How to Do Face Recognition Attendance on Mobile — Setup Guide
Setting up face recognition attendance on mobile is much simpler than buying and installing biometric hardware. Once the company-level configuration is done (15 minutes), each employee enrols in 30 seconds. After that, attendance is just a phone glance. Here is the practical setup guide for Pakistani SMBs.
Phase 1 — Company-level configuration (15 minutes)
1. Enable face recognition module
In the admin console, enable face recognition attendance for the company.
2. Set liveness check requirement
Recommended: ON. This is what prevents photo / video spoofing. The slight extra second at check-in is worth the anti-fraud protection.
3. Set geo-fence policy (optional)
If you want attendance restricted to specific locations, define the geo-fences:
- Office location — specify coordinates + radius (typically 100-500 metres)
- Per-location for multi-site businesses
- "Off" for distributed / remote teams where location does not matter
4. Set time windows
When can employees check in? Often 6am-10am for morning shift, etc. Outside the window, check-in is rejected (or marked late).
5. Set device binding (optional)
Restrict each employee's face check-in to their registered phone. Prevents someone else from using their phone for check-in.
6. Configure retention
How long face data is kept after employment ends — typically 90 days for dispute resolution, then deletion.
7. Update WFH / attendance policy
Make sure the employee handbook reflects the face attendance setup, consent, and rights. See: biometric legality in Pakistan.
Phase 2 — Per-employee enrolment (30 seconds each)
For each employee:
- Open the HRMS mobile app on their phone
- Go to attendance → face enrolment
- Hold the phone at face level, well-lit area
- App captures 3-5 face angles (front, slight left, slight right)
- Random micro-prompt (slight head movement) for liveness baseline
- System generates face embedding (numerical vector)
- Enrolment confirmed
Best practice: do enrolment in well-lit conditions. Avoid bright backlight (windows behind face). Glasses on if usually worn.
Phase 3 — Daily use (3 seconds per check-in)
- Employee opens HRMS mobile app at start of work
- Tap "Check In"
- App opens camera, prompts for face capture
- Employee looks at camera
- Liveness check (motion / depth) — auto-passes for a real face
- Face matched against enrolled embedding
- Attendance recorded; push confirmation
Edge cases to handle
Failed match
If face does not match (lighting issue, large appearance change), the system rejects. Employee can retry. After 3 fails, fallback to manager-approved manual entry.
Appearance changes
Beard grown, glasses changed, weight changed — re-enrol. Takes 30 seconds.
New phone
If device binding is enabled, employee registers their new phone via a one-time code from HR.
Lost phone
Web kiosk fallback at office. Face enrolment data is in cloud, not on the phone, so a lost phone is not a lost enrolment.
Bad lighting / no signal
App captures attendance offline, syncs when connection restores. Useful for field staff in patchy areas.
What employees should be told
- "Face data is stored as embeddings, not photos. Not reversible to a photo."
- "Data is encrypted and only accessible to HR + IT in audit role."
- "You can re-enrol any time."
- "On exit, your data is deleted after [X] days."
- "You can ask to see your own enrolment data."
Common setup mistakes
- Skipping liveness check — buddy punching becomes trivial again
- Geo-fence too tight (50 metres) — false rejects when employee is just outside
- Time windows too narrow — late employees cannot check in
- No handbook update — employees feel ambushed
- No re-enrolment process — employees stuck after appearance change
The Zaffre HRM mobile face attendance fit
Zaffre HRM mobile app ships with face recognition + liveness check + geo-fencing + device binding + offline capture. Per-employee enrolment in 30 seconds. See: face recognition explained.
Book a demo for live face attendance setup.