How to track employee hours

What is a timesheet?

A timesheet shows which days a person worked and for how many hours, often with start and end times, breaks and a comment. For hourly and part-time staff it is the basis for pay. For full-time staff on a fixed monthly salary it is mostly used to keep track of overtime, absence and flexitime.

Tracking hours is the work of recording and checking them, every day, week or month. It can be done on paper, in a spreadsheet or in an app, and either by the employee or by the employer.

What a timesheet usually contains

There are no requirements on exactly how the records must look, writes the Work Environment Authority (in Swedish), but most timesheets contain the same parts. The clearer they are, the fewer questions come up on payday. To work out the hours from start and end times with a break, use the work hours calculator.

• The business's and the employee's names, and the period the timesheet covers.
• The date of each working day.
• Start and end times, or the number of hours worked.
• Breaks that do not count as working time.
• Overtime and additional hours, separately, when there are any.
• On-call time, when there is any.
• Absence, such as sickness or holiday.
• A note when something is out of the ordinary, and a way to show that both sides have approved it.

What Swedish law asks of the employer

Under section 11 of the Working Hours Act (arbetstidslagen), the employer must keep records of on-call time (jourtid), overtime (övertid) and additional hours worked by part-time staff (mertid). Employees have the right to see the records, themselves or through someone else, and so do unions that represent employees at the workplace.

So the law expressly asks for records of on-call time, overtime and additional hours, not of every ordinary hour. The Work Environment Authority (in Swedish) still writes that all employers must keep track of both ordinary working time and the time beyond it. In practice, overtime and additional hours can only be worked out if you know how much someone worked in total, and for hourly staff the hours are the basis for pay. That is why most employers record every hour.

What the records must look like is set out in the Swedish Work Environment Authority's regulations, AFS 2023:2 chapter 9. The employer decides in which document they are kept, on paper or on a computer, but they must be clear and well laid out and include:

• the employer's name and the workplace,
• the employee's name and personal identity number or employee number,
• the period covered, for example dates, a week number or a calendar month,
• on-call time, general overtime, extra overtime, general additional hours and emergency overtime or additional hours, each kept apart.

How long should timesheets be kept in Sweden?

The records of on-call time, overtime and additional hours must be kept at the workplace for the calendar year they cover and the two following calendar years (AFS 2023:2, chapter 9, section 6).

When a timesheet is used as the basis for pay, it may also count as accounting records, meaning information needed to follow the bookkeeping (Bookkeeping Act, chapter 1, section 2). Under chapter 7, section 2 of the Swedish Bookkeeping Act, accounting records are kept until the end of the seventh year after the calendar year in which the financial year ended.

Do hours have to be reported every week?

No, neither the Working Hours Act nor AFS 2023:2 says how often ordinary hours must be reported. On-call time, general overtime and general additional hours, however, should be recorded as soon as they arise and must be recorded at the latest 14 days after the calculation period (AFS 2023:2, chapter 9, sections 8 and 9). How often staff hand in their hours is set by the employer's routine and sometimes by the collective agreement. Most commonly the hours are recorded day by day or week by week and closed at the end of the month. Check your collective agreement.

Four ways to track employee hours

Which way fits depends mostly on who records the hours and how many of you there are.

• Paper or a spreadsheet: free and simple for a couple of people. Hard to see who changed what, and the employee rarely sees the same version as the employer. There is a free timesheet template in Excel and PDF.
• A time clock: staff clock in and out on site. Fits when hours vary a lot and many work at once, but needs equipment or an app for each person.
• An app where the employee reports: everyone logs their own hours and the employer approves. Fits when staff work in different places.
• An app where the employer logs: the employer records the hours and staff see them straight away. Fits a small place where the owner knows who worked. That is how Klokka works, as an app where the employer logs.

A simple month-end routine

Whatever the tool, these five steps make the end of the month calmer for both sides.

• Record the hours day by day or week by week, not all at the end.
• Let the employee see the hours as soon as they are recorded.
• Sort out objections before the month is closed, and note what you agreed.
• Lock the month once both agree, so nothing changes afterwards.
• Send the records to whoever runs payroll, and keep them.

Timesheets for part-time and hourly staff

For part-time staff, hours beyond the contracted hours count as additional hours (mertid), and they must be recorded just like overtime. For hourly staff the timesheet is also the whole basis for pay, so every day needs to be in it. Wondering what happens if the hours are changed afterwards? Read can an employer change your timesheet?