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Is Clockify FLSA Compliant? What Employers Need to Know About Timekeeping

Clockify can help manage time records, but FLSA compliance depends on accurate hours, appropriate retention, and the employer’s complete recordkeeping workflow.

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Clockify can support an employer’s timekeeping and recordkeeping workflow, but using it does not by itself make an employer compliant with the Fair Labor Standards Act (FLSA). Covered employers remain responsible for keeping complete, accurate records of employee hours and wages, retaining them for the required periods, and producing them when requested. The federal baseline below applies to FLSA-covered employment in the United States; state and local laws, industry rules, contracts, and non-U.S. requirements may add obligations.

What does the FLSA require employers to record?

For each covered nonexempt worker, employers must keep accurate records covering identifying and pay information. The U.S. Department of Labor (DOL) lists items including the employee’s name and identifying details, the start of the workweek, hours worked each day and week, wage basis, regular rate, straight-time and overtime earnings, additions to or deductions from wages, total wages paid, and the date and pay period covered by each payment. See the DOL’s Fact Sheet #21 on FLSA recordkeeping.

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The FLSA does not prescribe a particular form or require a time clock. The DOL says employers may use a clock, have a timekeeper record hours, or have employees write their own time. Its Fact Sheet #21 summarizes the standard this way: “Any timekeeping plan is acceptable as long as it is complete and accurate.” The DOL’s Handy Reference Guide likewise says a specific record format and time clock are not required. These are agency summaries of federal guidance, not an endorsement of any product.

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How long must employers keep time and payroll records?

The DOL distinguishes records by type. Under Fact Sheet #21, payroll records, collective bargaining agreements, and sales and purchase records must be kept for at least three years. Records used to compute wages—including time cards and work or time schedules—must be kept for two years. Records must be available for inspection by DOL representatives.

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A time-tracking report may serve as part of a recordkeeping system, but employers should confirm it contains the information needed for the relevant record type and retain it for the applicable period. Wage calculations and employee details that a report does not capture may need to be maintained separately.

What Clockify says it can do for timekeeping

In an article published April 18, 2023, Clockify describes features intended to support timekeeping workflows: tracking hours and overtime, storing customizable employee fields, generating daily, weekly, monthly, or date-range reports, exporting reports, approving and locking timesheets, and using an audit log to trace changes. It also discusses required fields. Those are vendor descriptions, not regulatory certification or a legal conclusion; feature availability can depend on the current plan and workspace settings. See Clockify’s time-tracking compliance article.

Whether these features help in practice depends on how the employer configures and uses them. A report is useful only if entries reflect actual hours, corrections and approvals are handled reliably, required wage information is recorded somewhere, and records can be retained and produced when needed. Check the current product configuration rather than assuming a feature is enabled or included.

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How to assess a timekeeping workflow

The DOL permits different ways to collect time; it does not declare one method universally best. Evaluate the whole workflow, whether it uses Clockify, another system, or paper:

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  • Completeness and accuracy: Does it capture all hours actually worked, including overtime and time outside a standard schedule?
  • Corrections and approvals: Can the employer see what changed, who made or approved a change, and when?
  • Retention and production: Can required records be kept for the applicable period and retrieved promptly?
  • Pay and employee details: Does the system record required wage data, or is a separate payroll or personnel record needed?
  • Access and privacy: Are access controls and any monitoring practices appropriate for employees and the applicable rules?
  • Additional requirements: Do state or local law, the industry, a collective bargaining agreement, or a contract impose additional recordkeeping rules?

Worker-written time records and paper logs are also permissible under the federal guidance if the resulting records are complete and accurate. A physical logbook is an option, not a federal requirement or a guarantee of compliance.

Can employers round Clockify time entries?

The DOL’s Hours Worked Advisor guidance on rounding says rounding to the nearest five minutes, one-tenth of an hour, or one-quarter of an hour can be acceptable when the practice averages out over time and does not result in failing to count all time actually worked. A rounding setting alone does not establish that an employer’s practice meets that standard.

Review actual work time and the effects of rounding across the records, including whether the method consistently omits time. Also check applicable state and local rules, which may differ from the federal guidance. Do not assume a software setting resolves either question.

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How should employers export and protect Clockify records?

Clockify’s help documentation says its Detailed Report can be exported as a CSV and that the service does not provide per-account recovery when a user accidentally deletes or overwrites entries. Its data management guidance recommends monthly CSV exports. These are the vendor’s published statements, not an independent security audit. See Clockify’s Detailed Report help page and Clockify’s time-tracking data management guidance.

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  1. Assign an export owner. Make a specific person responsible for exporting the reports the organization needs.
  2. Choose controlled storage. Save exports where access is limited appropriately and where retention rules can be applied.
  3. Check the files. Periodically open exported reports and confirm they contain the expected dates, employees, and time entries.
  4. Match retention to record type. Keep each record for the applicable period rather than treating every export as the same kind of document.

Clockify also says it hosts data on AWS and uses 256-bit SSL connections. Those statements do not establish that an employer’s overall security or compliance obligations are met; assess the full system and the employer’s own storage, access, and retention practices.

What should employers know about monitoring features?

Clockify says manual time entry is the default, while auto tracking and idle detection are optional; it says auto-tracking information remains local and visible to the user. The vendor also describes administrator-enabled screenshots and location tracking, with user notifications. Its documentation says location collection uses the mobile app and device permissions, while screenshots use the desktop app. See the same Clockify data management guidance.

Monitoring can raise privacy and employment-law issues beyond the federal FLSA recordkeeping baseline. Before enabling it, verify current product behavior and settings, consider what information is actually necessary, and check rules that apply to the employer and employees.

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Does Clockify make an employer FLSA compliant?

No software feature or report can establish compliance on its own. Clockify may help collect, review, and export time records, but the employer must ensure the records are accurate and complete, preserve each category for the required period, maintain information the time tracker does not capture, and account for additional rules that apply to its workforce. The DOL guidance cited here is a federal baseline, not a jurisdiction-specific legal determination.

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