Attendance and Shifts: From Paper Sheets to a Trusted Log

The attendance record is the input payroll reads every deduction and every overtime hour from, so if the employee, the manager and the accountant do not all trust it, every month-end turns into an argument. The Labor Law sets the frame clearly: 8 hours of actual work a day or 48 hours a week, and overtime is paid at the hourly wage plus 50% of the basic wage. In part two we built the employee file and contract; this third part builds the attendance and shift record on top of it: how to define a shift, which check-in method fits you, why lateness and overtime go to a manager instead of being deducted silently, and an exercise comparing the attendance sheet with deductions for three employees.

Shifts first: define the working day before you record it

Recording check-in time means nothing if nobody has written down when the employee is supposed to arrive. The first step is not a fingerprint device but a defined shift schedule: every shift has a start, an end and a break, and every employee has a shift linked to their file. The limits shifts must respect are set out in the Labor Law published by the Bureau of Experts:

• Article 98: a worker may not actually work more than 8 hours a day if the employer uses the daily standard, or 48 hours a week if it uses the weekly standard. In Ramadan, for Muslims, this drops to 6 hours a day or 36 hours a week.
• Article 101, as amended: a worker may not work more than 5 consecutive hours without a break for rest, prayer and meals of at least half an hour, and may not stay at the workplace more than 12 hours a day.
• Article 102: rest, prayer and meal breaks are not counted as actual working hours.
• Article 104: Friday is the weekly rest day, fully paid and at least 24 consecutive hours; it may be swapped for another day for some workers after notifying the competent labor office.

In practice, the system has to know which standard the business uses, daily or weekly, because the definition of an overtime hour depends on it, and it has to know when Ramadan starts so it applies the Ramadan schedule automatically instead of someone editing sheets by hand.

Check-in methods: every option has a price

There is no check-in method that suits every business, only one that suits the nature of the work. The main trade-offs:

• Fingerprint or face recognition device: suits a fixed site everyone enters through, and stops one employee clocking in for a colleague. It does not serve field teams, and it needs maintenance and an integration so punches flow into the system automatically, not by exporting a file every week.
• Mobile with location: suits field sales, sites and projects; a check-in is accepted only inside a defined geographic zone around the site. The price is that location is personal data, so it should be read only at the moment of check-in, not all day, and the employee should know that.
• A fixed tablet at the entrance (kiosk): a middle path for small branches or warehouses, cheaper to equip, but it needs a photo or a personal code so it does not become a group signature.
• Paper sheet or spreadsheet: it works, but it records what people remember rather than what happened, it is re-keyed by hand before payroll, and every re-keying is a chance for error.

Many businesses need more than one method at once: fingerprint at head office and mobile for the field. What matters is that all of them feed one record under the same rules, not that each method keeps its own sheet.

Lateness, absence and overtime: a flag for the manager, not a silent deduction

What destroys trust in an attendance record fastest is the silent automatic deduction: an employee is fifteen minutes late because of traffic or an errand their manager sent them on, and finds money missing from their salary without anyone asking. The safer design is for the system to detect the exception and raise it to the line manager to decide: justified, charged to leave, or handled under the internal work regulations. The law itself supports that caution:

• Article 92: no amount may be deducted from a worker's wage for private claims without their written consent, except in listed cases, including fines imposed for violations they commit.
• Article 93: in all cases, total deductions may not exceed half of the wage due, except in cases established by the labor dispute settlement body.
• Article 62: under the Ministry of Human Resources Labor Relations page, a worker who shows up on time, or shows readiness to work, and is prevented only for a reason attributable to the employer is entitled to wages for that period.

Overtime follows Article 107 as amended, in force from 20/8/1446H: overtime pay equal to the hourly wage plus 50% of the basic wage, and with the worker's consent the employer may grant paid compensatory leave days instead of overtime pay. All hours worked on holidays and Eids count as overtime, which we covered in the National Day holiday and its effect on payroll. Even in the exceptional cases of Article 106, such as the annual stocktake or unusual work pressure, actual working hours may not exceed 10 hours a day or 60 hours a week. So overtime in the system should be a request approved before the work or right after it, not a number discovered at month-end.

Corrections with a recorded reason: how the log stays trusted

The fingerprint reader will sometimes fail, the phone will lose signal, and people will forget. A trusted log is not one that never needs correcting; it is one that records every correction:

• No edit without a reason: every change to an attendance punch carries a written reason, the name of who requested it, who approved it, and when.
• The original is never erased: the original punch stays visible next to the corrected one, so a reviewer sees what actually happened and what was decided about it.
• Employees see their own record: when employees see their attendance and lateness as it happens, they object the same day, not after payroll is paid.
• Lock before payroll: the month's record is locked on a set date before payroll, and anything corrected afterwards is carried to the next month with a clear entry.

This also matters in a dispute: a log that shows every punch, every correction and its reason is far stronger than a sheet amended in pen. Why payroll must close on time is covered in a wage 30 days late now opens an enforcement file in Najiz.

The Origami view

We are a technology company that builds custom systems and integrations, and when we build an attendance system we start from the shift schedule and the business's rules before choosing a check-in device, then connect every method actually in use, fingerprint, mobile and kiosk, to one record that reads from the employee file.

We design exceptions as requests that reach the right manager instead of automatic deductions, with a correction log that is never erased, because if employees do not trust the record, people go back to paper however polished the system looks. That is how we build our services around how a business actually works.

Exercise: compare the attendance sheet with deductions for 3 employees

• Pick 3 employees: one at head office, one in the field or on an evening shift, and one who worked overtime last month.
• Gather for each: last month's attendance sheet, and the deductions and overtime lines in payroll for the same month.
• Match every deduction to its cause: is there recorded lateness or absence behind each one, and who approved it?
• Check the overtime: was it paid at the hourly wage plus 50% of basic, and is there a request or approval behind it?
• Look for corrections: how many punches were edited by hand, and do you know why?

Every deduction without a recorded reason, and every overtime hour without an approval, is an item in your attendance digitization plan.

Conclusion and next part

A trusted attendance record starts with a defined shift, brings every check-in method into one source, raises exceptions to the manager instead of deducting them silently, and keeps every correction with its reason. In the next part we move to leave and employee requests: how they move through a clear approval path instead of WhatsApp messages, and how the balance updates itself.

Sources

• Bureau of Experts at the Council of Ministers: Labor Law — text of Articles 92, 93, 98, 101, 102, 104, 106 and 107 with their amendments.
• Ministry of Human Resources and Social Development: Labor Relations — amended text of Article 62.

This article explains the mechanism and is not legal advice; confirm your case with the Ministry or a labor lawyer.