If you track time in vPlan by clocking live, you may forget to stop the timer. Basically, the time registration runs indefinitely until you stop it yourself. To avoid these situations, you can set up an automation in vPlan that automatically stops running time registrations based on your own conditions. In this article, we explain how you can set this up.
To stop time registration automatically if someone forgets to do so, you have two available automations.
When time tracking is running and started number of days ago, stop timer after number of hours from start.
When time tracking is running and started number of days ago, stop timer today at number of hours
Both automations stop the timer at the condition you set. The difference is in when the timer is stopped.
Automation 1 stops the timer at a certain number of hours after the timer is started.
Automation 2 stops the timer at a fixed time after the timer is started.
The conditions in bold are freely fillable and work the same for both automations. You use them to determine how far back the automation should look at running time trackings. Do you want all current time entries from yesterday to be stopped automatically? Then enter 1 day ago.
The second parameter, the number, differs between the two automations. With the first automation, you set how many hours after the time recording has started the clock automatically stops. With the second automation, you set at what time the clock should automatically stop. The way of filling in this automation is then 17 for 17:00 or 12 for 12:00 in the afternoon.
Note
This automation can only be set to whole hours. 17:30 for example will not work.
Example automation 1
You work in shifts, so you cannot determine exactly what the end of workday is. It varies from shift to shift. You want time tracking to continue for a maximum of eight hours after the start. That is the work duration of a shift regardless of when the shift starts. You can then set the automation like this:
When timekeeping is still running and started 1 day ago, stop timer after 8 hours from start
Example automation 2
You work fixed hours from 08:00 to 17:00. Overtime is rare and you want time tracking to be neatly stopped by everyone every day when the working day is over. Then you can use automation as follows:
When time registration is still running and was started 0 days ago, stop timer today at 17 (5 p.m.).
Note
This automation is automatically performed by vPlan at night and therefore not live. So a time tracking that should stop at 5:00 p.m. runs initially. vPlan checks at night with an automatic process which ones should be stopped. The time recording is then stopped retroactively at the set end time.