Keeping track of employee time cards is one of the challenges faced by many construction companies. Fortunately, good tools have been available for quite some time to assist in streamlining this paperwork. For almost 15 years we have used Exaktime software to allow employees to enter their time and sync it with the office. That’s so long that in 2008 the crews entered their time on a shared Palm Pilot. In the years since, with the advent of the iPhone and cloud, the software went online, making it easier and more instantaneous.

Great, another business challenge solved! That was true until Exaktime, the independent company based in Southern California, was purchased by Arcoro. Two things happened, our small business account was too small, and our yearly fees were too affordable for Arcoro.

Last year we were caught flat footed, Arcoro’s yearly renewal would be almost 300% more expensive, from around $550 yearly to $1,500. We protested, management reviewed. They would deign to renew us at the bargain rate of $1,000.

This year another renewal, and a return to a $1,500 yearly fee.  Enter ClockShark an Exaktime competitor based in Chico, CA. We met with a sales rep and found that ClockShark was a better system with more features for us than the old software. The bonus, all this at a cost less than half that of Arcoro/Exaktime.

We again protested the rate increase to Arcoro this year, their response: