Time tracking on site, keeping track of leave, early warning notices, managing subcontractors, keeping projects within budget and everything in between. For the last couple of months, we’ve been digging into the time & attendance, project & workforce management struggles that construction and field service teams face daily. As we made our way through each segment, we knew we wanted to cap things off with a bang. We couldn't end Tricks of the Trade without speaking to the unsung heroes of every payroll period. The payroll admins. Office managers. The ones in charge of getting everyone paid on time. If there’s one role that sees the real fallout when time tracking goes wrong, it’s the payroll department.

More often than not payroll admins are the last to receive field data, yet the most impacted by its accuracy. This is the final instalment in our series, and we’re going straight to the core of the problem: the recurring challenges payroll admins are faced with week after week.

😕 “I Dread Payroll Every Week”

The timesheets come in late, they are incomplete and illegible. Each week, it's a race against the clock to get the numbers right all the while chasing down employees for their hours and piecing together missing job details. It’s a scramble every single time and the process from start to finish is anxiety inducing. Late pay, incorrect hours, missing breaks - all lands on your desk and you're left trying to explain and correct errors that can be avoided with a tighter process in place.

✅ Why teams use TimeKeeper for this very reason

Mobile clock-in/clock-out with GPS and job logging - timesheets fill themselves as work happens and not days later. With automated reminders, you’re not chasing employees but rather holding them accountable. With the correct workflow configured, all hours are visible and approved before they hit your desk. Clear, complete and accurate timesheets arrive on time and ready for payroll.

😕 “It's just me”

We know that more often than not, the employee handling payroll is also juggling a whole stack of other responsibilities - HR, admin, accounts, following up with subcontractors - you name it. It's a lot to keep on top of. While spinning all of those plates, payroll is the one thing thing that has to be correct. It's a huge responsibility that comes with risk, stress and plenty of room for things to fall through the cracks. People rely on their pay arriving on time and it being spot on. If something’s off, it falls on your shoulders.

✅ Why payroll departments turn to TimeKeeper

TimeKeeper is designed to take the stress out of time tracking and managing jobs. It automatically captures hours, breaks, job numbers, and more. Just as importantly, it reduces the overall responsibility sitting with one person by introducing structure, visibility, and automation. With better visibility, automated reminders, and structured approval workflows, the load is shared and you're not managing it all alone.

😕 "I'm doing the same work twice"

The hours have been collected, timesheets reviewed, everything double-checked. But despite all that, the same data still ends up being copied and pasted from one system to another - into spreadsheets, then into payroll software. It’s repetitive, tedious and the likelihood of errors is super high. All it takes is one wrong number or one missed decimal and suddenly payroll has to be re-run, mistakes need explaining, adjustments have to be made and so on...

✅ TimeKeeper removes the need for double-handling altogether

With a one-click export capability to systems like BrightPay, Xero, Sage and QuickBooks, approved timesheets can flow directly into payroll. The entire process is faster, smoother, and far less stressful. Hours are saved each week, and the risk of small mistakes snowballing into big problems reduces significantly. For BrightPay Cloud users, a direct integration between TimeKeeper and BrightPay will launch in summer 2025 and will allow users to capture employee hours and feed them directly into payroll.

😕 "Subcontractor hours are proving difficult to manage"

Subcontractors each have their own way of logging time. Some send spreadsheets, others use paper timesheets, a few text their hours via WhatsApp, and some don’t send anything until an invoice comes through. It's extremely difficult to have a pulse on who worked when and where. It turns into a slow, manual task of cross-checking invoices against job records or timesheets, trying to verify hours that may or may not be accurate. It takes a huge amount of time and leaves far too much room for errors.

✅ TimeKeeper 🤝 Seamless Subcontractor Time Tracking

Subcontractors can clock in and out via the app, just like internal staff. Their hours are tracked separately but stored centrally, so it’s easy to see what was worked, when, and on which job. When a job is complete, subcontractors can be archived with a single click, keeping records tidy, and making it easy to reactivate them if they return down the line. If you'd like to read more about how we support subcontractor time tracking, check out Part 5 of Tricks of the Trade.

😕 “Every Dispute Comes to Me”

"I didn’t get paid enough. I worked more than that. There’s no way I took a break that long."

It’s the end of the week, and the same familiar messages start rolling in. Without a clear record of who worked when, where, and for how long, it turns into a game of back-and-forth. Piecing together timesheets, checking calendars, and scanning through emails. It’s time-consuming and frustrating.

✅ No second guessing just facts

With TimeKeeper, every hour worked can be GPS-tagged and time-stamped. This creates a clear, verifiable record of when someone clocked in/out and exactly where they were. A complete audit trail logs all approvals, edits, and changes along the way, so any timesheet adjustments are fully traceable. When questions or disputes arise, the information needed is available instantly. With TimeKeeper, payroll disputes are resolved with proof.

Payroll teams, we appreciate you 👏🏻

Of all the moving parts in construction and field services, payroll is often overlooked. The pressure to get it right falls heavily on employees who are often juggling multiple roles and working with incomplete or inaccurate timesheets.

In this blog, we wanted to pay homage to the people who keep the payroll show on the road - often quietly, behind the scenes, and under a lot of pressure. From chasing timesheets and job details to resolving disputes and juggling other responsibilities, it’s a tough gig that doesn’t always get the credit it deserves. TimeKeeper is not just for tracking time, but also for supporting the people who depend on it. Our goal is to make your job easier, take the stress out of payroll, and give you the tools to manage it all with confidence.

To every payroll admin, office manager, and behind-the-scenes hero: we see the work you do, and we’re here to help make it smoother, faster, and far less stressful.

Tricks of the Trade, Signing Off

When we hit the ground running with the Tricks of the Trade series, our goal was to lay a solid foundation for solving the everyday challenges faced by construction and field service businesses. Over the past few months, we’ve put together a toolkit you can rely on.

We started with the basics - time tracking on site - because without accurate hours, everything else risks collapsing. From there, we tackled how to manage leave across widespread teams, ensuring no one falls through the cracks. We covered Early Warning Notices, helping you to stay ahead of disputes before they spiral. Then we turned our attention to the bottom line, with real-world advice on keeping costs vs. budget on track. We didn’t stop there. We dove into managing subcontractors - because different crews shouldn’t mean different systems. Finally, we wrapped with what is arguably the most pressure-filled task of all: payroll. No matter how well the work gets done, when payroll isn’t handled right, it creates problems for everyone involved.

Through it all, our message has been clear: we understand the daily grind. Early mornings, tight deadlines, and the constant balancing act between on-site work and office tasks. Every post in this series was created to support the people who keep projects moving forward - be it out in the field or handling things behind the scenes.

As we pack up our tools on this series, just know Tricks of the Trade might be done, but TimeKeeper is still on site, ready to support you every step of the way with everything time & attendance.