An Electrical Contractor Time Tracking App for Crews That Split Their Day

An electrical shop rarely has one kind of day. One journeyman spends three weeks on a commercial fit-out while another does a panel upgrade in the morning and two small service calls in the afternoon, with an apprentice riding along. JobSnap is an electrical contractor time tracking app that puts the clock on each phone, ties every hour to the right job by GPS, and keeps the photos of the rough-in with the job they belong to.

Where an electrical shop loses hours and proof

Most shops run two or three people per van, a journeyman and one or two apprentices. New construction means long stretches on one site: rough-in, then a gap while the drywallers work, then finishing. Service work means three or four addresses a day and a stop at the supply house in between. The leaks show up in the same places every week:

• Apprentice hours. The apprentice spends the day with a journeyman and nobody writes down which jobs he was on. Those hours matter for your job costing and for his apprenticeship record, and the rules for logging them vary by province.
• The small extras. "While you're here, can you add a plug in the garage?" Twenty minutes, never written down, never billed.
• Work that gets covered. Once the walls are closed, the only proof of how the boxes and runs were done is a photo, if someone took it and can find it.
• Time and material tickets. The GC says your crew left at two. Your journeyman says four. Nobody has a record.

How an electrical crew uses JobSnap

• Each person has a clock. The journeyman and the apprentice clock in on their own phones, or the foreman clocks in the whole crew on a big site. Shifts can start on their own when they arrive at the job. See time tracking.
• Hours split by address. On a service day, each arrival and departure lands on that job, so the panel upgrade and the two calls each carry their own labour.
• Geofences sized to the work. A radius around a house, a custom boundary around a commercial building or a subdivision. A punch from the supply house parking lot isn't blocked; it is flagged for review. See GPS geofencing.
• Photos before the walls close. The JobSnap camera picks the nearest job, so photos of the rough-in and the panel file themselves. Draw an arrow on a junction box, then share a batch with the inspector or the GC. See the jobsite camera.
• Supply house receipts. Receipt mode reads the receipt and attaches it to the job, not the van console.
• Extras written the same day. The daily report asks what caused delays or extra work. That is where the garage plug gets written down before anyone forgets it.
• Estimates from your own prices. Save items you quote often, like a service upgrade or a pot light installed, with a unit price. Duplicate last month's estimate for a similar job, and turn it into an invoice when the work is done. See estimates and invoices.
• Rented lifts. Equipment tracking logs a scissor lift against its job, so one sitting idle on a finished site shows up.

Shop mornings and job days

If the crew meets at the shop to load the vans, put a tablet by the door in kiosk mode. It stays locked on the time clock, so everyone punches in on the same device, and leaving kiosk mode takes the manager's sign-in. From there, the schedule assigns crews to jobs by day: a two-week commercial fit-out, or three service addresses on the same afternoon, each with its own hours and photos. The same setup works for plumbing shops.

What it costs

$5 CAD per active employee per month, with a $20 minimum and every feature included. A shop with four journeymen and three apprentices on the clock pays $35 a month. When the apprentices leave for their school block, pause them instead of deleting them and the bill drops to $20 until they are back. The first 30 days are free, and no credit card is needed to start.

Questions electrical contractors ask

Can the apprentice have different hours from the journeyman on the same job?

Yes. Each person has their own punches. If the apprentice stays an hour to pull wire, his hours show it. Supervisors can correct an entry, and the correction stays visible.

Can I bill a time and material job from the hours?

The timesheet shows each person's hours on that job with start and end times. You add the labour as a line on the invoice, and the timesheet is your backup if the GC questions it.

Does it work with QuickBooks?

Approved hours export to QuickBooks with regular and overtime hours separated. With QuickBooks Online, customers, estimates and invoices can sync too.