Employee attendance register: free template and the digital alternative
No law in the UK or Ireland requires a sign-in book as such. What is required is a record of working time: in the UK, records showing the working time limits are respected; in Ireland, the hours each employee works, kept 3 years. A staff attendance register is one way to keep it – a spreadsheet or app is another.
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Is an attendance register compulsory?
Not in its classic form – a book where staff sign in and out. Neither the UK Working Time Regulations nor Ireland's Organisation of Working Time Act names a register or prescribes a model. What they require is the result:
- UK: records adequate to show compliance with the 48-hour average week, night work and young worker limits, kept 2 years, in any format you reasonably think fit. Separately, holiday records (6 years from April 2026) and minimum wage records of hours and pay (6 years).
- Ireland: records of days and hours worked, leave and (unless exempt) breaks, kept at the workplace for 3 years – electronically or on the paper Form OWT1.
| Format | How it works | Weak point |
|---|---|---|
| Paper sign-in register | Employee writes arrival and departure times and signs | Rounded times, signing "in advance", easily lost or damaged |
| Spreadsheet | A supervisor types in hours for everyone | Edited without a trace; depends on someone's memory |
| Card or fingerprint time clock | Employee taps a card or finger at the entrance | Cards lent to colleagues; fingerprints are biometric data (GDPR) |
| Clock-in app | Employee clocks in by QR code or GPS on site | Needs a phone with internet (or offline mode) – or an entrance tablet |
There is also a safety reason many sites keep a sign-in book: fire evacuation roll calls. A digital "who is on site now" list does the same job and is always up to date. For the full legal picture, see working time records in the UK and Ireland.
Do employees have to sign the register?
The law doesn't require the employee's signature – except that in Ireland, where staff fill in Form OWT1 themselves, the employer signs it. A signature is still useful evidence: if an employee later claims unpaid hours, a record they confirmed is much harder to dispute than one completed only by the employer. In Ireland, missing records shift the burden of proof onto the employer.
The digital equivalent is a monthly confirmation of hours. In QRtimetrack the manager closes the month (after which hours can't be edited), employees get a notification and confirm or dispute their hours from the phone, with a reason. The confirmation appears in the exported report next to start and end times for every day.
A signature only confirms what's on the page. If times were written from memory or rounded, signing doesn't make them accurate. A good record starts from the real time of arrival and departure.
What columns an attendance register needs (template)
There's no official form in the UK. The model below covers what working time, holiday and payroll rules need. Use one page per day for the whole team, or one page per month per employee.
| No. | Name | Time in | Signature | Break | Time out | Signature | Notes |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Sarah Murphy | 07:55 | 12:00–12:30 | 16:30 | |||
| 2 | Tom Walsh | 08:10 | 12:30–13:00 | 17:00 | Late – notified | ||
| 3 | Ana Popescu | – | – | – | AL |
On the first page, add the company name, location (office, branch, site), period and a key for absence codes: AL (annual leave), SL (sick leave), PH (public holiday), UL (unpaid leave), A (unauthorised absence). At the end of each day or month, the checker signs and draws a line so no rows can be added later.
Want a ready-made sheet? The free timesheet template generator builds a monthly sheet with weekends and public holidays marked, as Excel or printable PDF.
How long to keep attendance records
| Record | Minimum period | Rule |
|---|---|---|
| UK working time records | 2 years | Working Time Regulations 1998, reg. 9 |
| UK holiday records | 6 years (from 6 April 2026) | Working Time Regulations 1998, reg. 16B |
| UK minimum wage records (pay and hours) | 6 years | National Minimum Wage rules |
| Irish working time records | 3 years | Organisation of Working Time Act 1997, s. 25 |
A prudent approach in the UK is to keep attendance records for 6 years, alongside the payroll they support. In Ireland keep them at least 3 years, and longer if your accountant advises. Record the retention period in your employee privacy notice.
The digital attendance register
Neither the UK nor Ireland requires an electronic register – but a digital one removes the usual weaknesses, because nobody writes the time by hand: it's taken from the moment the person clocks in. In QRtimetrack:
- employees clock in from their phone by scanning a QR code at the entrance or inside the GPS zone – nothing to install from an app store;
- staff without a smartphone use an entrance tablet with a PIN, a printed badge or a personal rotating code;
- time comes from the server, and a changed phone clock is flagged;
- the QR code on a tablet changes every 15 seconds, so a photo sent to a colleague doesn't work;
- managers' corrections stay in the history with their reason;
- a live "at work now" list doubles as your fire roll call;
- at month end employees confirm their hours from the phone instead of signing;
- you export the register to Excel, CSV or PDF with start and end per day, breaks and totals.
Unlike a fingerprint time clock, QRtimetrack never receives fingerprints or face images: Face ID or fingerprint checks, if you turn them on, happen on the employee's phone.
Price: €9.95/month for 1–5 active employees and €1.99 per active employee per month from 6, excl. VAT. Free 7-day trial, no card, up to 10 employees. For a fixed sign-in point, the special offer includes a Samsung Galaxy Tab A9+ tablet, 3 months free and a step-by-step guide (about 10 minutes to set up yourself) for €299 outside Romania, with limited stock of 100 systems.
Frequently asked questions
Is a staff sign-in book a legal requirement?
Not as such. UK and Irish law require records of working time, not a particular book. You can use a paper register, a spreadsheet or a clock-in app, as long as the record is accurate, kept for the required period and can be produced when asked.
Must employees sign the attendance register?
There is no general legal requirement. A signature or confirmation is still useful evidence that the employee agreed with the hours. A digital alternative is a monthly confirmation from the phone, which QRtimetrack records in the report after you close the month.
Can I keep the attendance register electronically?
Yes. The UK allows any format you reasonably think fit, and Ireland's Records Regulations explicitly accept electronic clock-in systems. Make sure changes are traceable and you can export the record for an inspector.
Who should fill in the register?
Ideally each employee records their own arrival and departure, with a supervisor checking daily. If only a supervisor fills it in, hours tend to be rounded or written from memory. With an app, the time is recorded at the moment of clock-in.
How long should I keep attendance records?
In the UK, at least 2 years for working time records and 6 years for holiday and minimum wage records – so many employers keep everything 6 years. In Ireland, at least 3 years.
Can the attendance register be used for fire roll calls?
Yes, if it's up to date. A paper book often isn't. A live digital list of who is clocked in at each location, viewable on a phone, is more reliable during an evacuation.