LiteLog vs. clockin – the comparison for facility service providers (2026)
Business software for more than 50 industries, or proof on site for facility service providers? We compare clockin and LiteLog where it matters in cleaning and caretaking: presence at the site, visit duration, service documentation, recurring work, planning and payroll, and proof towards the client.
This article is published by LiteLog. All statements about clockin are based on publicly available information and the vendor's own descriptions (as of September 2026). Sources are listed at the end of the page. Details may change; the vendor's own statements are authoritative.
Summary: clockin vs. LiteLog
clockin describes itself as the operating system for teams that do not work at a desk. The company was founded in 2018 in Münster, grew out of a trade business and, according to the vendor, is used in more than 50 industries, including building cleaning and caretaker services. Its scope covers time tracking via app, QR code and tablet terminal, project files with checklists, photos and customer signatures, shift planning, absences, a personnel file, a direct DATEV hand-over and invoicing through accounting software.
LiteLog is a proof-of-service platform for facility, cleaning, caretaker and security service providers. The site is at the centre: it has a property boundary drawn on the map, its own permitted clock-in methods and requirements such as a minimum duration per visit. Clock-ins, checkpoint scans, completed tasks and forms are recorded against the site. The client sees the visits through a dedicated client portal and can check them against the requirements. Payroll and personnel files are not part of the scope.
In short: clockin is strong when a business wants time tracking, payroll preparation, personnel files and invoicing in one system. For facility service providers who have to prove to the client, site by site, that work was done on site, for how long and how completely, LiteLog is the better foundation.
When is business software with time tracking enough, and when do you need proof on site?
A cleaning or caretaker business has to answer two questions. The first comes from its own office: who worked for how long, and are payroll, surcharges and invoices correct? The second comes from the client: was someone at the agreed site, long enough and at the agreed time, and was the work done completely?
clockin covers the first question broadly: clocking, time accounts, absences, shift plans, DATEV hand-over, personnel files and invoicing work together. LiteLog is built for the second question: the site has a boundary, requirements and checkpoints, and every visit is measured against them. Both systems track time and document work with photos and signatures. This comparison shows where they overlap and where they solve different problems.
Who is each product built for?
Where a product comes from shapes what it puts first. clockin comes from the trades and addresses small and medium-sized businesses across many industries. LiteLog comes from site security and facility services and addresses businesses that have to prove their work to clients.
clockin
- Time tracking via app, QR code, tablet terminal and crew device
- Project files with checklists, photos, notes and customer signatures
- Shift planning, absences, personnel file and DATEV hand-over
- Invoicing via Lexware Office, sevdesk, weclapp and others
LiteLog
- Site with property boundary, permitted clock-in methods and minimum duration
- Checkpoints via NFC, QR and beacon, inspection rounds with target vs. actual
- Recurring tasks with due dates, forms and incident reports
- Client portal in which the client checks the visits directly
clockin covers the commercial and HR side of a business more broadly. LiteLog goes deeper on proof at the individual site. For a facility service provider the choice depends on which of the two questions from the introduction costs more effort.
How does the software model clients, sites and visits?
A facility service provider works in recurring sites, not in closed projects. A stairwell is cleaned every week, a property is looked after every day. The question is which unit the software uses as its basis.
| clockin | LiteLog | |
|---|---|---|
| Basic unit | Project and sub-project, assigned to customers; plus named locations for clocking | Site with client, address and property boundary; below it visits, checkpoints and tasks |
| Time per location | Book time to a site or room via QR code; location as a column in the timesheet export | Clock-in at the site, visits per site in the planned vs. actual view and in the roster with demand per site |
| Settings per site | Checklists can be assigned to projects, work locations or customers | Clock-in methods, minimum duration, time windows, public holidays, notifications and client access per site |
A cleaning company looks after 30 sites with two to three visits a week each, around 300 visits a month. In a project-based system each site is kept as a project with a QR code. In LiteLog each site is a unit with its own boundary and its own requirement, for example at least 45 minutes per visit. At the end of the month you can see for each site which of the 300 visits met the requirement.
clockin organises work through projects and customers and can represent sites that way. LiteLog uses the site itself as the basic unit and attaches requirements to it. If you mainly bill hours per customer, projects work well. If you have to meet client requirements per site, the site model helps.
How is it proven that someone was at the site?
A clocked time first only shows that someone worked. For the client, what matters is whether it happened at the agreed site. The deciding factors are which clock-in methods the software offers and whether the business can set them per site.
| clockin | LiteLog | |
|---|---|---|
| QR code | Scan project and room QR codes; personal QR code at the tablet terminal | QR code at the site or at the kiosk tablet |
| NFC | Personal NFC chip at the tablet terminal; according to the help centre the feature is not active by default and is enabled on request | NFC tag at the site, scanned with the smartphone |
| Location | Optional: a geo marker at each activity start, or movement tracking outside breaks; according to the help centre no geo markers are recorded offline | Property boundary as a polygon or point on the map; every clock-in is marked as on site or off site |
| Clock-in methods per site | Locations are released per employee; setting the permitted clock-in methods per site is not documented | Permitted methods per site; an exception without a scan only if allowed for that site, and only with a reason |
| Leaving the site | Not documented | Warning on leaving and automatic clock-out, configurable per zone |
Both systems prove presence via QR code and work without an expensive time clock. For location, clockin relies on a geo marker per activity and explicitly leaves the use of GPS to the business. LiteLog checks every clock-in against the drawn boundary of the site and lets you define per site which proof counts. A property boundary per site is not described for clockin in the public documentation (as of 09/2026).
Is a visit that was too short noticed before the client complains?
A cleaning contract often states not only that cleaning takes place, but for how long and how often. A visit of ten instead of 45 minutes goes unnoticed without a check until the client complains. What helps is a requirement against which every visit is measured automatically.
| clockin | LiteLog | |
|---|---|---|
| Shift window | Option “Only count times within the shift”; times outside are marked as not counted | Clock-in window per shift; planned and actual with the difference per entry |
| Tolerance | Buffer times within which no notification is sent | Difference between actual and planned highlighted from 15 minutes |
| Minimum duration per visit | Not documented | Minimum duration per visit and per day; falling short triggers a notification |
| Alerts to management | Email on deviation from the shift; clock-out reminder at a set time or at maximum working time | Rules for missing clock-in, missing clock-out, shift start and end, by email, push, SMS or phone call |
clockin checks times against the shift window and reports deviations, which fits a payroll view well. LiteLog additionally checks whether each individual visit at the site was long enough. A minimum duration per visit is not described for clockin in the public documentation (as of 09/2026).
How is the work that was done documented?
Beyond presence, the client wants to see what was done: checklist ticked, defect photographed, acceptance signed. Both systems are strong here, with a different focus.
| clockin | LiteLog | |
|---|---|---|
| Checklists and forms | Building blocks with checkbox, text, scale, number, photo and signature, mandatory fields; can be assigned to project, work location or customer | Form templates with photo and signature, also created by AI from a description or PDF; attached to a checkpoint or a task |
| Photos and notes | Photos, sketches and notes in chronological order in the digital project file | Photos on tasks, incident reports and forms; completion with a mandatory photo uses the live camera only in the app |
| Customer signature | Customer confirmation by signature in the app, copy sent automatically by email to the customer | Signature field in the form |
| Tied to the location | Not documented | Option “Complete only at the checkpoint”: the app completes the task only after the checkpoint has been scanned |
| AI support | Add-on: video documentation turns a walk-through into a report with to-dos, including translation into German; meeting notes | Voice memo reports are transcribed and classified (opt-in) |
clockin is further ahead on customer confirmation by signature and on AI-based documentation from videos. LiteLog ties documentation more closely to the location: a task can be set so that it only counts as completed after a scan at the checkpoint.
How are intervals such as weekly, monthly or quarterly planned?
Caretaker services and maintenance cleaning run on intervals: deep cleaning every quarter, gutters twice a year, playground checks every week. What matters is whether the software keeps track of the date itself and reports a missed one.
| clockin | LiteLog | |
|---|---|---|
| Recurring tasks | Assign tasks in the dashboard and in the app; checklists for recurring routines; an interval plan with a due date per task is not described | Rhythms from daily to yearly, based on a fixed date or the last completion, series end, preview of upcoming dates |
| Leeway on the due date | Not documented | Due exactly on the day, with ± days of leeway or within the whole month; shifted for public holidays |
| Inspection rounds | Planned inspection rounds with a time window are not documented | Inspection rounds with time window and repetition, target vs. actual, notification when a round is missed |
| Not done | Open and completed visible per task | Third outcome “Cannot be done” with a reason, not counted as missed |
clockin organises recurring routines through checklists, shifts and assigned tasks. LiteLog plans the work itself as a series with due dates and reports when a date passes. For businesses with a service specification and fixed intervals, this is the bigger difference between the two.
How do times get into the roster and into payroll?
At the end of the month the hours have to be right, surcharges calculated and handed over to the payroll office. This is clockin's focus, and here clockin is ahead.
| clockin | LiteLog | |
|---|---|---|
| Payroll hand-over | Transfer directly to the DATEV data centre, import into LODAS and Lohn & Gehalt, preconfigured wage types, dispatch on a fixed cut-off date | CSV export of all time data; no payroll and no payroll integration |
| Month-end closing | Lock closed months, security log with original and corrected data | Approval of working times (optional); any later change cancels the approval |
| Personnel | Digital personnel file with contracts and payslips, absences via app | Employee master data and roles; no personnel file |
| Shift plan | Drag and drop, warnings for double booking and absence, applying for open shifts; AI suggestions for staffing (in a test phase according to the help centre) | Roster with demand per site and a staffed/target indicator; staffing suggestion from the Standard plan |
| Clocking for the team | Crew function: one device per team, the team lead clocks everyone in | Each person clocks in themselves, by smartphone, kiosk tablet or messenger; no clock-in without a device or without confirmation by the person |
If you want payroll preparation, personnel files and clocking a whole crew with one device in one system, clockin serves you better. LiteLog exports the times for the payroll software but does not calculate pay and does not allow clocking on behalf of others. This is a deliberate limit: every clock-in should come from the person themselves.
What does the client see, and how do they check the work?
Proof is only worth something once the client sees it. Some clients want a PDF at the end of the month, others want to check at any time whether the site was cleaned.
| clockin | LiteLog | |
|---|---|---|
| Access for the client | Read-only link per project file: the customer sees progress, hours worked and released entries in real time; the link can be deactivated | Client portal with its own login and seven modules that can be enabled individually, including attendance proof, inspection rounds, incident reports and tickets |
| Check against requirements | Not documented | Per cleaning visit: start, end, duration and a verdict against minimum duration, minimum interval and time window; every correction with old/new value and reason |
| Report | Project file as PDF, filtered by type, date or label | PDF reports, delivery rules for automatic dispatch by email |
| Reports from the client | Not documented | Ticket QR poster per site: report without login and without an app; tickets from the client portal arrive as tasks |
| Employee privacy | Entries can be hidden before sharing | Employees are pseudonymised in the attendance proof by default, switchable to names per access |
clockin shares the project file with the customer, filtered and in real time, which suits the acceptance of individual jobs well. LiteLog gives the client a dedicated portal in which they can check every visit against the agreed requirements, and takes reports directly at the site via the ticket QR.
Who finds out when something does not happen?
In site-based services the problem is not the work that was done, but the work that was not. Software helps when it notices the gap itself and informs the right person.
| clockin | LiteLog | |
|---|---|---|
| Built-in alerts | Email on deviation from the shift, clock-out reminder, notice when the device time looks unusual | 41 prepared rules, 15 of them active out of the box, for example on a missed inspection round |
| Own rules | Automated dispatch for DATEV and timesheets; a rule builder with freely selectable triggers is not documented | If-then rules with 50 triggers and 10 actions, including email, push, SMS, phone call and creating a task |
| Escalation | Not documented | Delay and status check for escalation chains |
clockin sends notifications where working time is concerned. LiteLog lets the business build its own workflows, for example: no visit at the site by 9 am, then an SMS to the people assigned to the site, and after 30 minutes an automatic call to site management.
How do multilingual teams and subcontractors work in the system?
In building cleaning, teams speak many native languages, and subcontractors often work at individual sites. The software has to work for both without anyone seeing data that is not theirs.
| clockin | LiteLog | |
|---|---|---|
| Languages | 26 languages in the app and the office centre | 14 languages; the app language is chosen on first start |
| Translated content | Video documentation with translation into German | App interface as well as forms and checklists; task texts are not translated |
| Subcontractors | According to the terms, licensed subcontractors may use the app; a dedicated subcontractor management is not described | Subcontractor with its own access, sees only its own staff and assigned sites; one level, from the Standard plan |
| Roles | Predefined roles and individual permissions | Roles with permission groups and site assignment |
With 26 languages, clockin is ahead on language choice. LiteLog offers 14 languages and translates forms and checklists, but not the texts of individual tasks. For subcontractors LiteLog provides a separate, restricted access; at clockin, the terms govern use by licensed subcontractors.
Where is the data stored, and how do you get to it?
Clients in the building sector ask about server location, data processing agreements and sign-in. The payroll office and accounting ask about integrations.
| clockin | LiteLog | |
|---|---|---|
| Server location | German servers, TÜV and ISO certified according to the FAQ | Germany (Frankfurt) |
| Sign-in | Single sign-on with Microsoft Entra ID; sign-in via QR code from the app | Two-factor sign-in and sign-in with Microsoft |
| Log | Security log of all user activities, exportable | Tamper-proof audit trail; corrections create new entries with a mandatory reason |
| Integrations | DATEV, Lexware Office, sevdesk, Sage, weclapp, Business Central, SAP via a partner, open REST API | REST API v1 from the Standard plan (sites, tasks, incident reports, forms), no webhooks; CSV exports |
| Invoicing | Invoices from project times via connected accounting software | Invoices and quotes in its own LiteBill module (invoicing package) |
| Platforms | Web, iOS, Android, tablet terminal | Web, iOS, Android, kiosk tablet, Telegram and WhatsApp |
clockin is considerably broader on commercial integrations. LiteLog offers an open API for sites, tasks and incident reports, and an audit trail in which corrections never overwrite the original.
Core features at a glance
| clockin | LiteLog | |
|---|---|---|
| Time tracking via app and QR code | ✓ | ✓ |
| Offline capture | ✓ | ✓ |
| Property boundary per site (geofence) | Not documented | ✓ |
| Minimum duration per visit with notification | Not documented | ✓ |
| Checkpoints via NFC, QR, beacon | Not documented | ✓ |
| Checklists with photo and signature | ✓ | ✓ |
| Recurring tasks with due dates | Not documented | ✓ |
| Client portal with its own login | Read-only link per project file | ✓ |
| Clocking a whole crew with one device | ✓ | Not included |
| Direct DATEV hand-over (LODAS, Lohn & Gehalt) | ✓ | Not included, CSV export |
| Digital personnel file | ✓ | Not included |
| Interface languages | 26 | 14 |
Based on publicly available product information, as of September 2026.
clockin vs. LiteLog at a glance
| clockin | LiteLog | |
|---|---|---|
| Approach | Business software for teams away from a desk | Proof-of-service platform for site-based service providers |
| Industry focus | More than 50 industries, rooted in the trades | Cleaning, caretaking, facility, security, care |
| Basic unit | Project and customer | Site with boundary and requirements |
| QR code | Project, room and personal QR codes | QR code at the site or kiosk |
| NFC | Personal chip at the tablet terminal, on request | Tag at the site, scanned by smartphone |
| Location | Geo marker per activity or movement tracking, optional | Property boundary, on site/off site; no GPS history |
| Leaving the site | Not documented | Warning and automatic clock-out |
| Minimum duration per visit | Not documented | Yes, with notification when not met |
| Shift window | Count only times within the shift, buffer times | Clock-in window, planned vs. actual with difference |
| Documentation | Project file with checklists, photos, sketches | Forms, tasks with mandatory photo, incident reports |
| Customer signature | In the app, copy by email | Signature field in the form |
| Recurring tasks | Checklists and tasks; interval plan not described | Rhythms with due dates and ± days |
| Inspection rounds | Not documented | With time window, target vs. actual, missed notification |
| Client | Read-only link and PDF of the project file | Client portal with attendance proof against requirements |
| Automation | Working-time alerts, dispatch to payroll office | Rules with 50 triggers and 10 actions |
| Payroll | DATEV data centre, LODAS, Lohn & Gehalt | CSV export, no payroll |
| Personnel file | Yes | Not included |
| Crew clocking | One device per team | Not included |
| Languages | 26 | 14 |
| Subcontractors | Use permitted by the terms, no dedicated management described | Own access, one level |
| Invoicing | Via Lexware Office, sevdesk, weclapp and others | Own LiteBill module |
| Prices | See the vendor's pricing page | See LiteLog's pricing page |
Which software fits your business?
clockin
clockin is broad business software for teams that do not work at a desk. Time tracking via app, QR code and tablet terminal, clocking a whole crew with one device, project files with checklists, photos and customer signatures, a direct hand-over to the DATEV data centre, personnel files, shift planning and invoicing via accounting software all work together. On top come 26 languages and AI add-ons such as a phone assistant and video documentation. If you want to take load off the office of a cleaning or caretaker business, you will find a lot of it in one system.
For proof at the individual site you will often need additional tools: a property boundary per site, a minimum duration per visit, checkpoints, inspection rounds and a client portal with its own login are not described in the public documentation.
LiteLog
LiteLog is built for proof on site: property boundary and permitted clock-in methods per site, minimum duration per visit with notification, checkpoints via NFC, QR and beacon, recurring tasks with due dates, freely combinable rules and a client portal in which the client checks every visit against the requirements.
Its limits lie in the office: no payroll and no payroll integration, only a CSV export; no personnel file; no clocking of a whole crew with one device; 14 instead of 26 languages; no GPS history.
One possible setup is LiteLog for proof on site and clockin for payroll, personnel files and invoicing. There is no documented integration between the two systems. Times would have to be exported from LiteLog as CSV and transferred via the clockin API, which according to its help centre also accepts past clock times. Without that step, employees would record their time twice.
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