ClockMath Guides
How to Total a Weekly Timesheet for Payroll
From five days of clock times to one weekly figure, without the rounding errors.
The work hours calculator totals a week of shifts for you, with breaks, pay, and a CSV export. This guide explains how the total is worked out, so you can check a timesheet before it goes to payroll.
Work out each day first
For each shift, subtract start from end and take off unpaid breaks. How to calculate hours worked walks through a single day step by step.
Example week, 30-minute unpaid lunch each day
Add up minutes, then convert once
Total the week in hours and minutes, and only then convert to decimal. Converting each day first and rounding as you go lets small errors pile up.
Five days of 7 hours 50 minutes is 39 hours 10 minutes, which is 39.17 hours. Round each day to 7.83 first and the week comes out at 39.15 — a minute short. Across a team and a year, that adds up.
Decimal hours
Divide the leftover minutes by 60: 15 minutes is 0.25, 30 is 0.5, 45 is 0.75. A common slip is writing 7 hours 45 minutes as 7.45 instead of 7.75. The decimal hours converter has every minute from 1 to 60.
Rounding clock times
Many employers round punch times. In the US, federal rules allow rounding to the nearest 5, 6, or 15 minutes, as long as it evens out over time and doesn't consistently work against employees. With 15-minute rounding, 1 to 7 minutes past the quarter hour rounds down and 8 to 14 rounds up — so 8:07 is recorded as 8:00 and 8:08 as 8:15. Rounding that only ever goes the employer's way isn't allowed.
Where overtime starts
Under the US federal rule, hours over 40 in a workweek are overtime, paid at 1.5 times the regular rate. Each workweek is totalled on its own — a short week can't offset a long one. If your total goes past 40, the overtime calculator splits regular and overtime pay, and how to calculate overtime covers the rules, including states with daily overtime.
Before you submit
- Every day has a start and an end, and overnight shifts end on the next day
- Only unpaid breaks are subtracted
- The week was totalled in minutes before converting to decimal
- The total matches the pay period your employer uses
Work Hours & Timesheet Calculator
Add up shifts with breaks, decimal hours, and gross pay
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