WorkMaster for Windows

Managing employee schedules and payroll is no easy feat, and a good piece of software for handling these tasks can be the difference between smooth operations and major headaches. WorkMaster is a basic program that handles scheduling, time worked, and payroll functions with ease. It's not the most beautiful program we've ever seen, but it gets credit for being easy to use.

WorkMaster's interface is plain, with the look of many no-frills Windows applications. The main screen contains buttons that take users to work schedules, employee information, a time clock, and payroll features. For the most part the program was quite easy to figure out, although there were some aspects of it that could have been a little more intuitive. For example, when we tried to enter a new employee, we kept getting an error message telling us that we hadn't completed all of the required fields, but it didn't tell us which fields we were missing; it turned out that the problem was located in a separate tab that wasn't even visible. These sorts of things are annoying, but relatively minor, and overall WorkMaster was easy to use. It keeps track of employee personal and tax information, automatically calculating withholdings and processing payroll. The program can be installed on multiple networked computers so that employees have access to the time clock, but only administrators can view employee information and other restricted features. The program's Help file is brief but adequate. Overall, there was nothing about WorkMaster that particularly impressed us, but it's a perfectly serviceable option for managing schedules and payroll.

WorkMaster has a 30-use trial limitation. It installs politely but leaves a folder behind up on removal. We recommend this program to all users.