Setting up geofenced attendance

"I was there, honest" does not hold up when a client queries a visit. OpsCores records attendance against a site boundary: a check-in captures the time, the location, the accuracy of that location and, if you require it, a verification selfie.

The rule that shapes everything: it never blocks a worker

This is the most important thing to understand before you roll it out, and it is a deliberate design decision rather than a limitation.

A worker is never prevented from starting. If GPS is denied, switched off, inaccurate or simply unavailable inside a steel-framed building, the check-in still succeeds. What changes is the record: it is marked as location unverified, the reason is stored, and it is flagged for a supervisor to review.

The alternative, refusing to let someone start their shift because a phone could not get a fix, moves an operational problem onto the person least able to fix it. So the app records the uncertainty honestly and routes it to a manager instead.

A QR checkpoint fallback covers the same situation deliberately: scanning a physical code at a known point records attendance where satellite positioning is not going to work.

What is actually captured

• Time in and time out.
• Latitude, longitude and the accuracy the device reported.
• Whether the position fell inside the site's geofence, computed on the server rather than trusted from the device.
• Optionally a selfie, uploaded to a private bucket and reachable only through a signed URL.

Because the geofence test runs server-side, a modified client cannot report itself as on site.

About the selfie, and what it does not do

If you enable selfie check-in, the app performs an on-device check that exactly one live face is present. Be clear about the boundary:

• It does not perform identity matching and cannot tell you the selfie is the right person.
• It never rejects a check-in. A failed or unclear check flags the record for a human to look at.
• Identity-matching face verification is an Enterprise capability and requires recorded biometric consent from the worker before it applies to them.

Anything stronger than that would be a claim about accuracy we are not prepared to make, and biometric identity checks carry obligations under UK GDPR that deserve a deliberate decision rather than a default toggle.

Timesheets that assemble themselves

Because attendance is captured as it happens, timesheets build from it rather than from memory. Each line is marked Signed, meaning worker-attested, or Instructed, meaning manager-directed, so a payroll query has an answer with a timestamp attached.

Sensible defaults per setting

• Construction and site services: geofence on, selfie commonly on, QR checkpoints for patrol rounds.
• Facilities management: geofence per building, so a portfolio keeps each site's attendance separate.
• Security: checkpoint scans across a patrol route, feeding the daily occurrence book.

Attendance records feed the same weekly evidence pack as your forms and briefings, so proof of who was on site sits alongside the work they did. See geofenced attendance in context.

The result: payroll-ready hours without chasing anyone, and an attendance record that is honest about what it does and does not know.