Questions

Yes. ShiftFence (sometimes written Shift Fence) is a GPS geofence time clock made by ShiftFence LLC in Alexandria, Virginia, for parking, valet, security, staffing and cleaning crews. Our official website is shiftfence.com.

Start with a free 15-day trial. If you continue: $750 one-time assisted setup, then $150 per month for up to 40 active workers and $0.50 per month for each active worker above 40. An active worker is someone who records at least one punch during the billing month; admin-only accounts are free. Every feature is included.

We do the setup for you: we map every job site and set each geofence radius (including tricky spots like garages and gates), add your workers, managers and employee IDs, run live training for your managers, help workers get started on day one, and set up your logo and your own yourcompany.shiftfence.com address. Send us your staff list as a spreadsheet and we set up everyone's accounts. Most time clock apps hand you a login. We hand you a working system. The setup fee is billed only if you continue after the free 15-day trial.

Yes. Every new company gets a free 15-day trial. We set up your job sites, you invite your team, and you use it on real shifts with up to 20 workers. No card is needed, and nothing is charged during the trial.

We email reminders before it ends. If you choose a paid plan, you can continue clocking in. Otherwise, clock-ins pause and you have 30 days to export company records. After that window, company data may be deleted from active systems, with limited legal-retention and backup exceptions explained in our policies.

Each job site has a location and a radius. When a worker taps Clock in, their phone sends its location and our servers check the distance to the site. If they are outside the fence, the punch is refused and the attempt is logged.

We use server-side distance checks, reject readings with poor GPS accuracy, flag impossible travel speeds and shared phones, and stamp punches with server time. No phone-based GPS check can guarantee a person’s identity or rule out sophisticated location spoofing.

No. Punches can't be edited or deleted by anyone. Mistakes are fixed with a correction request that a supervisor approves, and the original punch stays in the history.

Not yet, and we are upfront about it: ShiftFence does not have an App Store or Google Play app today. It is a web app (PWA). Workers open your company's ShiftFence address on their phone and can add it to their home screen, where it opens like an app and can receive notifications. Because it runs in the browser, location is only checked while the app is open, such as at clock-in and clock-out.

No. You pay the setup fee and the monthly price shown on our pricing page. No hardware, no add-ons, no per-feature charges and no cancellation fee. Admin-only accounts are free.

No. A punch needs a live connection and is not queued offline. If the service or your connection is down, write down when you started, took breaks and finished, and tell your manager. Once it returns, open Requests, choose the scheduled shift and submit each missed punch with its time and an outage explanation. Your manager approves or denies the request; the original request and decision stay on record. If the shift was not scheduled, ask the manager to add it first.

The phone requests a fresh location reading when a worker taps Clock in, Clock out, Start break or End break. Optional on-shift check-ins run at the company's chosen interval only after the company enables them, the worker signs the location policy and agrees in the app, and the worker is clocked in with the app open. A locked phone, closed app or browser in the background may stop check-ins; there is no reliable continuous tracking.

An alert requires a recent off-site location check-in during an active shift with optional checks enabled, location policy signed, worker agreement and the app open and visible. The worker and manager can then be notified; delivery depends on connection and notification settings. Opening the app alone does not immediately check location, and a stale clock-in point is not proof of current presence. Managers investigate and decide whether to clock out with a recorded reason. An optional, not-recommended auto clock-out setting exists but is off by default.

Workers are never stuck. Each company sets its own rules: a late grace period (up to 60 minutes), an early clock-in window, GPS accuracy limits and site radius, so small GPS drift does not block anyone. If a clock-in still fails, the worker submits a missed-punch request and a manager approves it, or a manager fixes the time directly. Every fix is recorded alongside the original, so hours are paid correctly and the history stays honest.

Weekly payroll with overtime, daily hours, and punch-level detail, as PDF, Excel or CSV, with your logo.

Yes. Each company can only ever see its own workers, sites and punches. Admins can download all of their company's data at any time.

Set each site's radius so workers can clock in at the entrance, gate or ramp before heading below ground. If a worker still can't get a signal or connection, they write down their times and submit a missed-punch request for the scheduled shift once they're back in range. The supervisor approves or denies it, and the original request and decision stay on record, so no hours are lost.

No. Location is read when a worker taps Clock in, Clock out, Start break or End break. Optional on-shift check-ins only run if the company turns them on, the worker agrees, and the worker is clocked in with the app open. Nothing runs in the background, and ShiftFence cannot see where workers are after they clock out, on days off, or when the app is closed.

We chose not to collect faces or fingerprints. Biometric privacy laws in several states put strict rules and penalties on storing that data, and face checks often fail in dark lots and on older phones. Instead, ShiftFence checks location on the server, flags shared or new phones, and lets managers block unrecognized devices. Like any phone-based clock, it can't fully prove who is holding the phone.