Time tracking in manufacturing and workshops: rotating shifts and collective agreements

In manufacturing, workshops and construction, time tracking comes with quirks you won’t find in other sectors: 24/7 rotating shifts, areas with no mobile coverage, staff moving between sites, complex collective agreements (metal, construction, automotive) and recurring overtime. In this article we explain how to comply with the 2026 clocking-in law (ley de fichaje 2026) in these environments, with real examples and the recommended setup.

The specific challenges of manufacturing

1. Rotating 3×8 or 4×6 shifts

A plant running continuous production with morning (6–14), afternoon (14–22) and night (22–6) shifts. Or 4×6 patterns (4 days on, 2 days off, repeated). Time tracking must automatically reflect which shift each clock-in belongs to, so that the hours count towards the corresponding premiums (night work, public holidays).

2. Sites and workshops with no mobile coverage

An electrician working in an underground car park, an operator in a plant that acts like a Faraday cage, a technician in a railway tunnel. Mobile clocking-in has to work offline and sync once the network comes back.

3. Roaming staff

Electricians or plumbers who visit 3–4 different sites in a single day. Each site is a separate workplace: you need to know how many hours each person worked at each site for the end client.

4. Complex collective agreements

The general metal-industry agreement (convenio general del metal) has more than 80 specific articles covering working hours, premiums and rest periods. Construction has a national agreement plus differing provincial ones. Calculating all of that by hand across a payroll of 40 employees is unworkable.

5. Everyday overtime

In manufacturing there’s overtime almost every week: production cover, an unexpected maintenance issue, a spike in orders. The difference between an ordinary hour, structural overtime, force-majeure overtime and holiday hours changes the Social Security contribution and the gross amount on the payslip.

How to solve it with the right software

Configuration by working-time model

In LapsoWork you create working-time models (for example “Morning shift”, “Night shift”, “Weekend on-call”) with their specific hours and associated premiums. When an employee clocks in within the “Night shift” window, the hours are allocated automatically with the night premium applied.

Guaranteed offline clocking-in

The LapsoWork app clocks in without a network connection and syncs afterwards. Critical on industrial sites and in workshops: if the phone fails to sync on an underground site, the clock-ins are stored locally and uploaded once the person reaches the surface.

Alternative: a kiosk tablet at the entrance to the unit or plant, with clocking-in by PIN or NFC card. More practical in factories with 30+ employees who all enter through the same point.

Geolocation when clocking in (optional)

For roaming staff, the clock-in can record an approximate location at the moment of clocking in. Useful for evidencing to the end client which hours were worked at each site. Important: this requires explicit information and consent from the employee (privacy).

Workplaces and projects

Each site or project is a workplace with a start and end date. Employees see in their app where they’re clocking in today and the hours allocated to each site. The manager can generate reports by workplace for client invoicing.

Overtime and rest alerts

The system alerts the manager when an employee:

• Is about to exceed the cap of 80 hours of overtime per year (art. 35 ET, Estatuto de los Trabajadores).
• Won’t have 12 hours of rest between working days.
• Is about to work more than 6 days in a row without a weekly rest period.

Real example: a mechanical workshop with 28 employees

An industrial-vehicle repair workshop with 28 employees (22 technicians + 6 admin staff). Before LapsoWork:

• A physical punch-card clock (bought in 2008, still working).
• A monthly spreadsheet kept by the manager to reconcile and send to the payroll bureau.
• The metal agreement applied “by eye” by the bureau.
• Overtime calculated only if the worker claimed it.

Labour Inspectorate visit in 2024: a €15,500 penalty for unaudited clocking-in + lack of traceability + three cases of unpaid overtime.

After rolling out LapsoWork (Basic plan, €2/employee/month = €672/year):

• A kiosk tablet at the workshop entrance. A personal PIN per employee.
• Automatic export to the payroll bureau in a compatible XML format.
• The metal agreement applied automatically with all its premiums.
• An audited history available for any inspection.

Result: the next inspection in 2025 → a clean report. No penalty.

Recommended setup by company type

Small workshop (5–20 employees)

• LapsoWork Basic plan (€2/employee/month).
• 1 kiosk tablet at the entrance (~€150).
• Metal agreement set up during onboarding.
• Annual cost: €120–480 + tablet.

Mid-sized manufacturer (20–80 employees)

• Advanced plan (€3.50/employee/month) with rotating shifts and a whistleblowing channel.
• 1–2 kiosk tablets per entry shift.
• Whistleblowing channel mandatory if 50+ employees (€299.99/year).
• Annual cost: €840–3,360 + channel.

Construction company with roaming sites (30–100 employees)

• Advanced plan with mandatory mobile clocking-in (no tablet, given the dispersion).
• Optional geolocation activated per site.
• Integration with project management software.
• Annual cost: €1,260–4,200.

Large factory (100+ employees)

• Custom plan with ERP integrations (SAP, Microsoft Dynamics).
• NFC readers per shift or access turnstiles with integrated clocking-in.
• Executive reporting with BI.
• Annual cost: bespoke.

Pre-configured collective agreements

LapsoWork ships with the following industrial agreements loaded as standard:

• State metal-industry agreement.
• Provincial metal-industry agreements (Madrid, Catalonia, Andalusia, the Basque Country, Valencia, Galicia).
• General construction agreement.
• Provincial construction agreements (main provinces).
• Wood and furniture sector.
• Chemical industry.
• Hydrocarbons and gases.
• Graphic arts.

If your agreement isn’t pre-loaded, the technical team configures it during onboarding at no additional cost, using the data from the BOE (Spain’s Official State Gazette) or the collective agreement currently in force.

Integrations with industrial ERPs

The LapsoWork public API enables integration with:

• SAP Business One (the most common ERP in Spanish manufacturing).
• Microsoft Dynamics 365 Business Central.
• Sage 200.
• A3 Nóminas (direct export).
• In-house ERPs via webhooks or REST.

A typical integration syncs employees, planned shifts and hours allocated to projects. Implementation time: 2–4 weeks.

Frequently asked questions

Does it work with unionised staff? Yes. In fact, unions welcome digital systems because they record overtime faithfully and make legitimate claims easier. The works council usually requests access to the system to view aggregated, anonymous data.

What happens if an employee forgets to clock in on a site with no coverage? Two options: (1) they clock in when they reach the next point with coverage, and the system records the approximate time with a note from the employee; (2) the manager corrects the clock-in with a justified reason. Everything is traced.

Are NFC card readers expensive? An industrial NFC reader costs €80–200. For a factory of 50 employees with 3 shifts, 2–3 readers (one per zone) are enough. Payback in weeks against the time saved.

Does it detect fraudulent clocking-in (e.g. a colleague clocking in for someone else)? It detects suspicious patterns (e.g. a PIN clock-in from an inconsistent location, unregistered fingerprints). For maximum security, biometric clocking-in (fingerprint or facial) prevents “buddy punching”. Available on the Advanced plan.

What about travel between sites? You can configure the travel time between sites to count as effective working time (as the construction agreement requires in certain cases). The system allocates it automatically, without the employee having to clock in manually.

Conclusion

Manufacturing and workshops face specific challenges in time tracking, but they can all be solved with well-configured software. The cost (from €672/year on the Basic plan for 28 employees) pays for itself by avoiding a single Inspectorate penalty (averaging €15,000 in the sector) and by saving the 6–10 hours a week lost managing spreadsheets and a punch-card clock.

If you’d like to see how it’s configured for your case, you can request a personalised demo or try LapsoWork free for 30 days. We also have a guide on the penalties for failing to comply with time tracking, and a comparison of HR software if you’re still deciding which tool to use.