The HRMS That Starts Where Hiring Ends
Daybook by CheesyHire takes over once someone is hired. Today it runs payroll-grade time and attendance — clock-ins on phone, web or a shared kiosk, schedules, leave, approvals and payroll-ready exports — with every hour traceable to a real punch and the person who approved it.
Illustration with fictional sample data — Northwind Depot is not a real company.
Product facts, not borrowed numbers
- 3ways to clock in — a phone, the web, or a shared kiosk with a personal PIN
- 0punches ever overwritten — a correction is a new version beside the original
- 16countries’ public holiday calendars built in, imported for a year in one click
- 1person who can reopen a locked pay period: the owner, with a written reason
Attendance Breaks in Four Familiar Places
Hours are rebuilt from memory Someone forgot to clock in on Tuesday, so on Friday the week is pieced together from messages and best guesses. A forgotten clock-out inflates payroll An open shift runs all night and nobody notices until the payslip does.
Late is argued, not recorded Whether 09:20 was late depends on who remembers the schedule, and the answer changes with whoever is asked. Payroll gets a copy of a copy Hours move between tools by hand, and every copy is another chance for a number to change with nobody able to say who changed it.
Clock in.Take a break.Clock out.
One button on a phone or laptop. The server stamps the time the moment the punch arrives, and the device’s own clock is kept beside it so any gap is visible rather than hidden.
No work email? A tablet by the door and a personal PIN. Same schedules, same grace periods, same rules — the kiosk is never a side door around them.
Illustration with fictional sample data — Northwind Depot is not a real company.
One Record. Every Attendance Problem, Answered.
Punches from a phone, the web or a kiosk, stamped by the server the moment they arrive.
A schedule with a grace period decides — judged by the rules that were in force that day.
One queue for late, absent, corrections and auto clock-outs — each cleared with a reason.
A correction is a new version. The original punch stays on the record beside it.
Facts, Never Scores
No productivity ratings, no rankings, no screenshots. Daybook records what happened against what was expected, and stops there.
Lock the period, then export payable time, unpaid breaks and paid leave as separate columns.
Everything a Working Week Needs
One record sits behind every screen. This is what it covers today — each of these is in the product now, not on a slide.
- Clock in on a phone
- Shared kiosk with PIN
- Paid and unpaid breaks
- Fixed and flexible schedules
- Grace periods
- Late and absent detection
- Automatic clock-out, flagged
- One exception queue
- Corrections with an author
- Accept with a reason
- Leave requests and balances
- Half days
- Public holidays for 16 countries
- Timesheet approval
- Period lock
- Payroll CSV exports
- Teams and manager scope
- Org chart
- Dated pay rates
- Daily manager digest
- Your own sending domain
- Per-company branding
- API keys for CheesyHire
- Sandbox for testing
- Append-only audit trail
From Hire to Payroll in Four Steps
Setup is front-loaded on purpose. Once the calendar and the schedules are right, the weekly routine is clearing a queue and pressing approve.
- 1The hire arrives
- 2Set the calendar and the rules
- 3Run the week
- 4Approve, lock, export
- Step 1
The hire arrives
CheesyHire sends the new person through Daybook’s API, or you add them yourself. Someone with an email gets an invitation; someone without one gets a kiosk PIN.
- Step 2
Set the calendar and the rules
Import your country’s public holidays in one click, then create the schedules and grace periods that decide what late means.
- Step 3
Run the week
People clock in and out. Anything that deviated from the schedule lands in one queue, for their own manager and nobody else.
- Step 4
Approve, lock, export
Approve each timesheet, lock the period, and hand payroll a CSV it can read without a spreadsheet in between.
The Product Records. People Decide.
Daybook compares what happened with what was expected and shows you the difference.
Every acceptance, correction, approval and reopening is written down with a name and a reason.
Nothing is scored, ranked or quietly fixed behind anyone’s back.
The decisions stay with your managers. Always.
Time and Attendance Today. A Complete HRMS Next.
CheesyHire stays the place you hire. Once someone is hired, Daybook takes over their working life — starting with every hour they work.
- Clock in and out on a phone, the web or a shared kiosk with a PIN
- Schedules and working hours with grace periods
- Late, absent and left-early detection
- Corrections with an append-only audit trail
- Leave requests, balances and half days
- Public holiday calendars, imported per year
- Timesheet approval, period lock and owner-only reopen
- Payroll-ready CSV exports
- Teams, manager scope and an org chart
- API keys, idempotent writes and a sandbox for CheesyHire
- Your company’s name, logo, accent colour and appearance
- Signing in with a CheesyHire account
- Automatic setup for companies that hire in CheesyHire
- HR documents
- Onboarding
- Performance reviews
Roadmap items are documented, not scheduled. Each one gets its own specification before it is built, and nothing on this list is sold as if it already exists.
Why Teams Move Their Hours Off Spreadsheets
| The week | Spreadsheets and paper | Daybook |
|---|---|---|
| Recording time | Typed in later, from memory | Punched on a phone, the web or a kiosk |
| A forgotten clock-out | Found on payday | Closed, flagged and confirmed |
| A late arrival | Argued weeks later | Accepted with a reason, on the record |
| Fixing a mistake | Overwrite the cell | A new version; the original stays |
| Public holidays | A list for each person | One calendar everyone inherits |
| Closing the period | Anyone can still edit | Locked; only the owner reopens |
| Handing over to payroll | Copy, paste and hope | A CSV with separate columns |
Free From Day One
Daybook costs nothing to use. Create an organisation and every feature described on this site is there from the first punch.
Common Questions
01How does Daybook work with CheesyHire?
CheesyHire stays the place you hire. When someone is hired, CheesyHire sends the person to Daybook through its API, using their CheesyHire reference, so a retried request never creates the same person twice. From then on their working week lives in Daybook. A sandbox with test keys lets the connection be rehearsed without touching live data.
02What happens if someone forgets to clock out?
The shift is closed automatically at the maximum shift length — never at the moment somebody noticed — and flagged as auto-closed rather than counted as a full shift. The person is asked for the real time, and the correction is recorded next to the original.
03Do people without an email address work?
Yes — that is what the kiosk is for. Give them a PIN and they punch from a shared tablet at the door. They still get schedules, timesheets and exceptions like anyone else, and if they get an email later, every shift they punched comes with them.
04How do public holidays work?
They are one calendar for the whole organisation. Import your country’s published days or add your own, and every person inherits them — there is no per-person holiday list to keep in sync. Anyone who works that day is recorded as working a holiday.
05Can a manager change someone’s hours?
A manager can approve a correction, and every correction keeps the original time visible with a reason and their name against it. Nobody, including an owner, can silently overwrite a punch.
06What can a manager actually see?
Only the people on their teams: their queue, board, timesheets, schedules, PINs and leave balances. Pay rates stay with admins and owners.
07Can we get the numbers out?
Every report exports as CSV — attendance, payroll summary and raw time entries — with the same figures you see on screen for the same date range.
08Is it really free?
Yes. There are no plans and no per-person prices. Create an organisation and every feature described on this site is available from the first punch.
Every term the product uses is explained in the product guide.