Time book

A time book is a mostly outdated accounting record, that registered the hours worked by employees in a certain organization in a certain period. These records usually contain names of employees, type of work, hours worked, and sometimes wages paid.

In the 19th and early 20th century time books were separate held records. In those days time books were held by company clerks or foremen or specialized timekeepers. These time books were used by the bookkeeper to determine the wages to be paid. The data was used in financial accounting to determine the weekly, monthly and annual labour costs, and in cost accounting to determine the cost price. Late 19th century additional time cards came in use to register labour hours.

Nowadays the time book can be a part of an integrated payroll system, or cost accounting system. Those systems can contain registers that describe the labour time spend to produce products, but those registers are not regularly called time books, but timesheets.

Before the 19th century employees could be registered on a payroll, especially in cases such as crewmembers on a ship or soldiers stationed in a location. The paid wages were noted in daybooks, in which daily expenses where registered, and eventually in the other accounts in the bookkeeping systems.

In the 19th century when organizations started to grow a separate register of labour hours emerged, which was called a time book. There were used to keep account of the work done.Loudon (1826) explained, that in gardening the books necessary for the system of keeping accounts are, the time-book, the cash-book, and the forest or plantation book. Loudon described how time books where handled in those days:

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