Reviewing flagged punches

Updated 2026-11-07

What it is

A flagged punch is a punch PunchMe accepted but wants a person to look at. It happens when a punch has a problem and your punch rule for that problem is set to Allow, flag for review. The punch counts as normal. It waits in a review queue until someone keeps it or rejects it.

Flagging gives you a middle path. Staff aren't stopped at the door for a grey-area problem, like weak GPS, but nothing slips through unseen.

Who uses it

Owner: sees and reviews every flagged punch.
Users with attendance.manage review flagged punches for the employees in their scope. HR, Office Manager and Office HR roles have it out of the box.
- Company scope: everyone.
- Office scope: employees whose home office is their office.
- Team scope: employees in their department.
Employees are not told that a punch was flagged. They see their normal status in the app.

See Roles and permissions.

Where to find it

Dashboard: Attendance → Flagged punches tab. The tab only shows if you have attendance.manage.
Manager app: Attendance tab → Flagged filter. The Home tab also shows a Flagged punches tile with the count waiting.
Notifications: each flagged punch sends "Punch needs review" with the employee's name and the flags. Opening it takes you to the queue.

Attendance > Flagged punches tab with approve/reject for outside-geofence and low-confidence face punches — Attendance → Flagged punches

What you see

The dashboard queue shows, newest date first, 100 per page:

Column	Meaning
Date	The day of the record
Employee	Who punched
In	Check-in time
Flags	Every problem recorded on this day, such as "poor accuracy, offline punch"

The manager app shows more detail when you tap a record: distance from the office and the allowed radius, GPS accuracy, face score, liveness, mock GPS, the punch source (kiosk or offline) and whether the check-out was automatic.

What each flag means

Flag	Meaning	What to check
outside geofence	Check-in was outside the office boundary	Distance from the office in the manager app. Was the employee on a client visit?
poor accuracy	GPS accuracy was worse than your limit	Accuracy value. Indoors or basement?
mock gps	The phone reported a fake location	Treat as serious. Talk to the employee
face low confidence	The face matched, but only just	Repeated cases may mean a poor enrolment; consider Reset face
attestation failed	The phone or app failed the integrity or signature check	Rooted phone, unofficial app, or a new phone. See Device binding
offline punch	Saved with no network and synced later	Punch time vs. when it arrived
kiosk punch	Punched on an office kiosk	Usually set to allow
kiosk code	Used the employee code backup on a kiosk	The face alone wasn't enough to identify them

A flag shows here only if its rule is set to flag. Problems set to Allow are still listed in the Flags column, but don't put a record in the queue on their own.

Approve or reject

Action	Dashboard button	Manager app button	Result
Approve	Approve	Keep punch	The day keeps its status (present, late or half day). It leaves the queue
Reject	Reject	Reject (mark absent)	The day's status becomes absent. It leaves the queue

Both actions take effect at once. There is no confirm step.

When rejecting or keeping in the manager app, you can add an optional note. It is saved on the record. The dashboard buttons don't take a note.

Each decision is saved in the record's history and in the audit log, with who decided and the status before and after. See Data privacy and audit.

What reject does and doesn't do

It sets the day to absent. Payroll treats it as an absent day.
The punch times, location and flags stay on the record, so you keep the evidence.
It does not block the employee's phone or reset their device or face.
The employee is not sent a notification.

Turning it on or off

The review queue is always there. What decides whether punches reach it is each rule in Settings → Punch verification. Defaults that flag:

Poor GPS accuracy
Face match near threshold
Offline punch (synced later)

Set a rule to Allow to stop it filling the queue, or to Block the punch to stop those punches altogether.

Changing it midway

Changing a rule doesn't touch records already in the queue. Clear them by approving or rejecting.
If a check-out (or undo of a check-out) raises a new problem set to Allow, flag for review, the record goes back to pending, even if you approved the check-in earlier. The same problem again, such as mock GPS on both check-in and check-out, doesn't re-open a day you already approved.
If someone edits the day by hand or approves a correction for it, the record leaves the queue. The edit is final.
After you reject a day, you can still change it later by editing the day or through a correction.

Limits and edge cases

One entry per day per employee. Check-in and check-out problems on the same day show together.
Reject always means absent. There is no "reject as half day". If you want half day, edit the day instead.
There is no bulk approve. Decide each row.
Records stay in the queue until decided. There is no time limit and no auto-approve.
The auto-absent run doesn't touch days that already have a record, so a flagged day is never auto-marked absent.
Your scope decides what you see. An office-scoped reviewer won't see a punch from an employee whose home office is elsewhere, even if they punched at the reviewer's office.

Common questions

Does a flagged punch count while it waits?

Yes. It counts with its normal status until someone rejects it. If payroll runs before you review, it uses the status at that time.

I rejected by mistake. How do I undo it?

Edit the day and set the correct status, or approve the employee's correction request. The day then leaves absent. See Corrections.

Will the employee know their punch was flagged or rejected?

Not through a notification. They see the day's status in the app, so after a reject they see absent.

The queue is full of "poor accuracy". What should I do?

Check the accuracy values. If they're mostly just over the limit, raise GPS accuracy limit (m) a little, or set Poor GPS accuracy to Allow. See Geofence and GPS.

Who gets the "Punch needs review" notification?

The owner, and every dashboard user with attendance.manage whose scope covers the employee.