Before a factory can calculate how much to pay Ramesh the machinist, it needs to answer two very different questions: Did he show up today? and What did he actually work on? These are the twin pillars of labour cost control — Time-keeping handles the first, Time-booking handles the second.
Time-keeping is the process of recording the total time a worker spends inside the factory premises — arrival time, departure time, and breaks. Think of it as the attendance register for wages. Common methods include the Attendance Register (a manual muster roll), the Token/Disc Method (workers pick up a numbered disc at entry and drop it in a box — any disc left uncollected means the worker is absent), the Time Recording Clock (the worker punches a card; machine stamps the exact time), and modern Biometric/RFID systems. Time-keeping feeds directly into Payroll — it tells you how many hours to pay for.
Time-booking goes one level deeper. It records how those factory hours were spent — on Job No. 101, Machine Setting, or Waiting for Materials. Methods include the Job Card (one card per job, worker records time spent on that job), the Time Sheet (one sheet per worker, listing all jobs done during the day/week), and the Labour Cost Card (a job-wise summary used by the cost department). Time-booking feeds into Job Costing — it tells you which job to charge the wages to.
The critical link between the two is Idle Time = Time Kept − Time Booked. If Ramesh was in the factory for 8 hours (time-kept) but only booked 6.5 hours to jobs (time-booked), the 1.5 hours is idle time. Normal idle time (unavoidable — e.g., waiting between jobs) is absorbed into the Factory Overhead rate. Abnormal idle time (avoidable — e.g., power failure due to negligence) is written off to the Costing Profit & Loss Account and is not included in product cost. This distinction is a favourite exam trap. Overtime premium — the extra 50% paid for hours beyond normal — is charged to overhead if overtime is general, but charged directly to the specific job if that job caused the overtime.