The standard type of time-recorder to-day is a simple mechanism with a dial which contains a certain set of numbers. There is a point which is pressed into the hole opposite each number, and when this is done a bell rings which indicates that the employee using the machine has registered the minute of the day and the hour on the record inside the machine. The whole mechanism synchronises with the timekeeper, which is in the machine itself, and registers the actual time of entering or leaving work even to fractions of minutes. Registration is done very quickly ; indeed it is said that on one of such machines two thousand men can register in less than four minutes. No system of signing on, of passing in checks, can work with more celerity; in fact the amount of time necessary for the old method is considerably more. Not only does the time-recorder register each man's arrival or departure, just as the employer wills it, but the machine itself provides a complete record in numerical order of the various entries and exits during the day. The record made by each man in coming in or going out is printed inside on a sheet which is only accessible to the employer. When the bookkeeper who wishes to work on the pay-roll is ready to go into the question of time, he has simply to turn up this list and extract the various records, guided by their numerical indication.
Slips can be taken from the machine each day, and are ready for the clerk who makes up the pay-roll when it leaves the register, while filed into a cover it forms a complete Time and Wages Book. No clerk is required to supervise the work of the machine, the only labour involved being the setting of the machine ready for each week's record.
Another interesting feature of such a machine is the automatic changing two-colour ribbon, which differentiates between regular hours and records of overtime or shortage of time. For instance, an employee's time may appear throughout the week in a green ink on the register, and a glance will show that the worker has made full time, without any further necessity of reading the individual registration. Similarly the employer may pick out by the change of colour men who late each day or who leave early. It is not only a great paving of clerical labour in the office to note these facts, but to have them put forward day by day in such a convenient form is a great help and economy to administration. The best types of these machines require no attention daily, but run automatically for a whole week. All the employer has to do is to change the time-sheet each week, adjust the clock, and wind it and alter the mechanism to start the following week.