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August 20, 2014
System Downtime Complete
The scheduled downtime for 1:30AM PDT on 20 August 2014 is complete. We've put in place some optimizations that should see some serious speed improvements for Online Time Clock MTS users with large employee lists. We've seen improvements in the the speed of refreshing the employee list on the time clock of the order of 95%. This should make for a better experience as well as removing considerable load to our servers. Thanks for your patience in this time.
Posted by markn at 6:30 PM
Downtime 20 August 2014 01:30AM PDT
The Online Time Clock MTS systems will be down for a period of about 30 minutes at 1:30AM PDT on 20 August (tomorrow). This is to address some issues caused by an update of some of the software on our servers. Sadly the impact of the updates was out of our control and has been causing excessive CPU usage and slow response times for the last few days. After spending most of the last day testing and tweaking we've got a fix in place and will be rolling it out early tomorrow morning. Thanks (as always) for your patience during this time.
Posted by markn at 10:42 AM
August 17, 2014
New Online Time Clock MTS Release
We're pleased to say that a major new release of the Online Time Clock MTS systems was rolled out today. We've been working on this release for a few months, a bit longer than we'd hoped, but we wanted to make sure everything was working smoothly before we unleashed it on the unsuspecting public! Here's a list of the changes made to the system:
1. Automatic Employee Breaks
Automatic employee breaks have been added. This is configured on the Time Clock Options->Payroll Settings screen globally, or for particular locations on the Manage Locations screen. When enabled automatic breaks are applied when a time punch pair exceeds a given time (which is configurable). The amount of break deducted is also configurable. Time for breaks is simply deducted from the elapsed time for that time punch, it isn't added as a separate time punch. Note that break settings can be global to a time clock account, or be configured on a location by location basis (like most other payroll settings). Additionally, each employee can be excluded from the automatic break system on that employee's Payroll Information screen by checking the No Automatic Breaks checkbox.
Example: employee breaks are setup to deduct 10 minutes when the punch time exceeds 4 hours. So, a time punch from 9:00AM to 2:00PM will have an elapsed time of 4 hours and 50 minutes.
2. Working Hours Report
The Working Hours Report has been added, and is accessible from the Payroll Reports screen. The report breaks down each day in the reporting period into the type of hours, such as normal, overtime 1, overtime 2, and weekly overtime.
3. Employee Note Report Available for Employees
The Employee Note Report is now available for employees to view from the Show Timecard button on the timecard screen. It is accessed by checking the Show Notes checkbox when the employee selects the timecard dates. Of course for this to be available your must have your system to allow employees to view their timecards by checking the Employees Can View Timecard checkbox on the Display and Report Settings screen.
4. Actual vs Rounded Report
The Actual versus Rounded Report has been added and is accessible from the Payroll Reports screen. The report simply compares the actual time punches versus the rounded value. For this report to actually be useful report rounded must actual be turned on. This can done via the Display and Report Settings screen.
5. Manage Employee Screen Enhancement
Added employee name and location filter boxes to the employee list on the Manage Employees screen. This allow for much easier location of employees in a long list as well as being able to quickly and easily filter employees by location when logged in as the time clock account admin.
6. Employee Message Screen Enhancements
Time spent re-working the employee message popup screen that is shown to employees when they punch in or out. Messages that require reading by employees are flagged with an icon and messages that have been read by employees are displayed with a different icon. In addition, if the employees tries to close the message window and there are still unread messages a prompt will be displayed to the employee suggesting they return and read the messages.
7. Auto Refresh Added to Time Clock Screen
We've added an auto update feature to the employee time clock screen. We've set this at two minutes. It will update the status of employees, add or remove employees from the time clock list if they are created/delete by the time clock admin, and display any new messages that are added by the time clock admin. In practice this means that if an employee clocks out from one time clock station that clock out will be reflected on our other time clock stations within the next two minutes.
8. Added Email Alerts
We've added a major new feature we're calling "Email Alerts". Basically this system allows you to define a set of rules, that when triggered results in an email being sent to your chosen email addresses. So, for example, you could have an email set when a given employees punches in or out, or punches in after a certain time, or punches out and their weekly hours worked exceeds a given time limit.
9. Various Bug Fixes
- There was a typo on the Add/Edit Login screen suggesting the - (hyphen) character could be used in login names. But it cannot. Typo fixed.
- Spent a fair bit of time tracking down and fixing up issues that were giving script errors in IE10/11. None of them actually impacted on the way system worked but it's nice that IE isn't throwing errors any longer.
- Fixed a bug on the Add/Edit Location screen that allowed selection of invalid dates for the First Day of Fiscal Year setting.
- A fix was made to the add/edit shifts screen that allowed the end time of a shift to be set before the start time.
- Some list columns on various manage data screens were not sorting correctly. These have now all been fixed. Screens fixed included the manage shifts screen, the manage jobs screen and the manage messages screen.
Posted by markn at 4:59 PM
August 16, 2014
System Downtime Sunday 17 August 2014
At 2PM PST this Sunday 17 August the Online Time Clock MTS systems will be taken offline for a period of 4 to 5 hours. This is so we can roll out the latest version of our web based time clock. We thank you in advance for your patience during this period.
Posted by markn at 6:11 AM
August 4, 2014
System Maintenance Complete
The Online Time Clock MTS systems are now available again after being down for about the last 90 minutes. Thanks for your patience during this time.
Posted by markn at 10:11 AM
August 2, 2014
System Downtime 3 August 2014
The Online Time Clock MTS systems will be going down on Sunday 3 August at 5PM West Cost USA time for a period of about 2 hours. This is for for some maintenance and operating system upgrades. Apologies for any inconvenience experienced during this period.
Posted by markn at 11:47 AM
