Attendance Management

Attendance Management in JobNext records how many hours each employee worked on each job site each day. This data is critical because it feeds directly into payroll: without finalized attendance, payroll cannot be run. The module handles uploading raw attendance data, validating it against business rules, and freezing (finalizing) it so that payroll can calculate salaries, overtime, and leave deductions accurately.

Navigate to HR > Attendance from the left sidebar to access the Attendance module.

Attendance Workflow Overview

The end-to-end attendance workflow follows these stages:

Past Months Dashboard

The main Attendance page shows the Past Months grid, which gives an at-a-glance view of attendance status for each month across all job sites.

Action Buttons

Below the Past Months grid, three action buttons are available:

Punch Manager Button

At the top of the page next to the "Past Months" heading, the Punch Manager button navigates to the biometric/mobile punch management interface (see Punch Manager section below).

Attendance Details (Drill-Down)

Clicking the magnifier icon on any month row opens the Attendance Details page for that month. This page has two tabs:

Tab 1: Attendance By Jobs

Groups attendance by job (project/site). The grid shows:

Attendance Records Dialog

Clicking the blue arrow button on a job row opens a dialog titled Attendance Details with the following information:

The dialog includes:

• An Export button to download the records to Excel
• Filter dropdowns for Job Code, Type, and Leave Type
• A search box for quick filtering

Tab 2: Attendance By Staff

Groups attendance by employee, showing a monthly summary per person. This is the view to check before finalization.

Action buttons at the bottom of this tab:

• Delete Attendance (red) — deletes selected employees' unfinalized attendance
• Reverse Finalised (yellow) — reverses finalization for selected employees (admin only)

Page-Level Actions

At the top of the Attendance Details page, two global action buttons are available:

• Reverse Finalised (cyan button with lock icon) — reverses the finalization for all finalized records in this month. Use with caution.
• Delete Unfinalised (red button with trash icon) — deletes all unfinalized attendance records for this month.

Upload 30 Day Attendance

The Upload 30 Day Attendance feature is the primary method for getting attendance data into JobNext. It accepts an Excel file containing day-wise attendance records for employees across jobs.

Step-by-Step: Upload Attendance

1. Download the template: Click the Upload File Structure button (cyan) at the top of the page. This downloads an Excel template with the required column headers.
2. Prepare your data: Fill in the Excel template with attendance data. The key columns are:

   Column	Description	Required
   Month	Month number (1–12)	Yes
   Year	4-digit year (e.g., 2025)	Yes
   Emp_No	Employee number (must exist in Staff Directory)	Yes
   Supervisor_Emp_No	Supervisor's employee number	No
   Job_Code	Job code the employee worked on	Yes
   ATT_Type	Attendance type: NR (Normal), OT, HOT, LV, LOP, etc.	Yes
   Day 1–31	Hours worked on each day of the month (columns for day 1 through 31)	Yes

3. Upload the file: Drag and drop the Excel file onto the upload area (or click to browse). Click Submit.
4. Review the summary: The info banner updates to show how many Staff and Lines were found in the upload.
5. Review uploaded data: The Uploaded Data grid below shows all imported records. Use the filter dropdowns (Month, Year, Emp_No, Supervisor_Emp_No, Job_Code, ATT_Type) to inspect specific subsets.
6. Process the upload: Click the Process Upload button (green, at the bottom) to validate and commit the uploaded data into the attendance tables. The system runs validation rules during this step.

Upload Page Controls

Punch Manager

The Punch Manager handles raw biometric or mobile-based punch-in/punch-out records. Punches are typically uploaded from external attendance devices (biometric scanners, mobile apps) and then converted into either attendance records or timesheet entries.

Filters

• Month (required) — select the calendar month
• Year (required) — select the year
• Business Unit (optional) — filter punches by business unit (e.g., Residential Construction, Commercial Construction, Facilities Management, etc.)
• Click Search to load punch data

KPI Cards

Eight summary cards show the punch status at a glance:

Action Buttons

The punch data grid below the KPI cards shows individual punch records with a Status filter dropdown to view specific statuses (e.g., Pending, Processed, Error).

Finalize Attendance

Finalization is the process of locking attendance records for a given month so they can be used by payroll. Once finalized, the records cannot be edited (except through admin reversal).

Step-by-Step: Finalize Attendance

1. Navigate to HR > Attendance and click Finalize Attendance.
2. Select the Month and Year from the dropdowns.
3. Click Search to load the data for that period.
4. The page displays four key sections:
   • Finalization Runs — history of previous finalization runs for this month (if any)
   • Info Banner — shows how many staff are ready to be finalized (e.g., "4 Staff ready to be finalised")
   • Unfinalized Attendance — grid of employees with their attendance summary
   • Validation Tabs — three tabs highlighting issues that need resolution
5. Review the Unfinalized Attendance grid:

   Column	Description
   EmpNo	Employee number
   Employee Name	Full name
   Normal Hrs	Total normal working hours for the month
   Overtime	Total overtime hours
   Leave Days	Number of leave days recorded

6. Check the Validation Tabs (see below) and resolve any issues.
7. Once all issues are resolved, click Finalize to lock the attendance.

Validation Tabs

Before finalization, the system runs automatic validation checks. Results are displayed across three tabs:

What Happens During Finalization

When you finalize attendance, the system:

1. Validates all uploaded attendance against business rules (leave conflicts, job allocations, attendance types).
2. Calculates hours: splits each employee's total hours into Normal Hours, Regular Overtime, and Holiday Overtime based on configured rules (normal hours per day, max OT, rounding rules, etc.).
3. Identifies holidays within the period based on the company holiday calendar.
4. Freezes records into the finalized attendance tables, making them immutable.
5. Auto-generates leave requests if attendance includes leave days that don't have matching leave requests (depending on configuration).
6. Marks LOP (Loss of Pay) for days where the employee has no attendance and no approved leave.

Attendance Types

JobNext uses the following attendance type codes throughout the system:

Common Workflows

Workflow 1: Monthly Attendance from Excel

1. At month-end, site supervisors prepare an Excel file with each employee's daily hours per job.
2. HR navigates to HR > Attendance > Upload 30 Day Attendance.
3. Downloads the template via Upload File Structure, fills it in, and uploads.
4. Clicks Submit, reviews the uploaded data, then clicks Process Upload.
5. Reviews the Past Months dashboard to verify "Uploaded" counts match expectations.
6. Clicks into the month to review via Attendance By Staff tab.
7. Navigates to Finalize Attendance, selects the month/year, reviews validation tabs, and finalizes.
8. Proceeds to Payroll to run salary calculations.

Workflow 2: Biometric Punches to Attendance

1. Biometric devices record employee in/out punches daily.
2. HR uploads the punch data via Punch Manager > Upload Punches.
3. Reviews the KPI cards — checks "Emp–Job–Days needing fix" for unpaired punches.
4. Clicks Fix All Punches to auto-resolve pairing issues.
5. Clicks Copy To Attendance to convert paired punches into attendance records.
6. Proceeds to finalization as in Workflow 1 above.

Workflow 3: Timesheet to Attendance Conversion

1. Employees or supervisors fill in Timesheets (job-wise hours per day).
2. From the Timesheet module, use Convert To Attendance to generate attendance records.
3. The conversion splits hours into Normal, OT, and Holiday OT based on configured thresholds.
4. Proceed to finalization as above.

Best Practices

• Finalize attendance before running payroll — payroll cannot be processed without finalized attendance for the month.
• Review validation tabs thoroughly before finalizing. Mismatched leaves, missing attendance, and no-attendance employees will affect payroll calculations.
• Use the By Staff tab to verify each employee's total hours, overtime, and leave days match expectations.
• Backup data before processing uploads, especially for large datasets.
• Finalize by the payroll cut-off date to ensure timely salary processing.
• Assign employees to correct jobs in the upload file — job-wise attendance drives project cost allocation in Finance.
• Handle exceptions early — if an employee worked on multiple jobs in a single month, each job's hours must be recorded as a separate row in the upload file.

Frequently Asked Questions

Q: Can I edit attendance after finalization?

Standard users cannot. An administrator can use Reverse Finalised from the Attendance Details page to unlock records, but this should only be done before payroll is processed for that month.

Q: What is the difference between "Upload 30 Day Attendance" and "Punch Manager"?

Upload 30 Day Attendance imports pre-processed daily hours (you know how many hours each employee worked each day). Punch Manager handles raw in/out timestamps from biometric devices and converts them to attendance or timesheet records.

Q: Can the same employee have attendance on multiple jobs in one day?

Yes. Each row in the upload represents one employee on one job with one attendance type. An employee can have multiple rows for the same day if they worked on different jobs.

Q: What happens to employees with no attendance when I finalize?

They appear in the "No Attendance" validation tab. If you finalize without resolving this, those days will be treated as LOP (Loss of Pay) and salary will be deducted accordingly.

Q: How does attendance relate to leave?

When attendance is finalized, the system checks for approved leave requests. If leave is recorded in attendance but no leave request exists, JobNext can auto-generate a leave request (depending on configuration). Conversely, if a leave request exists but no leave attendance is recorded, this appears in the "Mismatched Leaves" tab.