The spread of novel coronavirus has raised awareness of hygiene as the virus could spread through touching surfaces, such as keypads, phone cases, and any materials that are not regularly sterilised. The effect of this awareness has made touchless tools to be in high demand, with the market expected to reach $65.9 billion by 2027.
The shift to touchless practices has also been affecting businesses with the immediate impact including suspension of time and attendance systems that are touch-based. Two-factor authentication systems are being downgraded to RFID-only, abandoning the keypad and/or biometric components to better the healthcare of employees.
See also: 5 Ideas to Create Virus-Free Workplace
Not only could touchless systems like biometric attendance improve healthcare within an organisation, it can also make changes to employee’s productivity and efficiency. For example, a manual system can be very cumbersome and tedious to be implemented for employees. A manual process is also prone to errors which can translate to error outcomes. With an automated management system, an employer can drastically save time and effort in keeping track of their employees, thus helping them to use their time to concentrate on work that matters most and increase productivity, as well as outcomes.
Touchless management systems could also ensure the safety of client and consumers, without compromising their convenience and privacy. It will also improve the accuracy of data collected as a result of an automated system. In short, the touchless system is a reliable, real-time choice for an employer to allow employees as well as the board member within an organisation to be congruent with their work responsibilities.
Without the right setting or integration of data (if any), the touchless system would in fact give reverse disadvantage, such as lower productivity and could consume more of employees’ time to deal with an error system.
Moreover, most touchless systems would need to be integrated with the Internet and this could pose a higher risk to identity and cyber theft, especially for facial biometric attendance. Facial biometric attendance is more hackable because once a hacker gains access to a victim’s ID, it’ll be difficult for the company to reset their face or finger biometric. The alternative to facial is tap phone or ID card which can open a secured office premise through the access control device.
In short, there is always gain and lose in every system, be it manual or automatic. As companies need to ensure health and hygiene in the workplace, an automatic and touchless system is more favourable. Therefore, it is always safer to choose a touchless attendance system vendor that is certified in terms of its credibility and security system.
Read also: Data Protection Law in India that HR Leaders Should Know
