TimeTrak 24.1 Release Notes – What’s New

May 2, 2024 Release Notes,

Welcome to the Autumn release of 2024, TimeTrak 24.1
Please browse through this document to find out more.

Contents

1.  Attachment Gallery
2.  Dashboards within TimeTrak Professional
3.  Payroll Calendar
4.  SMS Notifications
5.  User must change password on next login
6.  Welcome Email
7.  Geolocation links added to Activities and Checklists
8. Ability to favourite Knowledgebase articles
9. Appointment Alerts in Professional Open Calendar in Week View
10. Fill Day behaviour updated to exclude specified roster hours
11. Ability to select serviceable unit, task and state of job quote lines within TimeTrak APP
12. MYOB Advanced Integration Improvement
MYOB Advanced Task ID now available as TaskCode in TimeTrak
Professional – Task code searchable on the task grid
Other useful areas where Task Code can be customised to display
Task Code Display in the App and Mobile
Mobile & App – Task code searchable on the task and queue
Ability to make Project Code Read Only
Ability to prevent data syncing after errors
Stock Level Improvements
13. Financial Year Start Setting to assist with TimeTrak Reporting
14. Appointments Colour – Labour Code Colour
15. Profile setting to control Quick Task functionality in TimeTrak Professional
16. New Contact Form Layout in Profiles with ability to force contact Email and Phone Number
17. Added ability to convert an appointment to a time entry without the time entry screen opening
18. Icon to indicate if disbursements are assigned to an entry in TimeTrak Professional
19. Add disbursements to entries via right click in TimeTrak Professional
20. Security Improvements and Email TLS version changes
21. Added ability to complete Global Approval via Professional Calendar
22. Profile setting to control “Copy Day” functionality within TimeTrak APP
23. Shift Patterns
24. “Stack Calendar Items” Timeline View now stacks entries that go over midnight
25. Ability to define against a customer if they pay for staff lunch breaks or not
26. Stack Breaks (at end of day)
27. Prevent Mobile/App users from disabling lunch on time entries

1. Attachment Gallery

To provide a better overview of images within TimeTrak attachments an “Open Gallery” option is now available within TimeTrak Professional to display images on Attachment tabs.

If the profile setting “Show Attachment Gallery” is enabled against the user’s profile a new “Open Gallery” option is available on the attachments tab.

On selection of “Open Gallery” an attachment gallery of all images in a thumbnail view will be displayed as per below example on a job in order to review these easily.

Selection of a thumbnail image will display the image larger with the ability to scroll through images attached to review as per below:

2. Dashboards within TimeTrak Professional

From release 24.1 there is the ability to have dashboards display within TimeTrak Professional.
Standard dashboards are available and can be found here.

Once dashboards have been imported or created, visibility of these is controlled by profile visibility settings.
Custom dashboards can be created to meet your business requirements.

Once dashboards have been imported or created visibility of these are controlled by profile visibility settings.

For clients who already have power BI and would like TimeTrak data to be utilised within this, it is now possible via a report URL that does not require authentication.

Click h er e for more information:

Previously payroll calculations were driven by the time of day and the user’s roster.
In release 24.1 there is the ability to create custom payroll rules and apply these to a roster.
Users with permissions enabled can run the payroll calendar as per below, via a workgroup in TimeTrak Professional to review and apply changes to time entries ensuring that payroll reports are correct.

For more details, see below Whitepaper on the Payroll Overtime Calculator

https://timetrak.co.nz/blog/category/payroll-overtime-calculator/

4. SMS Notifications

The ability to send scheduled SMS notifications of upcoming appointments to customers along with the ability to send manual SMS messages to customers via TimeTrak Professional and the APP is now possible in TimeTrak from version 24.1

For more details, see below Whitepaper on TimeTrak SMS

https://timetrak.co.nz/blog/category/timetrak-sms/

Note: SMS Functionality will incur an additional monthly fee that will be billed via Focus Technology Group.

5. User must change password on next login

The ability to force users to reset their TimeTrak password on next login is available in TimeTrak from 24.1.
Global Administrators who can access users within TimeTrak professional can now set this as per below:

6. Welcome Email

Global Administrators who have access to TimeTrak Professional can access TimeTrak users.

Users can now be filtered by columns displayed.

All displayed users or multiple users can be then selected and on right click there is the option to “Send User Welcome Email” as per below:

Selecting Send user welcome email will;

Generate a welcome email to the email address assigned to the user as per below example:

2. This welcome email will contain with their login Id and a temporary password that will expire in 24 hours.

TimeTrak Mobile users will have links to download and install the TimeTrak APP for both Android and Apple Devices.

Once downloaded staff can select the Setup App Connection link from the email which will add the APP connection.
TimeTrak Professional or Full Access users will also have a URL link to the professional website.

3. The user will be prompted to reset their password on login

This process has been designed to make onboarding new staff members into TimeTrak more efficient and secure.

7. Geolocation links added to Activities and Checklists

Location links are now available in Professional when a geo location was recorded at the time of the activity.

Checklists:

On the checklist tab of a job if the geo location was recorded when the checklist was completed a geo location icon can be seen as per below:

On selection of the geo location icon the location the checklist was completed can be seen within a map view:

Activities:

The Same functionality as checklists is also available in Activities such as Job, Time Entry and Appointment Activities.

If the geo location was recorded at the time the action was completed the location icon will be displayed with the ability to see the map location as per below:

8. Ability to favourite Knowledgebase articles

You can now mark related client, job, task and serviceable unit Knowledgebase articles as favourites in TimeTrak Professional from version 24.1.

This is a great improvement for businesses who use the Knowledgebase heavily and would like certain related articles to be displayed first across the organisation.

When an article is marked as a favourite it will display at the top of the related articles list for all users ensuring quick access.

9. Appointment Alerts in Professional Open Calendar in Week View

When the profile setting “Enable Unbilled Appointment Alarms” is enabled users are forced to deal with historic appointments that have not yet been converted to time entries within TimeTrak Alerts.

Previously selection of the appointment would open a locked one-day calendar view meaning appointments were unable to be dragged to future days to quickly reschedule.

From 24.1 on selection of an appointment a five-day calendar view will open within TimeTrak professional allowing users to drag appointments to future day(s) in order to reschedule work quickly:

10. Fill Day behaviour updated to exclude specified roster hours

In the previous release of TimeTrak the ability to exclude certain hours (roster classes) from time balancing was added as per below:

https://timetrak.co.nz/blog/category/timetrak-23-1-release-notes-whats-new/#6-exclude-specified-roster-classes-from-time-balancing

In this release, this functionality has been improved further also excluding these hours from “fill day” functionality.

11. Ability to select serviceable unit and task against quote lines within TimeTrak APP

In version 24.1, there is expanded functionality for quote line management within the TimeTrak APP.

If APP users have quote line “Form Layout” settings enabled for Serviceable Unit or Task on quote lines, these are now able to be seen and set within the TimeTrak APP as per below:

This enhancement provides greater flexibility for managing quotes efficiently on mobile devices

12. MYOB Advanced Integration Improvements

MYOB Advanced Task ID now available as TaskCode in TimeTrak

In the Admin Console < Profile < Form Layout tab, there are settings to determine the visibility of the Task Code field and whether it is Read Only or Required.

Typically, the Advanced Task Id is adopted and Synced to TimeTrak, in this instance Read Only would be selected.

Where a Task is added via TimeTrak then Required could be set, this is dependant of the Advanced site Task ID settings. Please consult your TimeTrak Consultant if this setting compatible with your ERP system.

The Task Code is also used by other integrations to TimeTrak where the setting Required may be of use. Please consult your TimeTrak Consultant if this setting compatible with your ERP system.

In Professional, the Task Code is displayed on the Task Details tab and shows in the Task form header.

Professional – Task code searchable on the task grid

Task Code can be made visible on the Task grid, from the Column Chooser, and is also searchable.

Other useful areas where Task Code can be customised to display:

In the Administration Console, Profile Customisations, Task Code is now available to choose from in the pick list for Appointment, Task or Time Entry Customisations.

Task Code can also be applied to Templates.

Task Code Display in the App and Mobile

Important: Within the TimeTrak App and Mobile platform, the Task Code field will only display if the Task Code field is populated.

Mobile Browser:
Task List and Task display

Mobile App:

Task List and Task display

Mobile & App – Task code searchable on the task and queue

The Task Code is searchable on a queue, but this does require Task Code is made visible via the Profile < Customisations tab within the TimeTrak Administration Console.

Option to force quote lines to be mapped to a Task

Here we can see the Task field is highlighted yellow, enforcing the user to select a task

Both the Mobile browser and the App platforms follow the same behaviour to enforce selection.

Quote Line State can be viewed and set within TimeTrak APP

Quote line “state” was added to TimeTrak Professional and Mobile in release 21.2 as per below for MYOB Advanced clients in order to control which quote lines sync through to MYOB Advanced.

https://timetrak.co.nz/blog/category/timetrak-21-2-release-notes-whats-new/#Point13

The ability to see and set the quote line state has also been added to the TimeTrak APP within this release.

Ability to make Project Code Read Only

The Advanced Project ID flows through to the Job Code field in TimeTrak, a Read Only setting has been introduced to prevent this field being edited in TimeTrak.

Validation Alerts – Ability to prevent data syncing after errors

TimeTrak Validation Alerts have been introduced to assist with the TimeTrak Sync Integration process. The there are occasions when data can fail to sync from TimeTrak to Advanced. When enabled, this feature allows client self-management of this data.

Often this can be resolved easily but requires a Resync of that data to sync to Advanced.

There are times when the TimeTrak data can no longer be synced or is no longer required to be synced, to Advanced. A Cancel Sync option has been introduced manage such instances. This means that, when this icon is clicked on, the item will be ignored from the sync going forward and will no longer try to sync the data to Advanced.

13. Financial Year Start Setting to assist with TimeTrak Reporting

An additional global system setting “Financial Year Start” has been added to TimeTrak from version 24.1 to assist with reporting requirements which run based on the financial year instead of the calendar year.

14. Appointments Colour – Labour Code Colour

Adding to the flexibility of appointment colour coding there is now the ability to have appointments colour coded based on the labour code colour as per below:

Labour Code Colours can be specified against the item under Disbursement/ Allowances within the Admin Console as per below example:

In order to set the labour code against an appointment users need assigned to a profile with “Default Time Entry Labour Code” visible on appointment form layout.

On appointment creation the default labour code can be set:

Which will colour code the appointment based on the configuration set (left colour in this example)

This is a great enhancement for those businesses who would like to colour code their schedules based on the type of work that will be completed.

15. Profile setting to control Quick Task functionality in TimeTrak Professional

Quick Tasks were introduced to TimeTrak Professional in version 4.0 as per below to improve task creation for reactive work:

https://timetrak.co.nz/blog/category/quick-tasks-in-timetrak-4-0/

In some instances, quick tasks should be prevented from being added as additional data against the task needs to be added.

A new Profile setting “Add Quick Task” has been added to control this functionality.

16. New Contact Form Layout in Profiles with ability to force contact Email and Phone Number

From release 24.1 a new Contact form layout is available in Profiles which provides the ability to force users to enter an Email and or Phone number on add and edit of a contact within TimeTrak:

This is a great improvement for businesses who wish to ensure contacts are added to TimeTrak with the appropriate information.

17. Added ability to convert an appointment to a time entry without the time entry screen opening:

In release 21.2 the ability to select multiple appointments and convert these to time entries via the TimeTrak professional calendar was added as per below:
https://timetrak.co.nz/blog/category/timetrak-21-2-release-notes-whats-new/#Point3

This provides the ability to quickly convert an appointment to a time entry using the defaults.

In this release there is now the ability to quickly convert a single appointment to a time entry without the time entry form opening by selecting the entry and pressing “Shift” and “T” on the keyboard.

Alternatively, users can right click an appointment and press “shift” when selecting “Convert to Time Entry” as per below to convert the entry without the form loading.

Changes have been made to this process to prevent single or multiple entries being converted via keyboard short cuts if “Must Choose” is set on the users’ profile time entry form layout.

The message below will display preventing this:

18. Icon to indicate and show count of disbursements/ attachments assigned to an entry in TimeTrak Professional

As per below, a new orange icon with a count will display against both time entries and appointments that have disbursements assigned to them

Note: The count is the number of disbursement lines assigned to the time entry/ appointment not the total quantity of items.

Disbursements also include fixed travel fees and payroll allowances.

An updated icon and count for attachments will also be displayed for time entries/ appointments that have attachments assigned as per below:

This is a great visual improvement for schedulers and professional users to ensure items have been assigned without the need to open the entry.

19. Add disbursements to entries via right click in TimeTrak Professional

If professional users have the profile setting “Add Disbursement” enabled there is now the ability to assign disbursement(s) to multiple time entries or appointments for the same job/ task via a right, click in the calendar as per below:

This will load a blank disbursement form where multiple disbursements can be added by clicking the + icon.

On save these will be assigned to each of the appointment/ time entries that were selected:

This is a great improvement for businesses who need to add additional costs to time entries and appointments frequently.

20. Security Improvements and Email TLS version changes

As part of being security conscious this release includes patches for TimeTrak website vulnerabilities identified in quarterly security scans.

Windows also recommends that applications do not set the email TLS version and instead use the operating system default.

From release 24.1 the TLS version used by emails sent from TimeTrak is no longer dependent on TimeTrak but rather the default set on the web server operating system.

21. Added ability to complete Global Approval via Professional Calendar

Global approval provides the ability for staff to approve hours on behalf of another users.

For example; when a manager is on leave and another manager needs to approve entries on their behalf.

Previously Global approval could only be completed via Approval reports and was unable to be completed via the calendar.

From this release, when users have “Enable Global Approval” enabled on their profile. On selecting one or multiple-time entries via the calendar and using the keyboard shortcut ‘V’ the approval prompt as per below has the added ability to “Complete Global Approval” of the entry when selected.

This selection will be cached to the browser meaning when selected this will be selected by default and complete global approval of the entries selected via the calendar without the need to use Approval reports.

For more details on global approval within TimeTrak click here.

22. Profile setting to control “Copy Day” functionality within TimeTrak APP

Copy Day functionality was added to the TimeTrak APP from version 22.2, for details on this click here.

For some businesses all hours recorded via the TimeTrak APP should be generated via appointments scheduled.

In this release an additional profile setting “Hide Copy Day” has been added to user’s profiles.

When enabled the Copy Day function will not be available to APP users.

23. Shift Patterns

In release 24.1, a new Shift Pattern feature has been designed for clients who schedule their staff to the same job/ task based on a set shift pattern.

Global Administrators can access “Shift Patterns” via TimeTrak Professional under settings.

Here shift patterns can be setup at a global level as per below example:

A Colour can be set against the shift pattern, this is available in appointment colours as per below in order for appointments to be colour coded based on the shift pattern.

The Shift description can be set and is available in Appointment Profile Customisations “AppointmentShiftPatternDayDescription” if this description needs to flow through to the calendar for scheduling or field staff.

The Time Analysis drop down is limited to Non-Productive (Leave) time analysis codes for clients who schedule employees rostered days off.

For clients who do not schedule employees rostered days off of the start / end time is set to 00:00 as per below example, these days will be missed and not scheduled:

Professional users with the profile setting “Show Shift Patterns” enabled will have a Shift Pattern selection within an appointment form as per below:

On selection of a shift pattern Start/ End Times are no longer displayed as the time will be set based on the shift pattern.

Start time is the date you wish the shift pattern to start from.

There is the ability to “repeat” a shift pattern which will repeat the entire shift pattern.

Note: Disbursements and serviceable units assigned to the appointment will be assigned to each appointment for the job/ task on the pattern.

On save, the appointments will be generated as per the pattern, in this example with a repeat of 1 the pattern has been generated twice:

24. “Stack Calendar Items” Timeline View now stacks entries that go over midnight

For clients who schedule work over midnight, in previous releases the display of this was not very user friendly in the timeline calendar as per below:

From release 24.1 when “Stack Calendar Items” is enabled within a timeline workgroup items that span over midnight will display within a single day column as per below:

25. Ability to define against a customer if they pay for staff lunch breaks or not.

In some organisations there are agreements with some clients that they will pay for staff lunch breaks when working onsite.

In TimeTrak Professional, when users have the ability to edit clients and the Client Form Layout Setting “Paid Lunch Breaks” set to visible they can specify if the client pays for staff lunch breaks or not as per below:

When time is added to a job/ task in TimeTrak for a client with “Paid Lunch Breaks” enabled;

If the user does not have any breaks setup against their roster or in “My Breaks” (professional users) there will be no lunch recorded.

If the user does have breaks setup against their roster but they are not mapped to a non-productive time analysis code like “lunch” this will behave as it usually does, and no time entry will be created for lunch.

If the user has “breaks” setup against their roster or in “My Breaks”, the break is mapped to a non-productive time analysis code like “lunch” and the break is enabled on the time entry;

On save the “lunch” time entry will be recorded to the job/ task instead of the non-productive lunch code with a narration of “Paid Break” as per below example where D & C Panel beaters pays for lunch breaks, but Comfort Automotive services does not:

26. Stack Breaks (at end of day)

Businesses who have staff working on the same job/ task long periods of time often do not want multiple time entries created against the job/task on the same day which is what occurs when hours are split over lunch.

To provide the ability for a single entry to be created against a job/task and have break hours reduced from the entry duration ensuring hours are correct for payroll.

An additional setting “Stack Breaks (at end of day)” has been added to Rosters against the break tab from release 24.1as per below:

When enabled, on save of a time entry that has “break” enabled the break(s) will be stacked at the end of the entry ensuring there is only one entry for the job/ task with breaks recorded at the end as per below:

27. Prevent Mobile/ APP users from disabling lunch on time entries

From release 24.1, in profile settings under Form Layout> Time Entry there is a “Breaks” option with the ability to set this as read only.

This is useful for businesses who set breaks against their staff rosters and wish to disable the ability for staff to not record a lunch break and adjust the time lunch was taken on a time entry that spans the break time.