GreatDay 8

Opening the app for the first time

Registering a company account is the first thing that happens. The app asks for a company code and admin credentials before anything else appears. This is not a typical consumer app. It expects your employer to have already set up the system. Without that company code, the screen stays blank except for the login fields. No guest mode exists. No demo data appears. You either have a valid company account or you cannot proceed past the login screen. This single gate determines whether the app becomes useful or completely useless.

The login screen itself is straightforward. Two fields: company code and password. Below that, a "Forgot Password" link. That link opens a web page, not an in-app flow. The web page asks for the company code and the registered email. If those match, a reset link gets sent. This split between the app and the web browser is a recurring pattern. Many actions that feel like they should happen inside the app actually redirect to the GreatDay HR website. This creates friction. Employees expecting a seamless mobile experience find themselves bouncing between the app and a browser tab. The app does not remember your credentials across sessions if you clear your cache. Users report that re-entering credentials every time becomes a daily chore.

Once logged in, the home screen displays a dashboard. The dashboard shows pending approvals, upcoming shifts, and a quick clock-in button. The clock-in button is the most used element. It uses GPS to verify your location. The app compares your current GPS coordinates against the radius set by your company admin. If you are outside that radius, the clock-in fails. This is where the first set of problems begins. Employees working from home or at client sites often find themselves outside the approved radius. The app does not allow manual override. The only workaround is to ask the admin to adjust the radius, which takes time and approval. This rigid GPS check causes daily frustration for field workers.

How attendance records feed into payroll

The attendance module and the payroll module are deeply linked. Every clock-in and clock-out event creates a timestamp. Those timestamps accumulate into a daily log. At the end of the pay period, the payroll module pulls those logs and calculates the total hours worked. Overtime, late arrivals, and early departures are all factored in automatically. This sounds efficient on paper. In practice, the connection between attendance and payroll is where the most serious complaints originate. Users report that attendance logs sometimes fail to sync to the server when the device is offline. The app saves the logs locally but cannot push them to the cloud. When the device comes back online, the sync fails silently. The log stays on the device but never reaches the payroll system. The employee assumes everything is recorded. The payroll calculation runs without those logs. The resulting salary is lower than expected. This is not a theoretical risk. Multiple user reviews describe this exact scenario.

The payroll module itself calculates taxes, BPJS contributions, and PPh 21 automatically. BPJS is Indonesia's social security system. PPh 21 is the employee income tax. The app uses the latest government rates, which is a strong point. Companies using GreatDay HR save money on tax consultants and payroll advisors. The app also generates payslips that employees can view directly on their phones. Those payslips break down the gross salary, deductions, and net pay. The breakdown is clear and detailed. Employees appreciate the transparency. However, the accuracy of the payslip depends entirely on the attendance data that fed into it. If attendance sync failed, the payslip is wrong. The employee then has to raise a ticket with HR. HR has to manually correct the records. This manual intervention defeats the purpose of automation.

Comparing shift scheduling with competitor tools

BrioHR and Gadjian are two named competitors in the Indonesian HR software space. GreatDay HR handles shift scheduling differently from both. BrioHR allows managers to create shifts and assign employees with a drag-and-drop interface. Gadjian focuses more on payroll compliance with PPh 21 and BPJS. GreatDay HR sits somewhere in the middle. Its shift scheduling feature lets managers set up recurring shifts, rotating shifts, and custom shifts. Employees see their upcoming shifts on the home screen. They can request shift swaps through the app. The approval workflow for shift swaps is built into the notification system. The manager gets a notification, reviews the request, and approves or denies it. This workflow is smooth when everyone is online. The problem appears when managers are offline. The notification sits in the queue. The employee does not get a response for hours or even days. BrioHR solves this with a timeout feature that auto-approves after a set period. GreatDay HR does not have that feature. Every swap request requires manual approval. This creates bottlenecks in fast-paced work environments.

Another difference is the treatment of overtime. GreatDay HR calculates overtime based on the shift schedule and actual clock-in/out times. If an employee clocks out late, the system automatically adds overtime pay. This is accurate and fair. However, the app does not allow employees to dispute overtime calculations within the app. They have to contact HR separately. Gadjian has a built-in dispute resolution feature where employees can flag incorrect overtime entries. GreatDay HR lacks this. The absence of an in-app dispute mechanism is a notable gap.

What actually changed in version 1.82.2

The version history shows that GreatDay 8 is the new look of GreatDay. The changelog does not list specific bug fixes or performance improvements. The developer simply states: "Hi This is GreatDay 8, the new look of GreatDay." No detailed changelog has been published for this version. This lack of transparency is consistent with previous releases. Users have to discover changes by using the app. Some users noticed that the clock-in button moved from the bottom navigation bar to the home screen dashboard. Others noticed that the payslip PDF generation is now faster. But these are anecdotal observations, not official release notes. The absence of a proper changelog makes it difficult for users to know what was fixed or what broke. This is a common complaint among long-term users. They want to know if their reported bugs have been addressed. The developer does not provide that information through the app or the Play Store listing.

The rebranding from SunFish Go to GreatDay HR happened in 2018. The app has evolved significantly since then. The current version 1.82.2 includes features that did not exist in the early days. Social media integration, secure file sharing, and organizational structure views are all relatively new additions. The social media feature allows employees to post updates and react to posts within the company. This is an unusual feature for an HR app. It blurs the line between HR management and internal communication. Some companies use it as a lightweight intranet. Others disable it completely. The feature is optional, which is a smart design choice.

Real-world performance and common failures

The app behaves differently depending on network conditions. On a stable Wi-Fi connection, most features work as expected. Clock-in takes about two seconds. Payslip generation takes five to seven seconds. Approval notifications arrive instantly. On mobile data, the performance degrades noticeably. Clock-in can take up to ten seconds. Payslip generation sometimes times out and fails. The app shows a generic error message: "Network error. Please try again." This error gives no specific guidance. Users do not know if the problem is with their connection or the server. The app does not retry automatically. The user has to manually tap the retry button. This manual retry process is frustrating when you are in a hurry to clock in before the shift starts.

Force closes are another recurring issue. The app crashes unexpectedly when navigating between the attendance log and the payroll summary. The crash happens more frequently on older Android devices running Android 8 or 9. The official support page acknowledges this. They recommend clearing the app data and restarting. This clears the local cache and forces the app to re-sync. However, clearing app data also clears offline attendance logs that have not been synced yet. This creates a catch-22. You clear the data to fix the crashes, but you risk losing unsynced attendance records. This is a serious design flaw. Users have reported losing days of attendance data because of this. The only safe way to clear data is to ensure all logs are synced first, but the app does not provide a clear indicator of sync status.

GPS-based attendance and location accuracy

The GPS check for attendance is strict. The app uses the device's GPS to determine the employee's location. It compares that location against the company-defined radius. The radius is typically set to 100 to 200 meters. Any deviation beyond that radius results in a failed clock-in. The app shows a message: "Location not within approved radius." This is a common issue for employees who work in multi-story buildings. GPS accuracy indoors is poor. The signal bounces off walls and structures. The app may show the employee as being 50 meters away from the building even when they are standing inside it. This false positive causes failed clock-ins. The app does not allow manual location adjustment. The employee has to step outside the building or move to a window to get a better GPS lock. This is impractical in many office settings.

The attendance report shows the GPS coordinates of each clock-in. Managers can see the exact location where the employee clocked in. This provides transparency and prevents buddy punching. Buddy punching is when one employee clocks in for another. The GPS feature makes that impossible. However, the strictness of the feature also penalizes employees who are genuinely at work but have poor GPS signals. The trade-off between security and usability is heavily tilted toward security. Employees have raised this concern in reviews. The developer has not introduced a Wi-Fi based alternative or a manual override option. The GPS check remains a hard requirement.