Farmer Reaps Profits with Telephone Time Clock

Here’s what Robert, a satisfied customer and California farmer, recently shared with me:

“As a farmer specializing in fruits and vegetables, I manage considerable acreage across several farms scattered throughout central California. At peak times during the year I have hundreds of people working under me, with the accompanying rise in administrative time for all tasks, including time attendance tracking for workers at various locations.

“Most of my employees are temporary, and at harvest time our work schedule becomes very intense, with variable hours of work per day. This creates a burden for my field supervisors, especially since they also have to travel between multiple distant locations while managing people, produce, transport, and some customer interactions. At that moment time really is money for me as it is for many growers who count on their harvests as their chief source of income. These are the weeks in which we need to maximize our direct money-making opportunities! Struggling with administrative tasks like time-keeping can be aggravating since of course the records must be totally accurate!

“We farmers who grow plants do not have the luxury that traditional plant managers have to create and enforce a regular schedule! Mother Nature dictates when strawberries or lettuce or other crops must be harvested—and often with little notice. There are days, for example, when we need to rush to harvest for one reason or another, perhaps changes in weather. At other times conditions force us to extend the hours and continue until dusk.

“Although my supervisors are very capable, we recently realized that the time had come to delegate the time-keeping task in order to make better use of their skills and time while actually improving the system—without adding another person to the payroll. In other words, we became more profitable almost overnight with a new kind of employee time clock!

"“We have found that the incorporation of Telephone Time Clock has solved our problem almost like magic. We simply installed or made available a phone on each farm, and upon starting and finishing work, each worker calls into the central number to identify himself or herself. That’s all there is to it. This generates a reliable, far more accurate record than manual records while eliminates misunderstandings as well. My foremen are especially grateful because it frees them to do the kind of tasks that they like best instead of pencil pushing.

“News travels, and several neighboring farmers starting to consider how incorporation of the system for next season. I wish them all the success that we have enjoyed!”

Thanks, Robert, and happy harvesting!