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How to enable Facial Verification

Updated

Audience

HR Administrators / People & Culture and Payroll support teams who:

  • Own time & attendance configuration in Roubler
  • Need to enable and manage Facial Verification for clock-ins

  • Coordinate with internal compliance, IT and Roubler Support on biometric consent

Description

Facial Verification is an optional time-and-attendance feature that uses AI to compare clock-in/clock-out photos against an employee’s historical photos. It helps to:

  • Reduce time theft and “buddy clocking”
  • Improve payroll accuracy and auditability

  • Protect both the organisation and employees by verifying who actually worked

Because Facial Verification processes biometric data, Roubler requires explicit employee consent and is designed to comply with frameworks such as POPIA and GDPR.

Steps

1. Before you enable Facial Verification

  1. Align internally with:
    • HR / People & Culture / Legal on biometric consent and privacy
    • Payroll on how Facial Verification will be used in timesheet review and escalation

    • IT on device readiness (working cameras on tablets/phones)

  2. Decide your consent model:
    • Default opt-in for all employees (organisation takes responsibility for recorded consent), or

    • Individual opt-in, where each employee explicitly consents in their profile

Note: Facial Verification is optional and not enabled by default on all tenants.

2. Enable Facial Verification at company level

Depending on your configuration and permissions, enabling the feature usually involves both a setting in Roubler and support from Roubler:

  1. Check Company Settings
    • Go to Settings → Company Settings → Clocking

    • Look for a Facial verification option under clocking/attendance settings. 

  2. If you can see the toggle and have permission:
    • Turn Facial verification = On for your company.

    • Save your changes.

  3. If you cannot see the toggle or cannot switch it on:
    • Contact your internal Roubler/System Administrator or your Roubler Success Manager / Support and request:
      • Activation of Facial Verification for your account

      • Your preferred consent model (default opt-in vs individual opt-in)

3. Guide employees to give consent

By law, Employees need to give consent for their Employer to verify their identity.

Please see this article for more information about this requirement:

 Facial Verification & Biometric Consent Compliance

Most Employees will give this consent during the onboarding process if they were invited to onboard and completed this process.

For any Employee that needs to give consent they can follow the below steps:

From the Roubler mobile app:

  1. Employee opens the Roubler app and signs in.
  2. Goes to Profile / Personal Information.
  3. Selects Facial Verification.
  4. Activates the Consent toggle or button to allow Facial Verification.

From the web portal (employee profile):

  1. Employee logs in on web.
  2. Opens their Profile.
  3. Finds the Facial Verification consent section.

  4. Provides or withdraws consent as appropriate.

Make sure you:

  • Communicate why Facial Verification is used (fraud prevention, payroll accuracy, fairness).

  • Provide links or summaries of your privacy and consent policy.

4. Verify that Facial Verification is working

Once enabled and consent is in place:

  1. Have a test employee clock in/out a few times to build their photo history (system needs initial photos; a profile is built after about three shifts).

  2. Confirm on Timesheets that:
    • Normal clocks show no errors when photos match.

    • When a different person clocks as that employee, Roubler can raise an “Invalid employee clock photo” alert on the timesheet (depending on your threshold and alert configuration).

  3. Adjust your matching threshold if required (e.g. lower it for poorer camera quality).

Troubleshooting

A. No facial-verification alerts on timesheets

Check:

  1. Employee consent

    • If an employee has not given consent, Roubler will not flag mismatches on timesheets, even if Facial Verification is enabled globally.

    • Verify consent in the employee’s profile or ask them to follow the steps in section 4.
  2. Enough photo history

    • The system needs at least three shifts’ worth of clock photos before it builds an accurate profile.

  3. Feature actually enabled for the account

    • Confirm with your System Administrator or CSM that Facial Verification is active in your company configuration.

B. Employees can’t find where to give consent

  1. Confirm they’re using the latest Roubler mobile app and a supported OS version, then direct them to:

    • Profile → Facial Verification in the app.

  2. If they still can’t see the option, check whether Facial Verification is enabled for your account at all (see Steps 2–3).

C. Timesheets blocked due to “Invalid employee clock photo”

If you have configured the alert to block timesheet submission on invalid photo match:

  1. Review the timesheet and clock photos to confirm whether the identity is correct.
  2. If it is a legitimate clock, managers can override/unblock the timesheet (as per your policy), and this override will be logged.
  3. If it is not legitimate, follow your internal misconduct / payroll correction procedures.

You may adjust the matching threshold to reduce false positives, especially on older or low-quality cameras.

D. Privacy or legal concerns from employees or internal stakeholders

Direct stakeholders to your internal policy and, if needed, the Roubler guidance on biometric consent and compliance, which explains:

  • Why explicit consent is required
  • How data is protected and not reused

  • Risks and penalties for non-compliance under POPIA/GDPR

You can also provide the standard Facial Verification feature overview for additional context.

Who to contact for help

  1. HR / People & Culture / Legal
    • Own:
      • Decisions on whether and how Facial Verification is used
      • Consent wording, employee communications, and alternative ID methods for staff who opt out
    • Contact them for:
      • Privacy/legislation questions

      • Policy on handling flagged or blocked timesheets

  2. Internal Roubler/System Administrator or IT team
    • Own:
      • Company Settings → Clocking and any Facial Verification toggles
      • Device readiness (cameras, app versions, connectivity)
    • Contact them when:
      • You cannot see or enable Facial Verification

      • Multiple devices or sites show consistent issues with clock photos or alerts

  3. Roubler Success Manager or Support
    • Contact them to:
      • Enable Facial Verification for your tenant (if not already active)
      • Configure default opt-in or handle bulk consent updates (where allowed)

      • Obtain compliance documentation for your internal privacy team

    • Include in tickets:
      • Company name
      • Whether the query is about enabling the feature, consent, or alerts not appearing

      • Example employees, dates and screenshots of timesheets/clock photos where relevant

Using these steps, HR Administrators can enable and manage Facial Verification in a way that is secure, compliant and transparent for employees.