The in-app Attendance Copilot
How to use the Attendance Copilot chat to ask attendance questions, generate charts, and download spreadsheet reports.
The Attendance Copilot is a chat assistant for managers. Open Copilot in the sidebar to ask attendance questions in plain English.
It's the same AI assistant that powers the WhatsApp AI Copilot — in the web app it can also show charts inline and produce downloadable reports.
Anyone with the View Employees permission can use it. The Copilot works as you, so it can only see what your role lets you see.
What it can do
| Ask it… | Example |
|---|---|
| Counts and aggregates | "How many people are clocked in right now?" |
| Date-range analytics | "Show me late arrivals last week" |
| Per-location filtering | "Who didn't clock in at the Cape Town office today?" |
| Charts | "Show late arrivals by day this month as a bar chart" |
| Spreadsheets | "Export every clock-in from May for the Joburg branches as xlsx" |
| Help lookups | "How do I install the mobile app?" |
| Variance and approvals | "How many pending variances do I have over 48 hours old?" |
The Copilot can look up clock records and employees, draw charts in the conversation, create Excel (xlsx) reports for download, and search the help centre.
Conversations
The left sidebar lists your last 50 conversations. Click one to resume; click New conversation to start fresh.
Conversations are private to you — other users in your company can't see them.
Charts
When you ask for a chart, it appears inline in the conversation. Bar, line, and pie charts are supported. Charts are interactive — hover for tooltips, click legend items to show or hide a series.
Reports
When the Copilot creates a spreadsheet, it appears in the Recent Reports panel on the right. Reports are kept for 7 days and then deleted automatically. Download links are refreshed each time you open the Copilot page.
Reports are private — only you can download the reports from your conversations.
Tips for good answers
Long conversations carry a lot of history. When you switch to a new topic, start a new conversation — answers tend to be faster and more focused.
Privacy
The Copilot works as you, within your company's data. It cannot:
- Read another user's conversations.
- See data from other companies on Timed.
- Change anything without your say-so. It can add, deactivate or reactivate employees, move them between sites and shifts, and change a person's role — but only what your own role allows, and only after it shows you exactly what it will do and you confirm. It can't approve variances or leave, or delete records.
If you think the Copilot showed you something it shouldn't have, contact Timed support and include the conversation link.
Troubleshooting
| Symptom | Likely cause |
|---|---|
| Conversation list is empty | You haven't started one yet. Type a message and send. |
| "I can't help with that" replies | The Copilot is set up to stay on attendance topics. It politely declines general programming, weather, or other off-topic questions. |
| Chart shows "no data" but data clearly exists | The question was interpreted too narrowly. Try rephrasing — "in May" vs "between 2026-05-01 and 2026-05-31" sometimes gives different results. |
| Report link doesn't work | Download links expire after about an hour. Reopen the Copilot page to get a fresh link (the report itself is kept for 7 days). |
| Slow response | Complex questions can take 5–15 seconds. Simple counts usually take under 2 seconds. |
If answers to a question are consistently wrong, send the conversation link to Timed support so we can improve it.
Still stuck? Sign in to Timed and contact support, or request access if you're new.