Troubleshooting Your Employee Time Clock | Blog

Virtual TimeClock Support Blog

Troubleshooting Your Employee Time Clock

October 1, 2010

There are a number of things that can affect the operation of your employee time clock software. Operating system updates, new antivirus software definition files, and hardware failure can all cause Virtual TimeClock, or any software, to become unstable. If you experience a problem or error when using your time and attendance software, it's important to note what happened or what's changed. Usually, a problem encountered with Virtual TimeClock is related to some other event like a hardware crash, an automatic system update, the installation of antivirus software, or the replacement of a printer. It's important to understand what's new or what happened immediately before the problem occurred in order to help isolate the cause of the problem.

If a problem with Virtual TimeClock can be reliably reproduced, it can be fixed. If the problem is intermittent or a one-time event, it's difficult to determine the cause and even more difficult to know when the problem has been solved. First, try to reproduce the steps or actions that led to the problem. Second, write down or screen capture any errors that occur along the way. Tracking the problem carefully provides the best opportunity to know what the issue is and when it's been resolved. Here are some basic troubleshooting tips that will fix most problems you may experience.

Restart the software
If Virtual TimeClock begins to produce unexpected results, the best first course of action is to quit and restart the program.

Reboot the computer
The system resources of a computer can become unpredictable for a number of reasons. If this occurs, Virtual TimeClock can perform unpredictably as well. If a computer reboot doesn't fix the problem with Virtual TimeClock, shut down the computer (do not rely on a restart!). Now start the computer again and test the functionality of Virtual TimeClock.

Rebuild data indexes
Occasionally, a system crash or other memory hiccup can cause Virtual TimeClock's indexes to become unreliable or inconsistent. The program indexes are checked for integrity at program start up so a restart of the program will usually fix any indexing issues. To rebuild the database indexes manually on Virtual TimeClock Pro:

  1. From the Tools menu, choose Database Maintenance.
  2. Click the Reindex button.
  3. Click the OK button to acknowledge that all database tables have been successfully reindexed.

Next steps

If the above troubleshooting tips don't fix the problem, try some of these additional troubleshooting steps.

  • Software updates - check the Virtual TimeClock software release notes to see if the problem you're experiencing has already been fixed and included in an update.
  • Web site help - Many of our support inquiries can be answered in the list of our customer's most commonly asked questions, the archives of product newsletters and technical articles, and the various training and installation guides available for your employee time clock software.
  • Contact us - contact a member of the time clock software technical support team for further assistance.