Attendance with GPS and a passkey: office or remote, without a biometric machine

What a phone check-in has to prove

An attendance record is only useful if three questions have clear answers:

• Who checked in? A shared login or a forwarded link should not be able to check in for someone else.
• Where were they? Office, a client site or home, decided by the system rather than typed by the person.
• When? The check-in and check-out times, with a rule for the days somebody forgets to check out.

Office or remote: the geofence

Pin the office on a map and set a radius, typically 100 to 250 metres depending on how accurate phones are in that building. A check-in inside the radius is marked office; outside it is marked remote. Two offices mean two pins.

Keep the location decision automatic and the override explicit. If somebody is at a client site, let them check in as remote and add a note; do not let them pick "office" by hand.

The passkey: proof it is the right person

A passkey uses the phone's own fingerprint or face unlock to sign the check-in. It cannot be forwarded, and it does not send biometric data anywhere; the phone only confirms the person is present. For teams that have had buddy-punching problems this is the single change that fixes it, and it costs nothing beyond a modern phone.

The forgotten check-out

Somebody will forget to check out. The record should not keep counting hours into the next day. A sensible rule: send a reminder in the evening, and if there is still no check-out by midnight, close the day with a "no check-out" flag so the manager can confirm the actual time. Hours for that day are then entered by the manager, not guessed by the system.

Making the report useful

Attendance becomes valuable when it sits next to the timesheet and the leave record. A report per person per month with days present (office and remote), days on approved leave, holidays, and days with no record, lets payroll apply the organisation's rules without a second spreadsheet.

How CrewClock does it

Attendance in CrewClock is a per-organisation feature switch. The office pin and radius are set in Settings; staff check in and out from the phone with one tap, the entry is marked office or remote from the location, and a passkey confirmation can be required. Managers see the team by day and the monthly report alongside timesheets and leave. A forgotten check-out stops counting at the end of the day and shows as "No check-out" for the manager to correct.