Small firms: the honest version
Most software aimed at small businesses is the big version with features removed and the price kept. This page starts somewhere else: with whether you need it.
When you probably do not need this
A small team on fixed salaried hours, with an opt-out register and a holiday system, can often demonstrate working time compliance without recording daily hours — regulation 9(3) says so in terms since January 2024. If that is you, a spreadsheet and a calendar may genuinely be enough, and we would rather you kept your money. Here is a free timesheet template, with no sign-up.
When you do
- Anyone paid by the hour, where pay divided by hours has to stand up for six years.
- Irregular hours or part-year staff, where holiday accrues at 12.07% of hours per pay period.
- Shifts, where the eleven-hour rest and the weekly rest break quietly and repeatedly.
- More than about five people, at which point consolidating spreadsheets becomes somebody’s Friday.
- Anyone who might dispute their hours — and the person with the record wins that.
What "small" means here in practice
- Free up to 3 employees, permanently, with every feature except the AI assistant. Not a trial.
- No hardware to buy from us. The terminal is any tablet with a browser; a card reader is optional and costs a few pounds a head.
- No IT. Nothing to install, nothing to patch, nothing to back up yourself.
- Priced by company size, not per head, so hiring inside a bracket costs nothing extra — which matters most precisely when you are small and growing.
- No minimum. Several vendors in this market bill a minimum invoice, a base fee or a minimum headcount. The table.
Half an hour, not a project
- Sign up. E-mail, password, your own installation. About a minute.
- Bring your people in from a spreadsheet, your current system or straight from payslips — with their holiday and hours balances, so day one matches what you had.
- Put a tablet by the door, or skip it and let people clock in on their phones.
Importing is free. We do not bill it as onboarding, which one vendor in our comparison charges from €400 for.
Questions we get
We have four people. Do we need this at all?
Possibly not, and we will say so. Regulation 9(3) lets you skip daily hours if you can demonstrate compliance another way, and a small team on fixed salaried hours often can. Where that stops being true is hourly pay, irregular hours and anyone near the minimum wage.
Is it really free for three employees?
Yes — no deadline, no card, every feature except the AI assistant, which is also included for the first 30 days. What is limited is company size, not features. The fourth employee needs a licence; everything already recorded stays readable and exportable whatever you decide.
How long does setup take?
The installation takes about a minute. Getting your people in with their balances takes under half an hour if you have a spreadsheet or a payslip. Putting the tablet on the wall takes ten.
We have no IT person.
Neither do most of our customers. There is nothing to install and nothing to maintain: a browser on a tablet, a browser on a phone, and updates that happen without anyone being told to apply them.
Free for up to 3 employees, forever
Thirty days with everything included, AI assistant and all, no card and no automatic renewal. When the trial ends, companies with up to 3 employees simply keep working for free. And within the first 60 days you get your money back if it does not fit.
Questions? Write to time@irot.com. We answer on working days, usually by the next one.