Some irregularities in workplace attendance deviate from the original intention of the system design. How to bring attendance back to a standardized order, protect rights and interests, and find a balance between being manageable and not hurting people's hearts? In order not to be late for those one or two minutes, I run out of the subway station and into the company elevator every morning. ”When it comes to the attendance clock in system, Zhang Fangfang, a new media editor at a company in Changsha, Hunan, admitted that she is a bit anxious. Although the company provides a tolerance limit of 2 times a month for forgetting to clock in and 3 times for being late within 5 minutes, once exceeded, the 300 yuan attendance bonus will be reset to zero and a minute by minute fine will be imposed. Zhang Fangfang works from 8:30 am to 5:30 pm, and in order to avoid being charged for being late, she accurately plans every minute of her commute every day. Sometimes, I arrive at the company building before 8:30 in the morning, but there are too many people in the elevator, which delays me for a short time before the clock in time passes. After work, I often work half an hour overtime, but I cannot flexibly extend my working hours. Nowadays, the attendance clock in system has become a normalized requirement for some companies. This was originally a management method for employers to regulate work order, but it occasionally leads to labor disputes. How to standardize this system? How to balance the autonomy of enterprises and the legitimate rights and interests of workers? The strict rules and formal management have sparked controversy. In my first month at the company, I was deducted 800 yuan in salary for being late four times. ”Li Yi, a manager at a real estate company in Hangzhou, Zhejiang, told a reporter from the Workers' Daily that his company's regulations stipulate that if the management is late, they will be fined 200 yuan, and if an ordinary employee is late, they will be fined 100 yuan. "They cannot even apply for a new card, and if they fail to clock in, it will be considered as absenteeism for half a day. The company has never publicly announced the rules for attendance rewards and punishments, and only when salaries are paid do they know that money has been deducted. We have provided feedback to the human resources department, and the response we received was' the boss requested it ', without any room for negotiation. ”Li Yi said helplessly. In addition to provisions such as salary deduction for lateness, the formal management of some companies that "only recognize clocking but not work" is often roast by employees. Wang Yanyan, an employee of a state-owned enterprise in Beijing, said that after her company changed the clock in method from facial recognition to location based clock in, she once worked overtime until 9 pm at the office. Due to being in a hurry, she realized that she didn't get her work card when she got home. When she checked in and made up for overtime at home through field work, the leader asked, "How did I know you were working overtime?" "It was clearly to help the company solve problems, but I had to prove it left and right, as if I was cheating. ”Wang Yanyan said. In fact, companies also have their own considerations regarding the attendance clock in system. If there is no fixed attendance system, the team can easily become free and loose. "In the view of Wang Ning, the sales team manager of a company in Beijing, attendance is a constraint rather than a control, and reasonable attendance can improve overall efficiency. Zhang Xiaoyue, Vice President of a brand company in Suzhou, Jiangsu, believes that attendance is not only to ensure that employees comply with rules and regulations and arrange their commuting time reasonably, but also to clarify the boundaries of responsibility. "For example, the company stipulates to leave work at 6:00 p.m., if an employee has a personal safety accident outside the specified time, the company can theoretically avoid unnecessary legal risks by consulting the attendance records." Different decisions clearly define the red line of behavior, which is that employees roast about the strict and formal system, and which is the reasonable boundary of the enterprise's emphasis on management, risk prevention and control, and attendance clocking? The reporter found through sorting out public cases that labor disputes caused by abnormal attendance have clearly drawn a red line between employees and enterprises in different court judgments. In a recent labor dispute case concluded by the Jing'an District People's Court in Shanghai, a company explicitly required employees to clock in within 300 meters of their office location. Employee Li discovered that the subway he was commuting on happened to pass by another check-in point set up by the company for disabled employees working from home. He took advantage of the loophole in the system's automatic recognition of the check-in location and completed the attendance check-in "on the way", but his actual arrival time was much later than the time displayed in the check-in record. After discovering this behavior, the company involved in the case terminated the labor contract on the grounds that Li "created a false attendance record and violated the principle of integrity in the employee handbook". After trial, the court found that the company's termination of the labor contract was legal and well founded. The verdict of another case was completely different despite the employee's attendance exception. In this case, Wang, the investment manager of a real estate company, was dismissed by the company on the grounds of "equivalent absenteeism" for failing to clock in 11 times within a few months. The court believes that the company's action ignores the actual attendance situation of the employees, deviates from the original intention of attendance management, and damages the legitimate rights and interests of the employees, lacking legitimacy, reasonableness, necessity, and legality. In the end, the court ruled that the company should pay Wang more than 38000 yuan in compensation for illegally terminating the labor relationship. The key difference between these two cases is that one is subjective malicious fraud, the other is objective omission without malicious intent, the other is that the attendance system is legal and effective, and the other is that the system procedures are missing and clearly unreasonable. ”Yang Baoquan, Senior Partner of Beijing Zhongyin Law Firm, analyzed. In the view of Yao Junchang, senior partner of Weiheng Law Firm in Beijing, the court mainly follows a double review standard when adjudicating such cases. "On a substantive level, it looks at whether the employee's behavior truly violates the rules and regulations and constitutes a serious violation of discipline; on a procedural level, it looks at whether the company's rules and regulations have gone through democratic and public procedures, and whether the dismissal process is legal. How to find a balance between "being manageable" and "not hurting people's hearts" to bring attendance back to a standardized order, protect rights and interests, and find a balance between "manageable" and "not hurting people's hearts"? Lawyer Zhang Qingxin from Beijing Yingshan Law Firm believes that rules and regulations related to the vital interests of workers, such as attendance, must be discussed by the workers' congress or all employees, determined through equal consultation with the trade union or employee representatives, and made public to workers. Yao Junchang further stated that attendance rules should clearly specify the check-in time, location, method, card replacement process, handling of abnormal attendance, appeal channels, and penalty gradients, without vague clauses. And progressive penalties such as verbal reminders, written warnings, and termination of contracts should be set up. Minor defects should not be punished or only reminded, and absenteeism or dismissal should not be directly recognized. Not all positions and scenarios are suitable for the 'one size fits all' timed clock in mode. ”Yang Baoquan suggested that companies should flexibly set attendance methods according to the characteristics of different positions. "For administrative, production, and other positions that require fixed attendance, fixed-point clock in can be strictly implemented; but for field and sales positions, a results oriented assessment method is more suitable." "Employers must follow the principles of reasonableness and moderation when verifying whether employees actually attend, and may require necessary proof to eliminate the tedious requirements of repeatedly submitting materials and multiple levels of approval. For workers, they should plan their commuting in advance, avoid proxy clock ins or false clock ins, and promptly retain evidence and replenish cards when the attendance system is abnormal. ”Zhang Qingxin said. (Looking into the New Era) (At the request of the interviewee, some names are pseudonyms)