An employee productivity tool without the surveillance
Productivity insights without surveillance, with optional, opt-in monitoring you switch on. Tickin shows how the working day actually went (hours, attendance, breaks, overtime and where project time goes) from the clock your team already uses in Slack or the web (Microsoft Teams on the Scale plan). Nothing watches anyone's screen unless you decide it should.
Shown with sample data. Employees see their own record; team leads see their team.
Productivity insights from the work day itself
Every clock-in, break and clock-out is already a record of how the day went. Tickin turns it into the numbers a manager actually needs: hours worked against each person's required hours, who started late or left early, how long breaks ran, overtime, absences and approved leave. None of it needs software on anyone's computer, and none of it is guesswork: it is the same record your timesheets and payroll are built from.
Ask in Slack or Teams, get the answer in the chat
Managers do not have to open a dashboard to see how the team is doing. In Slack, /tickin team today shows who is working, late, on a break or on leave right now; /tickin report week gives the attendance figures for the period; and /tickin insights shows attendance trends for you, or for your team if you lead one. A channel can subscribe to a daily, weekly or monthly report, so the numbers arrive on their own. The same reports work in Microsoft Teams on the Scale plan.
Where the hours go: projects and tasks
On the Scale plan, hours can be logged against projects and tasks, so productivity stops being a single number and becomes a map of where the time went. Leads see time by project, task and person, tasks move across a board from To Do to Done, and billable work can be flagged. Output is judged by the work that moved, not by how busy a mouse looked.
Insights first, monitoring only if you choose it
Most monitoring tools start watching the moment you install them. Tickin starts with nothing installed and nothing watched: out of the box it records worked hours, breaks and attendance, and captures no screenshots and no activity. For many teams that is all the productivity data they ever need, and it is data employees can see and trust, because every person sees their own record.
Optional, opt-in monitoring you switch on
Some teams want more than hours: which applications and websites the working day went to. Tickin can record that, but it never starts by itself. It takes two deliberate steps: the Desktop App add-on, available on any paid plan, and then a separate switch under Integrations → Productivity & Screenshot Monitoring that only an admin can flip and that defaults to off. Buying the add-on does not start it. Without the add-on the setting is still visible but disabled, marked “Requires the Desktop add-on”, so you can see what it would unlock before you pay. Turning it off never requires the add-on: an admin can always stop monitoring, whatever the billing state, and if the add-on is removed, monitoring and screenshots switch off with it.
What it records once it is on
For employees and team leads running the Desktop App while clocked in, Tickin records the name of the active application, the website domain if a browser is in front — github.com, for example, the domain only and not the full URL or page content — and a periodic screenshot. Applications and domains are sorted into categories, and each category counts as productive, neutral or unproductive toward the score. Admins can reclassify anything, and reclassifying applies to history as well as to future activity.
What it never records
Keystroke content: the app registers that typing happened, never what was typed. Anything during a break. Anything during idle time. Anything at all for admins and sys-admins, who are not tracked by design — an admin running the Desktop App produces no activity and no screenshots. And anything while clocked out: capture is tied to an open work session, not to the app being installed.
Screenshots need the employee’s own permission
On macOS, screenshots require the system Screen Recording permission, which only the person at the keyboard can grant. Tickin cannot grant it for them and does not try. Decline it and everything else still works: application and website time is still recorded, and no screenshots are taken. The dashboard shows a note explaining that screenshots are missing because the permission was not granted, so an empty gallery is never mistaken for an employee doing nothing.
Idle time is measured, then removed
Locking your screen or letting the display sleep starts idle immediately — the fifteen-minute threshold applies only to an unlocked machine left untouched. Idle is measured from the moment activity actually stopped, not from the moment the screen locked. It is then subtracted from worked hours before overtime is calculated, so idle time can never be paid as overtime.
Who sees what, and how to stop it
Admins see everyone in the workspace. Team leads see only their own team and cannot see anyone who does not report to them. Employees see their own record and nobody else’s. Switch the toggle off and capture stops on every device within about ten minutes — nobody has to reinstall or restart anything.
Frequently asked questions
- What is an employee productivity tool without surveillance?
- One that measures productivity from the work record itself (hours worked, attendance, breaks, overtime and time on projects) instead of watching screens. That is how Tickin works by default: it records nothing beyond the clock until an admin chooses to turn monitoring on.
- Does Tickin monitor employees by default?
- No. Monitoring is off until an admin turns it on, and it also needs the Desktop App add-on. Both have to be true. Out of the box Tickin records worked hours, breaks and attendance, and captures no screenshots and no activity.
- What exactly does it capture when it is on?
- The name of the active application, the website domain (the domain only, not the full URL or page content), and a periodic screenshot — only while an employee is clocked in and actively working. It never captures keystroke content, anything during breaks or idle time, or anything at all for admins.
- Can employees see their own data?
- Yes. Every employee can see their own record: their score, tracked and idle time, their applications and websites, and their own screenshots. They cannot see anyone else’s.
- What if someone declines the screenshot permission?
- Nothing breaks. On macOS the Screen Recording permission is granted by the employee, not by Tickin. If it is declined, application and website time is still recorded and no screenshots are taken, and the dashboard explains why the gallery is empty rather than leaving it looking like inactivity.
- How do I turn monitoring off?
- Switch it off under Integrations → Productivity & Screenshot Monitoring. Capture stops on every device within about ten minutes. Turning it off never depends on your subscription — an admin can always stop monitoring.