. If not electronically sent the non-employee opts to have invoice printed out which prints out name, secondary employer, hours, position worked, date, and location.
Invoice is given to main employer for signature and accounts payable with copies going to secondary employer and account receivable. When deposits are made the non-employee can access their funds through their local branch, ATM, or P.O.S.

3. [C] Non-employee working for a third employer at the work-site presses F3 since this key represents (programmed) the third employer. This and all subsequent non-employees working for the third employer press the F3 key. Non-employee then enters employee ID and places finger (palm) print on biometric reader to verify ID. Once verified the non-employee is clocked in and starts the workday. Time, Attendance, and Pay recorder clocks in and clocks out non-employee during breaks and lunches automatically during the day. At the end of the day the non-employee presses F3, enters their employee ID, and places their finger (palm) on biometric reader. Time, Attendance, and Pay recorder displays hours worked and wages to be deposited into account at financial institution. Non-employee verifies that calculations are correct and presses `Okay'.
Time, Attendance, and Pay recorder withdraw amount from Employers payroll account. After transfer the recorder prints out a paycheque stub to non-employee listing all deductions.
Calculations listing, employees name, employee ID, employer, hours worked, wages paid with deductions is electronically sent to main employers HR system and third employer's HR system. If not electronically sent the non-employee opts to have invoice printed out which prints out name, third employer, hours, position worked, date, and location. Invoice is given to main employer for signature and accounts payable with copies going to third employer and accounts receivable.
When deposits are made the non-employee can access their funds through their local branch, ATM, or P.O.S.

4. [D] Non-employee working for a fourth employer at the work-site presses F4 since this key represents (programmed) the fourth employer. This and all subsequent non-employees working for the fourth employer press the F4 key. Non-employee then enters employee ID
and places finger (palm) print on biometric reader to verify ID. Once verified the non-employee is clocked in and starts the workday. Time, Attendance, and Pay recorder clocks in and clocks out non-employee during breaks and lunches automatically during the day. At the end of the day the non-employee presses F4, enters their employee ID, and places their finger (palm) on biometric reader.
Time, Attendance, and Pay recorder displays hours worked and wages to be deposited into account at financial institution. Non-employee verifies that calculations are correct and presses `Okay'.
Time, Attendance, and Pay recorder withdraw amount from Employers payroll account. After transfer the recorder prints out a paycheque stub to non-employee listing all deductions.
Calculations listing employee's name, employee ID, employer, hours worked, wages paid with deductions is electronically sent to main employers HR system and Fourth employer's HR system.
If not electronically sent the non-employee opts to have invoice printed out which prints out name, fourth employer, hours, position worked, date, and location. Invoice is given to main employer for signature and accounts payable with copies going to fourth employer and accounts receivable.
When deposits are made the non-employee can access their funds through their local branch, ATM, or P.O.S.

5. [E] Non-employee working for a fifth employer at the work-site presses F5 since this key represents (programmed) the fifth employer. This and all subsequent non-employees working for the fourth employer press the F5 key. Non-employee then enters employee ID and places finger (palm) print on biometric reader to verify ID. Once verified the non-employee is clocked in and starts the work day. Time, Attendance, and Pay recorder clocks in and clocks out non-employee during breaks and lunches automatically during the day. At the end of the day the non-employee presses F5, enters their employee ID, and places their finger (palm) on biometric reader. Time, Attendance, and Pay recorder displays hours worked and wages to be deposited into account at financial institution. Non-employee verifies that calculations are correct and presses `Okay'.
Time, Attendance, and Pay recorder withdraw amount from Employers payroll account. After transfer the recorder prints out a paycheque stub to non-employee listing all deductions.
Calculations listing employee's name, employee ID, employer, hours worked, wages paid with deductions is electronically sent to main employers HR system and Fifth employer's HR system.
If not electronically sent the non-employee opts to have invoice printed out which prints out name, fifth employer, hours, position worked, date, and location. Invoice is given to main employer for signature and accounts payable with copies going to fifth employer and accounts receivable.
When deposits are made the non-employee can access their funds through their local branch, ATM, or P.O.S.

Registration of a new employee takes place when an authorized employee enters their employee number and verifies through the biometric system. A control panel is then displayed digitally with the authorized employee prompted to use the menu to choose which function is to be used. These functions may included but be limited to correction of hours, cancellation of wage deposit, registration of new user, deletion of user, and diagnostic program run. When the authorized employee selects `register new user' the screen prompts authorized employee to `enter user's id number'. Employee number is entered issued from either the main employee or secondary employee.
The new user is then prompted to place finger or palm onto biometrics reader. The time, attendance, and pay recorder then records prints and assigns number with them. Information such as hourly wage, vacation pay, location of work-site, and if necessary financial institution is entered by the authorized employee on behalf of the new user. An alert would then be sent through the e-mail system to another authorized employee alerting them that a new user is registered. It would ask that this authorized employee click on link to complete the registration of the new user and allow the new user to use the time, attendance, and pay recorder. This would conclude the registration of new users of the time, attendance, and pay recorder by authorized employees.

Claims (22)

1 A manual submission of paperwork between the employer and employee that verifies identification and signatures authorizing the employee to receive pay electronically via the Time, Attendance, and Pay recorder. This paperwork will note the account number of the employee and the name of the financial institution the account is located. This will prevent loss of company funds to fraud or errors by stopping companies from depositing funds into unauthorized accounts.

2. Time, Attendance, and Pay recorder as defined in claim 1, will have a digital display that will display a control panel that can be accessed locally or remotely and then programmed by authorized employees of the company(s) that is using the Time, Attendance, and Pay recorder. There will be an internal memory capable of storing information electronically including but not limited to employer name, employee's name, employee's ID, employee's biometric information, employer's financial institution information, employee's financial institution, employee wages, vacation pay, deductions, positions, and location of work-site.

3. Time, Attendance, and Pay recorder as defined in claim 1 & 2, will have up to five accompanying function keys on the Time, Attendance, and Pay recorder. The First (1st) function key will represent the main employer the main employer at the work-site and will be used by their employees. The Second (2nd) function key will represent the secondary employer at the work-site that supplies non-employees to the main employer. The Third (3rd) function key will represent the third employer at the work-site that supplies non-employees to the main employer. The Fourth (4th) function key will represent the fourth employer at the work-site that supplies non-employees to the main employer. The Fifth (5th) function key will represent the fifth employer at the work-site that supplies non-employees to the main employer.

4. Time, Attendance, and Pay recorder as defined in claim 3, will allow each authorized employee of the temporary services or subcontractors supplying non-employees at the work-site to semi-permanently program their companies financial institution information under one of the function keys. This would allow the non-employees at the work-site to use the Time, Attendance, and Pay recorder to withdraw wages from their employer's account and deposit it directly to their own personal financial institution.

5. Time, Attendance, and Pay recorder as defined in claim 4, will allow each authorized employee of the secondary employers at the work-site to program non-employee's information.
This includes but not limited to non-employee name, non-employee ID, hourly wage, overtime pay, deductions, type of job/position, biometric information (fingerprint & palmprint), frequency of pay, and name of temporary service or subcontractor. Special instructions can be programmed for employee regarding the amount of pay, frequency of pay, vacation pay, limitations to hours worked in a day, week, or month.

6. Time, Attendance, and Pay recorder as defined in claim 5, will have a keypad that will allow employers and employees to enter alpha-numeric information into the Time, Attendance, and Pay recorder. This information will include employee's id, passwords, PIN, and navigate menus on the digital display.

7. Time, Attendance, and Pay recorder as defined in claim 5, will be able to record employee's biometric information through use of scanners that are able to read and record this information. Biometric information can be sent electronically by secondary employers to the Time, Attendance, and Pay recorder allowing non-employees to bypass registration at the work-site location.

8. Time, Attendance, and Pay recorder as defined in claim 5, will have magnetic card readers so that employee and non-employee cards can be read by the Time, Attendance, and Pay recorder. These magnetic card readers will allow Employees to check in and check out using their employer issued ID
cards. Employee's own bank issued cards will also be able to be read by the Time, Attendant, and Pay recorder that will deposit wages into the employee's own personal financial institution account. An infinite number of financial institutions used by individual employees are able to accept deposits via the Time, Attendance, and Pay recorder.

9. Time, Attendance, and Pay recorder as defined in claim 8, will be able to print Invoices daily, weekly, or bi-weekly that will display the secondary employers own company information such as but not limited to address, phone number, representative names, and invoice numbers.
Also on the invoices will be the non-employees name, hours worked, date worked, and address of work-site. These invoices maybe printed out by non-employees and given to the main employer at the work-site as part of the accounts payable function of the main employer.

10. Time, Attendance, and Pay recorder as defined in claim 9, can send electronically non-employees work period information to a secondary employer's database determined by which function key is pressed and what secondary employer is programmed under that function key. The frequency of information sent will vary but will include amount of time worked, type of work done, hourly wage, work-site location, and name of main employer at the work-site. The information can simultaneously be sent to the main employers human resources database.

11. Time, Attendance, and Pay recorder as defined in claim 10, will send electronically employee or non-employee registration information to the main and/or secondary employer databases each time there is registration under their respective function keys. This will prevent registration of ghost employees and prevent theft of company funds due to fraud. A link must be clicked on by an authorized employee to verify and validate that employee's (non-employee's) registration to use the Time, Attendance, and Pay recorder.

12. Time, Attendance, and Pay recorder as defined in claim 11, has the option of using a combination of tools to check in employees (non-employees) at the beginning of the workday.
Keypad which can be used to enter an employee's ID, a magnetic card scan which can read an employees Id card, and a biometric reader/scanner to read the finger/palm prints of the employee. A
digital display will report information to the employee (non-employee) as to the accuracy of the biometric prints, time checked in, date, employee number, and company working for.

13. Time, Attendance, and Pay recorder as defined in claim 12, will be programmed to use facilities existing relays that ring bells, whistles, or lights. These will be used to alert employees (non-employees) of start-up, breaks, lunches, and end of day. Emergency signals can also be programmed to ring when alerts are sent to the Time, Attendance, and Pay recorder.

14. Time, Attendance, and Pay recorder as defined in claim 12 & 13, has the option of using a corresponding combination of tools to check out employees (non-employees) at the end of the workday. Main employers and Secondary employers can program the Time, Attendance, and Pay recorder to automatically check out an employee (non-employee). This avoids the clock running for employees who haven't checked out after working for the day. Once checked out at the end of the day the digital display will report the employee (non-employee) information. This digital display includes employee number, time out, date, total hours worked, & company working for.

15. Time, Attendance, and Pay recorder as defined in claim 14, will show the employee (non-employee) via digital display the total number of hours worked, hourly wage, vacation pay, deductions, &
expenses displaying these amounts to the employee (non-employee).

16. Time, Attendance, and Pay recorder as defined in claim 15, Information pre-programmed for the specific employee (non-employee) will result in one of two things happening.
The first one would be if the frequency of pay (daily, weekly, bi-weekly) allows the employee to have their wages deposited into their account or two the information is saved until the end of the current pay period. If eligible to be paid the Time, Attendance, and Pay recorder will then use the information pre-programmed information to calculate the wages to be deposited to the employee (non-employee).

17. Time, Attendance, and Pay recorder as defined in claim 16, will ask the employee (non-employee) via digital display whether the information displayed is correct. The information displayed needs to be verified by the employee (non-employee) and then they are prompted to `Okay' or `Cancel' the amounts to be deposited into their financial institutions account.

18. Time, Attendance, and Pay recorder as defined in claim 17, will process an `Okay' response by the employee (non-employee) by asking them to swipe their ATM/Debit card and enter their PIN. The amount is withdrawn from the main (secondary) employer's account and made available immediately or the next business day depending on their financial institutions policy.

19. Time, Attendance, and Pay recorder as defined in claim 17 & 18, will process a`Cancel' response by the employee (non-employee) by saving the information to an internal memory.
Or optionally sent to a network computer for review by an authorized employee of the company to make adjustments to the employee's (non-employee) information. Any disputes are then resolved and the appropriate information is re-entered by an authorized employee using a password and employee id along with fingerprint or palm print. The correct information is displayed then the employee is allowed to continue the process at step 18 with an `Okay' response.

20. Time, Attendance, and Pay recorder as defined in claims 17,18, & 19 will complete the process by providing the employee (non-employee) with a printout with information such as hours worked, hourly wage, vacation pay, deductions, and totals. The print out will include all information required by government regulations to qualify as a paycheque stub.

21. Time, Attendance, and Pay recorder as defined in claims 9 & 15, non-employees will be able to print out invoices from secondary employers to give to the main employer at the work-site. The secondary employer's invoice will include information such as but not limited to employer's name, employer's contact information, policies, non-employee's name, hours worked, date, and location of work-site. If required by secondary employer's policies the main employer may sign it for use by either their own HR department/accounts payable and/or the secondary employer's HR
department/accounts receivable.

22. Time, Attendance, and Pay recorder as defined in claim 18, 19,20, & 21, will be sent information electronically to the main employer's database (secondary employer database as needed). This includes employee name (non-employee), employee number, employer, type of work, hours worked, date worked, location worked. When paid it will include paycheque stub information such as hours worked, hourly wage, vacation pay, deductions, expenses, yearly totals and amount deposited into employee account.