Punches record when work starts and ends for working-time records. They create a draft that the employee reviews and confirms.
During setup, decide who can clock in, what information is requested and how location or forgotten clock-outs are handled.
Configure the punch-clock settings
Open Settings → Punch clock → Punch-clock settings.
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Punch clock usage determines the role of clocking in time entry. Working time can be entered manually in every mode.
- Off hides punching entirely, and the other fields are hidden.
- Optional: punching is available alongside the other ways of recording.
- Primary: punching is the expected method, but nothing is required. A hand-entered day is an ordinary day.
- Required: a hand-entered working day needs a justification. The employee cannot confirm the day until one of its entries carries a Note, and the justification is visible to the approver in the day’s details. No justification is required for a day created from punches.
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Default punch entry type.
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What the clock asks for – five rows: work type, target, billable, note and clock-out reason. Each is Not asked, Asked or Required. More questions add more steps for the employee. If all are Not asked, clocking takes one tap.
- Target is a project or cost centre. When required, a target must be given; clocking in to a task counts.
- Note is carried onto the entries the punch creates.
- Clock-out reason ends the day. When it is not asked, the default (end of day) applies.
- A shared punch terminal does not ask for a note or for billability. If they are required and the organisation has terminals, the page warns you.
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Location capture: Not stored / Work site / Geofence (at site or not) / Coordinates. If you choose the work site or geofence, you need punch points – see Work sites below.
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When location is in use, Location required (punching is blocked if no location can be obtained) and Information text for the employee (fi/sv/en) appear. The text is shown to the employee before their first punch; if it is empty, a default text is used. Location retention (days) sets how long location data is kept before deletion. An empty field keeps it as long as the working-time records.
Location is personal data. Using it requires a defined purpose, informing staff and co-operation procedures. The geofence check stores only whether the employee is at the work site. Storing coordinates is systematic processing of location data: carry out a data protection impact assessment before enabling it, and use a work-site or geofence check if precise coordinates are not needed.
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Employees may enter the time of a forgotten clock-out lets employees enter their actual finishing time afterwards. Also set how many hours back they may enter a time. Supervisors can see that the time was added later.
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Ask about a forgotten clock-out (h) sets how long a punch may remain open before the app shows a reminder. Set it to 0 to disable the reminder. The reminder does not end the punch session.
Punches create an editable draft that the employee reviews, corrects if needed and confirms. The original punches remain in the event history alongside the day.
Add sites
Settings → Punch clock → Work sites. A work site is a punch point.
| Field | What it does |
|---|---|
| Name (fi/sv/en) | The name the employee sees in their own language. |
| Address | Finds the site’s location from an address when the organisation has address search. The location can also be picked on the map or pasted as coordinates. |
| Latitude, Longitude | The site’s coordinates. |
| Radius (metres) | The permitted distance from the site. Usually 50–500. |
| Linked project | Punches are assigned to the project automatically. |
| QR code | Can be printed as a label. |
Configure the punch reasons
Settings → Punch clock → Punch reasons. Each reason has exactly one effect: Day complete, Break (break type), Absence (day type) or Entry type. Reasons are only asked once the clock-out reason in step 3 has been set to asked or required.
- The list is split in two: Clock-out and Clock-in. A reason offered on both appears in both.
- A break reason is linked to a break type, and whether the break is paid follows the break type. If the organisation has no break types, the break reason is set as paid or unpaid.
- Until return: the days between the clock-out and the clock-in are recorded as absence automatically. Punch day only records the absence to the end of the punch day.
- A clock-in reason explains past days nobody recorded (for example Back from leave).
- Order the reasons with the arrows. The top reason comes first in the picker and is the terminal’s default clock-out reason.
Set up a punch terminal
A punch terminal is a shared Android tablet or wall terminal with an NFC or card reader. Employees punch with a tag – a card or key fob – without signing in, and the terminal also works offline.
- Open Settings → Punch clock → Punch terminals and choose Add punch terminal. Give a name, a site and what the terminal asks.
- Saving shows the pairing code once. Install the Kelomo punch terminal app on the device and enter the code in the app before it expires.
- Link tags to people (below) and set PINs where needed. A PIN is a second check for the tag: a PIN alone cannot be used to punch.
The terminal’s state shows in the list: Working, Attention (a pairing code is waiting to be entered, or punches are queued), Not working (no contact for more than two hours) or Not set (the terminal is not paired). New pairing code unpairs the terminal until the new code is entered.
Link a tag to a person
A punch tag is a card or key fob the employee presents to the punch terminal. A tag always belongs to one person and can be linked in three ways. Once linked, it works on every punch terminal in the organisation.
At the terminal. The supervisor opens the terminal’s admin mode with their own tag, selects the person and presents the new tag. This also works when the terminal is offline. Linking at the terminal requires the supervisor’s or administrator’s PIN, so set theirs first on the punch terminals page. For everyone else a PIN is a second check for the tag.
By the number the terminal shows. When a tag that is linked to nobody is presented to a terminal, the terminal registers the tag and shows a number for it: Tag registered · Number 47. The employee tells the number to their supervisor. The number appears under Settings → Punch clock → Punch terminals → Pending tags and in the phone app under Team → Punch tags. Choose Assign on the row and the person the tag belongs to. The tag starts working when the employee presents it to the terminal again. Discard removes the number from the list, and an unassigned tag leaves the list on its own after a week.
By reading the tag with a phone. On a phone with NFC turned on, the phone app has Read a tag with the phone under Team → Punch tags: pick the person and hold the card or key fob against the back of the phone. This is useful when you have the tags but the terminal is at another location.
A Basic licence includes access to punch terminals. If the person has no licence, you can still link the tag in advance. Clocking works once the person has a Basic or Device user licence. See Licences, subscription and modules.
Create staff-group exceptions
Punch clock usage, location capture and all five questions can be set per staff group – the office and the building site do not have to share the same rules. The information text and the retention period are always shared across the whole organisation.
Rounding, grace time and the automatic close of an open punch are working time rules, so they are set on the shift type: Settings → Working time → Shift types → the Punch section. The fields are Punch rounding, Grace at start (min), Grace at end (min) and Open-punch auto-close. See Shift types.
Rounding and grace time only affect the day’s start and end times. The original punches retain their exact times. The default 0 means no rounding is done.
If something goes wrong
The clock is not visible to employees. Check Punch clock usage – Off hides the clock entirely. Also check whether a staff-group exception applies to this group.
A punch is rejected at the work site. The site needs Latitude, Longitude and Radius (metres) values, and too small a radius rejects the punch. If Location required is on, punching from outside the radius is not possible at all.
Rounding has no effect. The default value 0 does not round the times. The setting is on the shift type, not in the punch-clock settings.
The Clocked in now view is missing. It is a separate feature enabled under Features. The view does not show coordinates.