CLASS ROOM ATTENDANCE AT FAS

FÁS is Ireland's national Training and Employment Authority, providing a range of highly valued training and employment programmes, aimed at employers, employees and unemployed people.

In order to modernise the method of managing attendance of Trainees at courses, some time ago FÁS decided to implement FlexTime's Web oriented Class Room Attendance system.

Up until now the system has been used by 3,500 Trainees per quarter on courses managed by Instructors at FÁS. In a significant new move, from February 2011 the system is being extended to also cater for all Trainees on FÁS courses that are being run by external Training companies.

There are 18 Training Centres througout Ireland. So the Class Room Attendance system now runs over the FÁS network. Trainees record attendance at Time Terminals at each of the remote centres and the data is sent in real time to the central server. Instructors can keep a check on Attendance at local PCs. The calculated data at the end of each week provides the hours on which the trainees are paid, making this one of the largest payroll oriented time recording solutions in Europe. Once approved by the supervisor a elecronic file is transferred to SAP payroll system at FÁS.

Classroom Attendance System - Why?

FÁS continously improves the management of Government Training Schemes. Equally, the employee and employer need to have confidence that the Training process can aim at workplace engagment.

One way to satisfy this this aim is to have a good method of dealing with attendance issues, where they exist. Thus a major focus is on avoiding anything which can result in:

a) affecting the level of the Trainee’s potential.
b) an impact on the employer’s view of Trainee and his/her readiness to enter their workplace.

The Class Room Attendance system provides a fair and impartial method of confirming what Trainee attendance levels are. This is while also ensuring that payments are capable of being calculated efficiently and on time.

Already over 20,000 Trainees have used the system making this one of the largest Time and Attendance projects in Europe.

For example :

- Up to 500 trainees in session, on any one day in each of the 18 centres.

- Courses have varying lenghts but usually up to 3 months.

Because of the reasonably short nature of the courses, there is a huge turnover of Trainees using the system.

Trainees are required to clock in each morning at convenient Time Terminals that are connected back to a single server over the FÁS intranet.

The Time Terminals are activated by a card swipe and pin pad to allow the trainee to clock with a card, and, for example, when he/she forgets their card can instead use the pin pad for clocking. There is no limit to the number of times the Trainee can clock in/out – so the system is capable of capturing miscellaneous recordings during the day, reflecting interview absences, doctor’s appointments etc.

Instructors and Administrative staff have direct access over the intranet to time and absence records of students irrespective of their physical location in the network. In addition, and if necessary, the system allows others with access to PCs located anywhere in the network - to instantly see who is in/out, for example, reception/switchboard staff and the security/safety officer.

Ask us for more details at 00353 1 2609680

To find out about another example of a specialist project that FlexTime is involved in, go to the case history on VisionTime at the Oireachtas.