Three-stage timecard approval: who signs what
5 minute read
A timecard that goes straight from a crew member to the accountant asks the accountant to verify something they did not see. Three stages fix that by putting each check with the person who has the information to make it: the department head knows the day happened, production knows it was authorized, accounting knows it can be paid.
The three stages
| Stage | Who | The question they can answer |
|---|---|---|
| 1 | Department head | Did this person work these hours, on my department, on this day? |
| 2 | Production | Was this day authorized, at this rate, against this budget line? |
| 3 | Accounting | Is this payable: coding, classification, eligibility on file? |
Each stage can only be actioned by the matching role. A producer cannot clear the department head stage on their behalf, which is the point: an approval that anyone can give is a record that nobody gave.
Why the department head goes first
They were there. A gaffer's wrap time is verifiable by the person who wrapped the department and by almost nobody else afterward. Push that check downstream and it stops being a check: production is comparing the timecard to a call sheet, and accounting is comparing it to nothing.
It also puts the correction where it is cheap. A wrong wrap time caught the same evening is a conversation. Caught at the payroll deadline, it is a hold on the whole batch.
What production is checking
Not whether the hours happened, which is settled by then. Whether they were meant to. Overtime nobody authorized, a day worked by someone who was not on the schedule, a rate that does not match the deal memo, a position that changed for the day and moves the cost to a different line.
Accounting as the last gate
The last stage is the only one about the payroll system rather than the production. Is there a project and account code, is the loan-out complete, is the union local and member ID present, is the W-9 or I-9 on file. These are the fields that bounce an import, and catching them here means catching them in a batch rather than one at a time.
Sending a day back
A rejection at any stage returns the day to the crew member with the reason attached, and the card resumes at the stage that rejected it once it is resubmitted. It does not restart from the beginning: the department head does not need to re-confirm a day they already confirmed because the account code was wrong.
Every decision is written to an audit log with who, what and when. On a production that gets audited, or one where a crew member disputes a day months later, the log is the answer.
Questions
- Is three stages too many for a small production?
- On a crew of six, the producer often is the department head and the accountant is external. The stages still separate the three questions; they are just answered by fewer people.
- Can a stage be skipped?
- The order is fixed: department head, production, accounting. Skipping is what a rejection and resubmission exists for, and it leaves a record either way.
- What happens to an approval given by mistake?
- It can be withdrawn, which returns the card to the stage that was decided. The original decision stays in the audit log rather than disappearing.