Glossary

Buddy punching

Name: TempClock
Price: 150.00 GBP
Author: TempClock

Buddy punching is when one worker clocks in or out on behalf of another, recording hours the absent worker did not actually do.

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Definition

Buddy punching is when one worker clocks in or out on behalf of another — recording hours the absent worker did not actually do. It is the most common form of time-and-attendance fraud, and on a temp desk it flows straight through to inflated client invoices.

At a glance

Also called Buddy clocking, ghost clocking

Category Time-and-attendance fraud

Typical cost minutes per shift, compounded

Stopped by Face-verified clock-ins

Why it matters

Why buddy punching matters

On its own, a few minutes here and there sounds harmless. Across a workforce of temps clocking in five days a week, it adds up to hours that were paid for but never worked — and, on an agency desk, hours that were charged to a client who can dispute them later.

The damage is not only financial. When a clock-in cannot be trusted, every downstream record inherits that doubt: the time-and-attendance data, the timesheet, the payroll run and the client portal. If a client or an auditor questions an hour, you want to be able to prove who was there, not explain why you cannot.

Traditional defences — PINs, swipe cards, fingerprint readers — all share the same weakness: the token can be handed over. A card or a PIN proves only that a credential was present, not that the person was. That is the gap buddy punching exploits.

The honest picture

PINs and cards prove a credential was present, not a person.

Inflated hours reach payroll and the client invoice, where they are hard to claw back.

A disputed clock-in puts the whole timesheet in doubt, not just one entry.

The fix is to tie each clock event to the actual worker, every time.

How TempClock relates

TempClock removes the gap that buddy punching depends on. Every clock-in is verified against the enrolled worker’s face, so a credential alone is not enough — the person has to be there. The match score is recorded on the entry, and a low match is blocked and flagged rather than waved through.

Faces are matched at clock-in; a credential on its own will not record an entry.
The match score travels with the hours, all the way to payroll and the client portal.
Low-confidence attempts are blocked and surfaced for a manager, with a PIN fallback so nobody is ever locked out of work.

See facial-recognition clock-in →

app.tempclock.com

Clock-in attempt — Kiosk 2 09:01

Clocking in as: James Patterson Face does not match enrolment 41% match

Clock-in blocked Flagged for a manager to review Below threshold

Result · no entry recorded
Nobody can clock in for someone who is not there.

A clock-in is refused when the face does not match the enrolled worker.

Keep reading

Terms that sit alongside this one, and the parts of TempClock that put them into practice.

Geofencing

A virtual boundary around a worksite used to confirm a clock-in happened on site.

Read the definition →