"Rounding" of time clock punches

What is the name of your state? PA

I work for a company that has (lately) been making a habit of rounding off my time clock punches and altering the punch times (for me) in the computer. I am the company's only hourly, administrative worker and my shift times can run from 7:00-3:30 or 8:00-4:30. Because of extremely variable traffic patterns I can be anywhere from 10 minutes early to 10 minutes "late." The owners of the company have no problem with my 5-10 minute latenesses, basically this is a problem that I have with "HR."

Here is an example: If I punch in at 8:08 and leave at 4:40, they will round both times (to their advantage) to 8:15 and 4:30 respectively. Even though I've "done my time" and put in a solid 8, they get me for :15 every other day or so. They used to just zap at the end of the week with the paycheck. I caught them a few times (we get daily timeclock punch summaries) and now they are changing my punch times in the computer! Now, in the end, I know that even over four days, thats only an hour, and after taxes, thats likely to only amount to $10-$20 a week, but *still*...

What are the laws governing this? My last employer (I thought) re-wrote their timeclock policy so that employees would get paid for *all* their time worked. I actually like this job, so I am reluctant to stir the pot, but what should I do to set the "HR" department straight?

Thanks for any help in advance.

LBerry

Federal wage and hour laws don't address this per se but guidelines from the DOL make "rounding off" timekeeping practices permissible provided they don't unduly favor the employer. They have to even out over time so it's fair to both the employer and the employee.

So if you punch in a few minutes late, they can't "round forward" and also "round back" if you work a bit past customary quitting time This assumes you're actually WORKING past shift end. The employer does not have to pay for time spent on personal clean-up, getting your coat, socializing on the way out the door, and so forth.

What isn't clear to me though is whether your company has an automated timekeeping system or whether someone is really going in and changing your punches in order to short-change your pay. (If it's the later, then that's a real problem. Once your supervisor has approved your time, nobody else should be changing it without his/her permission. Secondly, short-changing your pay is illegal.)

If it's a timekeeping system, what has likely happened is that in setting up the "rules" in the timekeeping system, they put iin paramaters that said if an ee leaves between X and Y (i.e. 4:30 and 4:45), round back to 4:30. It's not unreasonable to assume that up to 15 minutes after customary quitting time won't be actual work time but rather "getting ready to leave" time. Automated timekeeping systems save a lot of work and are very accurate but the "rules" you have to program into them can get very frustrating since the computer can't differentiate between work time and personal time and naturally, if they set up the rules differently, then everyone will realize if they wait to punch out a few minutes longer, they'll all get a free 15 minutes of pay every day.

Anyway, having worked with these systems before, it's my guess that's what's going on, assuming your employer isn't out to cheat you out of actual compensible time.