Track Time and Wages with Labor’s Timesheet App

Sep 24, 2015

Believe it or not, even a couple years ago, I was using pen and paper to record and track the hours I worked. It was definitely a chore, reconciling work hours with leave, overtime and any number of other entries, week after week. However, in these times of mobile apps for almost anything, several products are available to capture and track time. While this category is quite crowded, the U.S. Department of Labor has created a free mobile app for employees to independently capture and track the hours they work and determine the wages they are owed.

A paper timesheet form

Hailshadow/iStock/Thinkstock

The app is currently compatible with the iPhone and iPod Touch and is available for download from iTunes in both English and Spanish. It is categorized as a utility and has a very small footprint. The app can be downloaded in less than a minute and is easy to use, with the added convenience of increasing/decreasing the size of display screens with just a click.

The app opens up and directs you to add one or more employers. Once you add the employers, you are able to start recording regular work hours and break time on any working day for the chosen employer. The app automatically computes any hours over the regular 40 hours / week as overtime hours.

U.S. Department of Labor Timesheet App

Although the app includes overtime pay calculations at a rate of one and one-half times (1.5) the regular rate of pay for all hours you work over 40 in a workweek, the app does not handle items such as tips, commissions, bonuses, deductions, holiday pay, pay for weekends, shift differentials, or pay for regular days of rest.

You are able to obtain weekly and monthly summaries of the hours worked and the wages. The app gives you the ability to email a report of time worked for a chosen date range to any of your contacts.

You can access the glossary, contact information and materials about wage laws through links to the Web pages of the department’s Wage and Hour Division.

Labor provides this app as a public service and intends the regulations and related material in this app to enhance public access to information on its programs.

You can download this and other government apps through the USA.gov Federal Mobile Apps Directory. Do you have a federal app that is not listed on the Directory? Take part in the Great Federal Mobile Product Hunt.