Time Card Calculator

How to use the time card calculator

1. Type each day’s clock-in and clock-out times, like 8a and 4:30p. If you leave off AM or PM, the clock-out time is taken as the first one after the clock-in, and the times are written out in full so you can check them.
2. Add any unpaid break in minutes. Shifts past midnight are handled automatically.
3. Open Options for a two-week card, rounding, overtime rules and your hourly rate. Then print, copy or download the card.

Who uses a time card calculator

• Hourly employees checking that the hours and overtime on a paycheck or payslip match the time they actually worked.
• Managers and small business owners adding up paper time cards, time clock printouts or timesheets before running payroll.
• Contractors and part-time workers keeping a weekly record of work hours to invoice or to keep.

It works as a weekly timesheet calculator, a time clock calculator for punch times, and a biweekly time card calculator for two-week pay periods. For a single shift, the hours calculator is quicker.

How to calculate hours worked on a time card

Each day’s hours are the clock-out time minus the clock-in time, minus unpaid breaks. The days are added in hours and minutes first and the total is converted to decimal hours once, so the total never drifts by a hundredth the way adding rounded decimals can. Need a single conversion? Use the time to decimal calculator.

Example time card

42:15 is 42.25 hours. Under the US federal 40-hour rule that is 40:00 regular and 2:15 (2.25 h) overtime. At $18 an hour: $720.00 regular pay plus $60.75 overtime (2.25 × $27) = $780.75 gross.

Overtime on a time card: US and Canada

In the US, federal law requires at least 1.5 times the regular rate for hours over 40 in a workweek for non-exempt employees (29 U.S.C. § 207). Each workweek stands alone: a two-week card is never averaged. Some states also have daily overtime, such as California after 8 hours in a day. Outside the US, choose a Canadian province or enter your own limits and rates under Custom. Choose the rule under Options; the overtime calculator explains the rules, bonuses and double time in detail. This is general information, not legal advice.

Time clock rounding and the 7-minute rule

Some employers round clock times to the nearest 5, 6 or 15 minutes. With quarter-hour rounding, often called the 7-minute rule, 8:07 rounds down to 8:00 and 8:08 rounds up to 8:15. US federal rules allow rounding only when it averages out and doesn’t underpay employees over time (29 CFR 785.48(b)).

Rounding is mainly a US practice. In the EU, employers must have a system that measures each worker’s daily working time (EU Court of Justice, C-55/18), so check your national rules and contract before rounding.

The calculator rounds only the first clock-in and the last clock-out of each day, never the times you clock out and back in for a meal. In California, meal-break punches can’t be rounded (Donohue v. AMN Services, 2021), and whether rounding ordinary work time is allowed at all is before the California Supreme Court in Camp v. Home Depot.

Time cards in the UK and Europe

European rules mostly limit how long you work rather than how overtime is paid:

• European Union: average working time can’t exceed 48 hours a week including overtime, averaged over up to 4, 6 or 12 months; you get a rest break when you work more than 6 hours, and at least 11 hours’ rest between working days (European Commission). Employers must measure each worker’s daily working time (EU Court of Justice, 2019). Overtime pay isn’t set by EU law but by each country and by collective agreements.
• Overtime pay by country: France pays +25% after 35 hours a week and +50% after 43 (Service-Public.fr). Germany, the Netherlands and the UK don’t set an overtime rate by law, and in Spain and Italy the rate comes from your agreement. See overtime in Europe for each country and its source.
• United Kingdom: the limit is 48 hours a week on average, normally over 17 weeks, unless you opt out (GOV.UK). You’re entitled to a 20-minute break when you work more than 6 hours, and whether it’s paid depends on your contract (GOV.UK). There’s no legal right to overtime pay; your contract sets it (GOV.UK).

To use the calculator, open Options and choose France, No overtime, or Custom with your contract’s numbers, and pick your currency next to the hourly rate. Each week’s total is shown, so you can compare it with the 48-hour average.

Time card hours in Excel or Google Sheets

One row per day: clock-in in column B, clock-out in C and the unpaid break in minutes in D. Hours for the day, in E:

=(MOD(C2-B2, 1) - D2/1440) * 24

Fill it down for each day, then total the week with =SUM(E2:E8). Round only the weekly total, with =ROUND(SUM(E2:E8), 2), so the hundredths don’t drift. Hours over 40 are =MAX(0, SUM(E2:E8) - 40). Or skip the formulas: the calculator above does the same and downloads a CSV that opens in Excel.

Check your paycheck or payslip against your time card

Payroll shows hours as decimals, so 42 hours 15 minutes appears as 42.25. If your paystub or payslip says 42.15, that is 42 hours 9 minutes, and 6 minutes are missing. Convert any figure with the decimal to time calculator, then compare it with the total here.