Use Incentive to Encourage Timesheet Compliance

For hourly employees, the paycheck is dependent upon punching the clock so, generally, they will comply. A timesheet or invoice is equally important for contractors. Without hours listed in detail, no paycheck will be forthcoming.

But for salaried project employees the situation is often a little different. They can expect a paycheck regardless of whether they’ve turned in a completed timesheet. And since many employees save the timesheet for the end of the week, come Friday, they resent the task all together.

They think it’s a hassle. They want to go home. They can barely remember which projects they worked on and for how long. They don’t, themselves, bill the customers so its value is pretty distant.

So how do you get your employees to complete their timesheets then?

A couple of ways come to mind.

1. Offer employees efficient timesheet software that makes it easy for them to enter time
2. Offer incentive

Three Ways To Enter Project Time on Timesheets

• Throughout the day employees can keep a Timesheets.com tab open on their browsers and simply start and stop timers as they start and stop various tasks.

• At the end of the day an employee can enter time for projects one by one using the manual entry form.

• At the end of the week employees can enter all of their time using our handy week view grid.

Timesheet Incentive

We try to take the hassle out of timesheets by offering these various options but, let’s face it, some employees will still rebel. This is where incentive comes in handy. Give employees a tangible reason to fill out their timesheets.

Some companies have already implemented the timesheet incentive idea, including JWT and Casa who offers free beer at the end of the week if all employee timesheets are completed. They documented this comical incentive with a video.

While beer may not have a place in every workplace, there is surely some kind of incentive that does. Some other ideas include:

• Coffee gift cards
• Leave early on Friday
• Work from home one day the following week
• Free lunch