The MEP24 alternative with HR in one tool
A day plan in 15-minute steps, shift planning, time tracking and the personnel file: from 5 euros per user, with no activation fee and no annual commitment.
All information about MEP24 comes from the official provider pages. As at:2. September 2026.
Features in detail
Sources and notes (12)
- 1. MEP24, Time tracking (web, mobile, terminal): Trust-based time tracking via the portal and app is in the base scope; minute-accurate electronic recording with terminals is a paid add-on module.
- 2. MEP24, Project time tracking / budgets: The package overview lists basic and professional time tracking, service levels and terminals. It mentions projects, clients, activities and budgets in none of the four packages (mep24software.de/preise, retrieved 3 September 2026).
- 3. MEP24, Allowances / hour packages: The package overview does not mention client-bound hour packages with renewal and carry-over (mep24software.de/preise, retrieved 3 September 2026).
- 4. MEP24, Digital Employee File: Document management with read receipts exists; a full digital personnel file with contract, salary and social security data is not part of the documented scope.
- 5. MEP24, Onboarding and offboarding workflows: The packages mention an „onboarding webinar“ and „individual onboarding“. What is meant is introducing the business to the software, not a person joining: a process with tasks, owners and deadlines is not listed (mep24software.de/preise, retrieved 3 September 2026).
- 6. MEP24, Analytics & reports: Reports and analyses with PDF and CSV export are included; multi-dimensional, freely filterable reports by project or client are not documented.
- 7. MetronHR, Application hosted in Germany: The application and customer data run at Hetzner Online GmbH in Nuremberg and Falkenstein, exclusively in Germany.
- 8. MEP24, Application hosted in Germany: A provider based in Germany; for the application the privacy policy names no server location. The website itself runs on Webflow and Cloudflare (both USA) as well as Amazon CloudFront.
- 9. MetronHR, Hosting operator without a US parent company: The operator is Hetzner Online GmbH, a German company with no US parent. This marketing website is hosted with Vercel, Inc. (USA) in the Frankfurt region, where no employee data is processed.
- 10. MEP24, Hosting operator without a US parent company: For the application the privacy policy names no operator. The website is run by Webflow, Inc. and Cloudflare, Inc., both based in the USA, plus Amazon CloudFront.
- 11. MetronHR, API: The open REST API v1 is part of the Professional plan: readable are employees, departments, clients, services, projects, time entries, absences and published shifts, while clients, services, projects, time entries and absences can be changed, each secured by keys with permissions per resource. Outgoing webhooks and the MCP server for AI assistants also belong to Professional. Sign-in via Microsoft Entra ID comes with every plan. Further integrations are agreed individually in the Enterprise offer.
- 12. MEP24, API: Ready-made partner interfaces (including Aposoft, Apotune, HRworks, Datafox); an open API is not documented.
~ = available with limits, the notes are below the table. – = no verified information is available for this provider on this feature. That is not a no: we only record a negative where we can cite a source.
An overview of which features exist at all, regardless of plan. The price-performance comparison is on the pricing page, the individual features in detail under Features.
Feature comparison as at September 2026. Information about competitors comes from publicly available sources, in each case the official provider pages with the date retrieved, and can change. MEP24 is a trademark of its respective owner.
MetronHR is also available as a native app for iOS and Android:
Where the data sits
Server location and operator are two different questions. A data centre in Germany does not remove the data from US law: providers with a US parent company fall under the CLOUD Act and the surveillance powers of FISA 702, regardless of where the servers stand. Microsoft's chief legal officer in France testified under oath before the French Senate's committee of inquiry on 10 June 2025 that he could not guarantee that data from European data centres would not go to US authorities (record of the Sénat). That is why both are shown side by side here, each with the source it comes from.
What is compared is what the provider documents for its own application, not the infrastructure of its marketing website. More about our own hosting is in the Trust Center.
MetronHR
- Server location of the application
- Hetzner Online GmbH, Nuremberg and Falkenstein. All servers stand exclusively in Germany.
- Operator and legal jurisdiction
- Hetzner Online GmbH, a German company with no US parent and therefore beyond the reach of the CLOUD Act and FISA 702. No US provider sits in the data path for the application.
- Processors outside Germany
- None for the application. Payment is handled by Stripe Payments Europe (Ireland). This marketing website is hosted with Vercel, Inc. (USA, Frankfurt region), and analytics run through PostHog Cloud EU and the reverse proxy cdn.metronhr.de with a Cloudflare edge. No employee data is processed there.
- Source
- MetronHR privacy policyAs at 08/2026
MEP24
- Server location of the application
- Not documented. The privacy policy covers only the website; for the application it names no server location.
- Operator and legal jurisdiction
- Not documented for the application. The website is run by Webflow, Inc. and Cloudflare, Inc., both USA, plus Amazon CloudFront. The controller is MEP24 Software GmbH in Hirschberg an der Bergstraße.
- Processors outside Germany
- Website hosting and CDN via Webflow, Inc. (USA), Cloudflare, Inc. (USA) and Amazon CloudFront via Amazon Web Services EMEA SARL (Luxembourg), alongside IONOS SE (Germany). Also named are HubSpot (USA) and Zapier (USA). Transfer to the USA is based on EU standard contractual clauses.
- Source
- MEP24 privacy policyAs at 19 May 2026
All information comes from the providers' publicly available privacy policies and security pages, and the date retrieved is on every card. Providers can change their infrastructure and their processors at any time. The adequacy decision on the EU-US Data Privacy Framework still applies, but is under legal challenge.
Connections to other software
MEP24
- ZiB interface to Datafox terminals
- Vetera.net for veterinary clinics
- DATEV payroll
The connections are tailored to two industries, veterinary clinics and businesses with Datafox terminals, rather than being broadly based.
Source: The provider's feature overview, retrieved on03.09.2026.
MetronHR
MetronHR connects to no other software today. What exists: the export as Excel and CSV for every report, plus an iCal feed that carries absences and the duty plan into Outlook and Google. Lexware Office and sevdesk come next.
A long list of connections is not the price of entry in this market: two of the five providers surveyed name only two to four connections themselves.
What MetronHR does better
A per-user price with no activation fee instead of a package with an annual commitment
MEP24 bills in packages (as at 08/2026, per the official pricing page): Essential 99 euros a month for up to 10 users plus 249 euros activation, Professional 290 euros a month for up to 20 users plus 449 euros activation; all prices apply on a 12-month contract term with annual billing. A pharmacy with 10 employees pays 50 euros a month at MetronHR (Team) or 100 euros a month (Professional), with no activation fee, no minimum user count, cancellable monthly.
Day plan and shift planning: the deployment planning MEP24 is known for
MEP24's core strength is staff deployment planning, and that is exactly where an alternative has to hold up. MetronHR plans the day in 15-minute steps: activities such as the dispensary, compounding, goods-in or deliveries as blocks per person, staffing rules, qualification requirements (compounding only for pharmacists), target and planned hours per person in the footer, PDF printing. Plus shift planning with templates, patterns and a shift market. The difference: at MetronHR the planning is part of a complete HR solution with a personnel file and onboarding, not the entire product.
A full digital personnel file instead of a documents module
MEP24 offers document management with read receipts. Contracts, salary data, social security, health insurance and documents with expiry reminders (residence permits, occupational health) are not part of the documented scope. MetronHR keeps the complete file per employee with self-service, GDPR-compliant retention and permission control, in the same system as the duty roster and time tracking, with no second licence.
Onboarding & offboarding as a workflow, which MEP24 does not provide for
Hired a new dispensing assistant? At MEP24 you create a user in the duty roster. Contracts, access, mandatory training and leaving processes run alongside in Excel or on paper. MetronHR defines reusable onboarding and offboarding workflows with tasks, owners, deadlines and automatic task assignment, documented with editor and timestamp and linked to the personnel file.
Price comparison
MEP24 bills in packages with an activation fee. Here are the costs for a typical pharmacy team side by side.
| Service | MetronHR | MEP24 |
|---|---|---|
| 10 employees: duty roster + time tracking + holiday | Team 50 euros a month (10 x 5 euros) | Essential 99 euros a month |
| 20 employees | Team 100 euros a month (20 x 5 euros) | Professional 290 euros a month |
| One-off activation fee | none | 249 to 999 euros depending on the package |
| Contract term | terminable monthly | 12 months, billed annually |
10 employees: duty roster + time tracking + holiday
- MetronHR
- Team 50 euros a month (10 x 5 euros)
- MEP24
- Essential 99 euros a month
20 employees
- MetronHR
- Team 100 euros a month (20 x 5 euros)
- MEP24
- Professional 290 euros a month
One-off activation fee
- MetronHR
- none
- MEP24
- 249 to 999 euros depending on the package
Contract term
- MetronHR
- terminable monthly
- MEP24
- 12 months, billed annually
Source: official MEP24 pricing page (mep24software.de/preise), as at 08/2026. Essential up to 10 users (extra users +12 euros), Professional up to 20 users (+10 euros), Advanced 490 euros a month up to 50 users (+8 euros), Enterprise on request.
No credit card needed · cancellable monthly
FromMEP24 moving to MetronHR
Your data comes with you.MEP24 hands them over as a file, MetronHR reads people, personal data, hours and absences out of it, and before anything is taken over you see row by row what will happen. For a team under thirty people that is a matter of one to two hours, most of it spent putting the file together.
- 1
AtMEP24 export
- Reports, statistics and employee overviews as PDF and CSV, automatically by email on request
- 2
Load the template and map the columns
The template comes as Excel and as CSV, with a second sheet that states for every column whether it is required, its format, an example and the permitted values. If your file's header row matches, the mapping falls away entirely. Otherwise the assistant proposes the mapping and marks everything that did not match word for word.
- 3
Check, then take it over
The dry run is mandatory and writes nothing. It shows for every row whether it will be created, changed, skipped or rejected, naming the column and the value behind the finding. Only the second click takes it over, in one transaction. The default is "create new ones only", and an empty cell never changes a value that has been maintained.
Export routes fromMEP24 according to MEP24, features, retrieved on06.09.2026.
At the time: On annual billing the MEP24 contract runs for twelve months. Plan the switch date accordingly.
Comes with you
- People, with staff number, work address and employment contract
- Remaining holiday and the overtime balance as an opening value per person
- Departments, clients, services and projects
- Time entries and absences for the current year
- Public holidays, including regions that differ
Does not come with you
- Files from the old personnel file, they are uploaded again
- The history of an hours account, MetronHR starts from the opening value
How the move works in detail, what the dry run shows and why no invitation email goes out with it is set out on the page switching time tracking.
Frequently asked questions
What you need to know about switching from MEP24 to MetronHR.
Per the official MEP24 pricing page (as at 08/2026): Essential 99 euros a month (up to 10 users, extra users +12 euros) plus 249 euros activation, Professional 290 euros a month (up to 20 users, +10 euros) plus 449 euros activation, Advanced 490 euros a month (up to 50 users, +8 euros) plus 999 euros activation, each on a 12-month contract term with annual billing. Example for 10 employees: 99 euros a month + a one-off 249 euros at MEP24, against 50 euros a month (Team) or 100 euros a month (Professional) at MetronHR, with zero one-off costs, cancellable monthly.
Yes. The pharmacy template comes with the groups pharmacists, dispensing assistants, pharmacy technicians, apprentices and delivery, plus eleven activities from the dispensary and advice through compounding, prescription checking, goods-in and picking to emergency duty. Planning runs in 15-minute steps, with staffing rules and qualification requirements (compounding only for the pharmacist group). Target and planned hours appear per person in the plan, and the printout comes as a real PDF.
MEP24 advertises an annual working-time account under section 4 of the federal framework collective agreement for pharmacy employees. MetronHR represents working-time models at three levels (day/week/month) and carries overtime and hours accounts forward automatically; there is no module explicitly labelled a BRTV annual working-time account. Anyone who needs the collectively agreed annual view represents it through monthly models and the hours account; the report delivers the balance per employee over any period.
A full digital personnel file (contracts, salary data, documents with expiry reminders), onboarding and offboarding workflows, project time tracking with clients and budgets, and client allowances with auto-renewal. MEP24 concentrates on deployment planning, time management and holiday administration. For HR processes a second system is needed alongside, or MetronHR directly with planning and HR in one tool.
MEP24 quotes an average of 4 to 6 weeks for the rollout with three training sessions of 90 minutes each. MetronHR relies on self-service: register, invite employees by email, productive in 5 to 10 minutes. The standard working-time model, the public holiday calendar (all 16 federal states) and approval rules are preset; the pharmacy template for the day plan is set up in half a day.
Question not answered here? Every step is explained in the help centre.
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