A common question we are asked is what is the difference between an employees hours shown in Hours & Minutes (7:30) and in decimals (7.5). In terms of the amount of time an employee is receiving, there is no difference. The only difference is how the hours are presented as one format is easy to understand while another is easier for payroll calculations.
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What is the Difference?
Hours & minutes are generally used/presented to managers and employees as it is easier to understand how long they worked, while decimal time is easier for payroll purposes and adding time on a calculator.
When looking at the employees' hours in any system, be it ExakTime Connect or your accounting/job-costing application, you must be diligent about the symbol that separates your hours and minutes. If you see a colon (:), the hours are shown in hours & minutes. If you see a decimal (.), the hours are in decimal time. You cannot use these values interchangeably and should always use a singular time format to avoid any possible issues or convert the values from one to the other.
For example, let's say an employee worked 45 minutes. This can also be conveyed as .75 of an hour. You would not want to use .45 of an hour as that would result in fewer hours for an employee. A visual example has been included below.
ExakTime Time Format Settings
ExakTime offers options for time formats throughout the system to ensure consistency with your other applications:
Adding Time
Using the wrong time format can confusion/trouble when trying to add the time on a calculator.
For example, adding 4:30h (4 hours & 30 minutes) to 3:45h (3 hours & 45 minutes) would result in 7:75h (7 hours & 75 minutes) when added on a calculator. This is because calculators do not roll over to the next hour after 60 minutes and do not typically have a colon symbol. This can result in an employee receiving an incorrect amount of hours than expected. The correct result should be 8:15h (8 hours & 15 minutes).
A time calculator should be used to properly add time based on hours & minutes, while decimal time can be added on a regular calculator.
If we use the above example and convert it to decimal equivalents, 4:30 becomes 4.50 hours and 3:45 becomes 3.75 hours. Adding the decimal time would result in 8.25 hours, which can be converted back into 8:15h (8 hours & 15 minutes).
Entering Time
Another issue that can be caused by incorrect time formats is entering time for payroll purposes.
If entering hours shown as hours and minutes into a system that is expecting decimal time can result in an employee receiving less time than expected.
For example, Chris Coleman worked 40:45 hours for the week. If you were to enter this into a system that is expecting decimal time, it would be formatted as 40.45 hours for the week. This would result in the employee receiving less time than expected.