Managing Time Cards

In this article:
Multiple User Access on Time Cards
Approve and Edit Time Cards
Nudging Employees to Complete Time Cards
Rejecting Time Cards
Sending Approved Time Cards to Payroll

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Patriot customers who use the Time & Attendance Software add-on can easily manage employee time cards in the software before sending approved time cards to payroll.

You can also give managers permission to approve time cards of direct reports. They will be able to approve, reject, or “nudge” employees right from their employee portal. To learn more, see our help articles, How to Assign Managers in Patriot and Manage Team Time Cards in the Employee Portal.

Multiple User Access on Time Cards

Multiple users can view the “Manage Time Card” page at the same time, however, only the first user can make changes or edits.

The page will be “read-only” for subsequent users and they will not be able to approve or make edits to the page. A banner will display the names of all users on the page.

example of viewing a page being edited by another simultaneous user

Although you can see that the page is being edited you will not be able to view “real-time” changes. When the user editing the page leaves, refresh your page to see any updates made and to edit.

Approve and Edit Time Cards

The “Manage Time Cards” page allows the employer to view a list of time cards grouped by pay period for each employee.

Go to Payroll > Time and Attendance Tasks > Manage Time Cards.

Filter Time Cards:

Select Pay Schedule: Choose the appropriate pay schedule if you have multiple schedules set up for your employees.
Choose Pay Period: The pay period defaults to the current one, but you can select past periods as needed.
Run the Report: Click “Run Report” to generate the list of time cards based on your selected criteria.
Show Inactive Employees: Use the “Show Inactives” toggle to display inactive employees if needed.

Editing time cards

Click an employee’s name to edit their time card.
- See help articles about editing employee time cards for Salary Employees and Hourly Employees for more info.
A time card remains “Active” until the payroll is finished. If payroll is not yet completed, you can still make edits and resubmit the time card. For more details, see Correcting Time Card Hours After Sending to Payroll.

Approving time cards

Approve timecards directly on the Manage Time Cards page. You can also approve directly on the employee time card, whichever you prefer.
Select time cards by checking the box next to the employee’s name. Use the header checkbox to select multiple employees at once.
- After a time card is employer-approved, the manager can still edit the time card, but the employee cannot.
Click the green checkmark to approve all selected time cards. Time cards must be approved before they can be sent to payroll.
Time cards must be employer-approved to send to payroll.
Managers can un-approve individual time cards by clicking on the time card and unchecking the “Approved” box. This will remove the manager’s approval, allowing further edits by the manager or employee.

Nudging Employees to Complete Time Cards

Select pending time cards, click the envelope icon, and customize or send a reminder email to employees.
You can customize a message or send the default reminder email.
Your employee must have the employee portal set up to use the nudge feature.

Rejecting Time Cards

Reject time cards directly from the Manage Time Cards page or within individual time cards.
Select the employee(s) whose time cards you want to reject, then click the “X” icon at the top of the column.
Customize the rejection message or use the default, then click “Reject Time Card” to notify the employee via email and their employee portal.

Example of time card rejection in Patriot Software.

Sending Approved Time Cards to Payroll

After you have approved the time cards, click the “Send To Payroll” button at the bottom of the page.

Send to Payroll: Once all time cards are approved, click the “Send To Payroll” button at the bottom of the page. Only employer-approved, unpaid time cards will be sent.
Status after sending: Even after approved time cards are sent to payroll, their status remains “unpaid” until the payroll is finished. See the full article Sending Approved Time Cards to Payroll.
View closed time cards in the Edit/View column, click “View” to view a time card. No edits can be made after a timecard has been paid.