What Timekeeping Go-Live Includes
Timekeeping go-live covers more than activating software. It includes configuration, employee setup, project and charge-code availability, approval workflows, testing, training, cutover procedures, and validation of the first production timecards.
- Employee configuration: Users, departments, labor categories, supervisors, and approval relationships are established.
- Charge-code setup: Contracts, projects, tasks, indirect activities, and other allowable time classifications are available for employees.
- Timecard rules: Work schedules, submission deadlines, corrections, leave codes, and approval requirements are configured.
- Integration: Approved time data can flow to payroll, project accounting, billing, and the general ledger.
- Training and support: Employees and approvers understand the new process before the first production timecard.
How Timekeeping Go-Live Works
The process generally begins with configuration and data preparation. Employee records, organizational structures, contracts, projects, labor categories, and charge codes are reviewed and mapped to the new system. The implementation team then tests time entry, approval, correction, and downstream accounting workflows.
Before the cutover date, the organization establishes a final timekeeping period in the legacy environment and determines when employees begin entering time in the new system. A controlled transition helps ensure that each labor hour is recorded once and associated with the correct project or indirect activity.
After activation, the first production timecards should be monitored closely. Finance and project teams can compare submitted hours with expected work assignments, review unusual coding patterns, and confirm that approved hours reach downstream payroll and project accounting processes correctly.
DCAA Requirements and Timekeeping Controls
Government contractors need timekeeping processes that support accurate labor cost records and clear audit trails. Timekeeping Compliance is the broader control concept covering practices that help ensure employee time is recorded accurately, approved appropriately, and supported by consistent procedures.
The DCAA Timekeeping & Labor Cost Tracking Guide provides educational guidance on DCAA timekeeping requirements, labor cost tracking practices, compliance rules, and maintaining audit readiness. During go-live, these principles can be translated into system configuration, employee procedures, supervisor approvals, and correction workflows.
Timekeeping controls should also align with the organization's accounting structure. The chart of accounts connects accounting operations with general ledger reporting and financial controls, while project and labor coding provides the additional dimensions needed for contract cost reporting.
Timekeeping and ERP Integration
Timekeeping data becomes financially useful when it moves accurately into the systems that calculate labor costs, project performance, billing, and financial reports. An ERP implementation should therefore define how approved time interacts with the ERP's project accounting and general ledger structures.
The ERP Integration Layer: How It Powers Finance Automation explains the role of an integration layer in connecting finance workflows with live ERP data. During timekeeping go-live, this integration can determine how approved labor transactions move between timekeeping, payroll, project accounting, and financial reporting environments.
Timekeeping also intersects with operational spending. For example, employees may record hours against projects while related materials or services are acquired through procurement. Keeping these processes aligned gives project managers and finance teams a more complete view of project activity and costs.
System Go-Live and Post-Launch Support
System Go Live describes the transition from implementation and testing into active production use. For timekeeping, the event should include a defined cutover schedule, confirmed user access, validated charge codes, communication of deadlines, and clear ownership for resolving questions.
The first payroll or accounting cycle after activation is an important validation point. Teams should review timecard completion, approval status, rejected entries, project coding, labor classifications, and downstream postings. Go Live Support provides the operational assistance needed during this transition, helping users address process questions and allowing implementation teams to monitor early production activity.
Best Practices for Timekeeping Go-Live
- Test end to end: Validate time entry from employee submission through approval, payroll, project costing, billing, and accounting.
- Confirm charge codes: Verify that active contracts, projects, tasks, indirect activities, and labor categories are available before employees begin production entry.
- Train by role: Give employees, supervisors, payroll teams, project managers, and finance users training appropriate to their responsibilities.
- Define correction procedures: Establish how missed entries, incorrect project codes, and approved-time corrections are documented and processed.
- Monitor the first cycles: Review timecard completion, approval timing, coding accuracy, and accounting integration after go-live.
Summary
Timekeeping Go-Live activates a new system for production labor and project time recording. For government contractors, careful configuration of employees, charge codes, approval workflows, accounting structures, and ERP integrations helps establish accurate labor cost tracking from the first production period. Strong testing, role-based training, compliance controls, and post-launch monitoring support reliable financial reporting and contract cost management.