The most frequently asked question in a demo sounds like this: "Do you have reports?" The answer is always yes - and the question clarifies nothing. A useful check on attendance software reports is built differently.
This piece covers what to ask concretely during a demo.
The minimum set: four reports
1. The monthly timesheet. The main output: days and hours worked per employee, lateness, overtime, leave and time off. Test question: is it in a form that can go straight to accounting, or does it need correcting by hand?
2. The lateness list. It has to be filterable by period, branch and department. A general list does not serve a decision.
3. The days-and-hours cut. Unlike the timesheet this is for management: who worked how much, how the load is distributed.
4. The correction log. The most overlooked report and the most important one in a dispute: who changed what, when, why, and what the original value was.
Without the fourth, every dispute is settled from memory - and in practice the result never satisfies both sides.
Branch and department cuts
This looks like a technical feature but directly determines the usefulness of the reporting.
"42 late arrivals company-wide" says nothing - what can be done with it? "28 at branch three" demands a specific action.
Whether that is possible depends on the system supporting branch, department and section levels. Without structure the report is either too general or too granular.
The second requirement is a comparison form: branches side by side, over the same period, on the same indicator. More on this: analysing attendance indicators.
Leave and time-off balance
This report often lives in a separate system, and that is precisely why it causes problems.
The test question is simple: does an employee who is away show up as late in the timesheet?
If the answer is yes, the leave information is not in the same place as attendance - and reconciling two lists at month end becomes unavoidable.
The second question concerns balances: are annual, unpaid and sick days calculated separately, or are they all in one row? Kept in one row, the year-end balance comes out wrong.
Device and point cuts
This is a relatively new requirement and it matters in the mobile model.
Two questions are asked: is the point the record was made at visible in the report, and can device changes be tracked separately?
The first is needed in multi-branch companies and field work - "who worked where" is answered from exactly that cut. The second relates to the reliability of the record and builds a picture over time.
Export formats
This is the item that causes the most practical trouble - and the one least often checked in a demo.
A spreadsheet is needed for further calculation and filtering; PDF for a document that will be signed or must not be altered.
But the main question is in the format itself: is the column layout in the order accounting expects? Unless the format is agreed once and written down, the same manual work repeats every month.
Scheduled delivery
The last item is not about the report itself but about getting it delivered.
The test question: can the same cut be prepared automatically at set times and sent to the right people?
Without that capability every report is built and sent by hand by HR - and across a month that is measured in hours. More on this: scheduled attendance reports.
How to ask in a demo
A general question gets a general answer. The practical approach is to give a concrete scenario:
"This month at branch four, how many people from which department worked how many hours, and how many were late? Can this report be sent to the branch manager automatically every Monday?"
If the answer is not demonstrated in a few clicks, the reporting is not ready for your structure - and "yes, that's possible" is not enough.
A worked example: the gap a demo exposed
A retail chain was choosing between three systems. All three demos produced the answer "yes, we have reports".
The selection team prepared a scenario and asked all three the same question: "This month at branch four, how many people from which department worked how many hours, and how many were late?"
The first system showed the answer in two clicks. The second gave a general list - there was no department cut. The third had a branch cut but did not support the section level.
Then a second question was asked: "Can this report be sent to the branch manager automatically every Monday?" Only one system answered yes.
The choice was settled by two questions - even though across three earlier meetings the same subject had stayed at the level of general discussion.
Preparing for a demo: write three scenarios
A general question gets a general answer. So before going into a demo, write three real scenarios from your own company.
Scenario one - daily management. "Which site is short this morning?" This is the question a branch manager asks every day.
Scenario two - month end. "What format is the file that goes to accounting, and how many clicks does it take to produce?"
Scenario three - a dispute. "On the 14th of last month, who changed this employee's record, when, and for what reason?"
The third scenario is the most informative and the least often asked in a demo. A system with no correction log causes no trouble in daily use - the trouble surfaces at the first serious dispute, and by then it is too late.
The next step
The report set is the most overlooked part of a system and the most felt in daily use. The recording method is chosen once; the reports are looked at every day.
Read more on the attendance report, look at what QRGate does, or calculate the price.
