OnTheClock vs Puntual

OnTheClock provides small businesses with employee time tracking, scheduling, PTO management, and payroll software. Employees can clock in and out through desktop, mobile app, web, kiosk, or browser. Location controls include GPS tracking, geofencing, breadcrumb trails, employee location maps, and device, IP, and Wi-Fi restrictions. Managers can build drag-and-drop schedules, share updates, and track attendance across locations and departments. PTO tools cover requests, accrual rules, holidays, carryover, and a shared calendar. Reports include employee time, gross payroll, labor costs, job and project costing, and a Who's In dashboard. The time-tracking plan is $4 a month per employee plus a 5 USD monthly base fee, after a free 30-day trial; there is no free plan. Payroll is an add-on at $6 a month per employee plus a 40 USD monthly base fee, with a one-time 250 USD migration and onboarding fee, and requires the time clock. Payroll service excludes some workers, businesses, and industries, including employees outside the United States and specified sectors.

Puntual records employee working hours and applies labor regulations based on the company’s selected country. It runs on Android and the web, with clock-ins that are saved on the device first and synced later, allowing recording without an internet connection. Staff can also use a shared entrance tablet, entering a name and PIN instead of installing the app. Administrators can review daily details, weekly and monthly totals, differences from expected hours, and monthly incidents. PDF and CSV reports include an annex for independent checks of whether records were altered. The maker says clock-ins are chained with cryptographic fingerprints, server timestamps are sealed, and corrections add records rather than changing originals. Optional location records where a clock-in or clock-out occurred, without continuous tracking. Puntual lists labor-rule settings for 23 EU countries and says it works worldwide. Cloud-mode data is hosted in Ireland; local-mode data stays on the device. Local Mode is free for one employee, with no cloud sync. Subscription costs €4.99 a month; One-Time Purchase costs €9.99 as a one-time purchase. A 30-day trial includes the whole staff, web dashboard, verifiable exports, and server timestamps, with no card or automatic charge.