How to roll out time tracking in your company, step by step

Published on 18 April 2026

Rolling out time tracking in a small company needs neither IT people nor weeks of work. With the right method you have it running in one afternoon. We take you through it step by step, including the trickiest part: getting your team to accept it without complaint.

Step 0: look at the collective agreement and talk to the workers' representatives

This step appears in almost no guide and it is the one the Labour Inspectorate checks first. Article 34.9 of the Workers' Statute does not only say «registra» — record: it says that the record «se organizará y documentará mediante negociación colectiva o acuerdo de empresa o, en su defecto, decisión del empresario previa consulta con los representantes legales de los trabajadores» — that it shall be organised and documented through collective bargaining or a company agreement or, failing that, a decision by the employer after consulting the workers' legal representatives. The order matters:

1. Look at your collective agreement. If it regulates working time records, that governs: the system, the breaks, the flexibility, all of it.
2. If the collective agreement says nothing, you can settle it in a company agreement.
3. If there is neither one nor the other, you decide, but consulting first with the workers' legal representatives, if there are any. Consulting means giving them enough information, far enough in advance, for them to have a view; telling them the day before is not enough.
4. If there is neither legal representation nor any provision in the collective agreement, you decide outright. That is the case in most small companies.

Careful: the duty to keep the record does not depend on your having done this. It applies in every case. But skipping the consultation when there was somebody to consult is a breach in itself, and it leaves written evidence of how little care you took.

Step 1: choose how your employees are going to clock in

Decide on the method. There is no single best one for everything: it depends on your business. The options are a mobile app (the most convenient and the cheapest), an RFID card or key fob (ideal for a warehouse or a site), a physical terminal on the wall or a PIN. We go into it in the guide to clocking-in methods.

For most small businesses, starting with the mobile app is the quickest and costs nothing in hardware. Two warnings before you decide:

• If you turn on geolocation, you have to inform the staff and their representatives beforehand and in writing, in the detail article 90 of Ley Orgánica 3/2018 requires. And only when they clock in, never continuously.
• Rule out fingerprints and facial recognition. The Agencia Española de Protección de Datos takes the view that biometric clocking in finds no basis in current Spanish law, because there is no statute lifting the ban on processing that data and the worker's consent cannot lift it either.
• If you are going to use your team's personal phones, agree it or offer an alternative. There is no rule obliging anyone to put their phone to work, and for remote work Ley 10/2021 expressly requires the company to provide the means and cover the costs.

Step 2: choose a simple tool

Steer clear of complicated software. You need something that: records the working day legally, is understood first time and does not charge you a fortune. See our comparison of apps. And do not rule out the option that costs nothing: paper and a well-kept template are still legal, as we explain in free time tracking.

Step 3: set it up and register your team

Create your account, add your employees (name, department) and, if you use an app, send them the link so they can install it. In modern tools this is 10 minutes. Set the standard working day and, where it applies, the radius of the workplace.

And before anyone clocks in, close off the data protection side: enter the processing in your record of processing activities, decide how long you keep the data and give the staff the article 13 GDPR information. If the supplier stores the data for you, it is a processor and you need the article 28 contract.

Step 4: communicate it well (the key to success)

Time tracking usually breeds suspicion. How you present it changes everything. Explain that:

• It is a legal obligation, not a sign of distrust in them.
• It protects them: it puts their overtime on record.
• It is easy: one button on their phone.
• And that they can look at their own record whenever they want: the law requires it to be available to them and to their representatives.

Run a trial week with no consequences, so they get used to it.

Step 5: check the first few days and adjust

In the first week, check the dashboard every day: is anyone forgetting to clock in? Is anyone having trouble with the app? Adjust the reminders and answer the questions. In two weeks it will be routine and you will stop thinking about it.