Key takeaways
- Start with what the tool collects, since that decides your privacy and trust position
- Ask who can see what, how long data is kept and whether employees see their own data
- Check platform support, deployment effort and exactly how licensing and renewals work
Most monitoring tools promise attendance, productivity and reports. The differences that matter sit underneath. Use these questions with any vendor, and compare the answers rather than the feature lists.
1. What does it collect?
Ask for the list in writing, including what it never collects. TIMO360 publishes both: presence signals, application name, window title text and browser domain, and never keystroke content, screenshots, recordings, audio or webcam.
2. Who sees what?
Look for role-based access, department scoping and a view-only role for reviewers. In TIMO360, managers see their own team, employees see only their own data and every request is scoped to your organization.
3. How long is data kept?
You want configurable windows and automatic deletion. TIMO360 defaults to 7 days for raw events, 365 for sessions and 730 for reports, each adjustable from 1 to 3,650 days.
4. Can employees see their own data?
Transparency lowers resistance. Each TIMO360 employee has a My Report page.
5. Does it fit your devices and rollout?
Check operating system support and how agents are deployed. TIMO360's agent supports Windows (Windows 10 or later, 64-bit), macOS (macOS 12 Monterey or later, Apple silicon and Intel), or Linux (any x86_64 distribution with a desktop session), and employees enroll with a single-use code that expires after 1 day.
6. How does licensing work?
Ask who counts as a seat, whether renewals are automatic and whether offers apply at renewal. TIMO360 uses one license per monitored employee, paid once, with no automatic renewal and full price at renewal.
7. How is the account secured?
Look for two-factor sign-in, lockout after failed attempts and strong password hashing.
Score it yourself
Put the same questions to every vendor on your shortlist and keep the answers in a table. Check claims against the vendor's own privacy documentation, not just the sales page.
Read the privacy policy, security overview and pricing, or compare TIMO360 with other tools.