Time Clock & Other Methods of Tracking Productivity

I am interested in knowing how shops feel about time clocks and tracking technician hours. Some say that with the management programs we have today, a time clock is not has necessary as it once was. What are your thoughts?

Hey Joe,

How are you currently tracking technician productivity? Do you just divide book time hours by clocked in hours? When it is slow and you technicians are doing other tasks not fixing a car/auto repair related (cleaning the shop, etc.), do you add this time to productivity hours?

Hey Joe,

How are you currently tracking technician productivity? Do you just divide book time hours by clocked in hours? When it is slow and you technicians are doing other tasks not fixing a car/auto repair related (cleaning the shop, etc.), do you add this time to productivity hours?

We track hours through our Mitchell Management system. We do use book time, but not always. For menu priced jobs, which we use much more now than years ago, we calculated the average time for a particular service or repair and have assigned menu fixed labor times for those jobs.

Each tech gets a productivity/efficiency report each week.

For slow times, that's a different story. If a tech is working on the company truck, we track productivity. If a tech is working on servicing the air compressor or other piece of equipment, that time is deducted from his potential productive time. We use a log sheet where the manager and tech signs off for those non-productive hours. If the tech is still on the clock, but he is repairing the parts washer for example, he will get paid for the time, but it does not affect his productivity hour tracking. So the tech is never abused and his/her hours are accurately tracked. This is the way we have done it for many, many years. It’s simple and the techs like it.