How to manage your employees' absences
In this article, you can learn about:
- how you can manage absence requests in a browser
- how you can manage absence requests in the app
- how to edit and delete absences in a browser or the Smartplan app
Approve/decline absence requests
When employees request an absence, you will be notified about this by mail or push on your phone or both. It completely depends on your notification settings.
You can read more about setting up your notification settings here:
How to edit notification settings
Manage absence requests in a browser
In your Smartplan account, new absence requests by the employees will appear in the notification history in the upper right corner. Click on it to see the absence request and to either approve or reject it:
Before you can finally approve an absence request, you need to decide what should happen with the shifts in the period and how the hours should be counted. This will appear when you click on "Approve".
In the highlighted box at the top, you have the option to change the default settings for the employee's absence. If any shifts need to deviate from this default setting, you can adjust them by clicking “Edit” on the shift:
At the same time, you can also check how the new absence will affect the employee's holiday account:
How to add a compensation to the time balance when adding/approving absence
When you create or approve absence for your employees, you also have the option to add compensation to their time balances. You can do this at the bottom of the page where you also decide what should happen to the employee's shifts during the absence period.
If the employee has shifts during the absence period which you choose should give 0 hours, the number of hours those shifts were supposed to last will automatically be subtracted from the time balance (provided that attended hours are used to calculate this). In such cases, you can add a positive compensation for the same number of hours if the absence should not affect the time balance.
On public holidays, a compensation can also be useful if you do not assign shifts to your employees on these days in the rota. When you create absence for your employees, you can simultaneously choose to add compensation for the number of hours they were supposed to work.
If you add or approve time-based absence, it will not automatically be subtracted from the time balance. If the absence should affect the time balance, you have the following options:
- Subtract the hours by adding a negative compensation to the time balance.
- Adjust the meeting time accordingly when adding the absence. In this case, a compensation is not needed.
- Set the entire shift to give 0 hours and add positive compensation for the number of hours the balance needs to be adjusted by.
Another way to see a persons absence requests is in their profile. Go to "Employees", find the wanted person in the list and click on that person's name to open their profile:
In the tab "Absence" you will now see all the absence requests of that person under "Absence waiting for approval":
You can edit, approve or reject the request. Before you finally approve an absence request, you have to to make a decision on what should happen with the persons shifts in the period and how the hours should be counted. This will appear, when you click on "Approve". Here, you are also able to see how the new absence request affects the employee's holiday account.
If you would like an overview of all the different absence requests that exist within a certain time period, you can go to the menu item "Absence" in your Smartplan account and take a look at the absence calendar.
Unapproved absences are here highlighted in white and with a bell symbol. Furthermore, in the top, right corner you can see all absences waiting approval:
In order to either edit, reject or approve the absence, simply click on it in the calendar. Before you can finally approve an absence request, you have to to make a decision on what should happen with the persons shifts in the period and how the hours should be counted. This will appear, when you click on "Approve". Here, you are also able to see how the new absence request affects the employee's holiday account.
Manage absence requests in the app
If you want to see and manage the absence requests on your phone, you can do this via the menu item "Employees".
In the tab "Employees" you are presented with your employee list, where you can find and choose the person, you would like to see the absence request for:
In the user's profile, you can find the absence requests in the tab called "Absence" and then under "Absence that needs approval":
Here you can now edit, approve or reject the request. Before you can finally approve an absence request, you have to to make a decision on what should happen with the persons shifts in the period and how the hours should be counted. This will appear, when you click on "Approve".
In the highlighted box at the top you have the option to change the default settings for the employee’s absence. If there are any shifts that need to deviate from this default setting, you can adjust them by clicking “Edit” on the shift:
You will get an overview of the employee's holiday account at the top of the menu. The holiday account is an optional feature which tracks the number of absence days for an absence type of your choice. It will also help you to secure a certain predefined limit of absence days.
In the screenshot above, Mia has 5/30 days of holiday registered.
It is up to you whether you want to use the holiday account. You can activate it from your Smartplan account. You can find it in Settings -> Smartplan Settings -> Absence.
You can read about the holiday account here.
How to add a compensation to the time balance when adding/approving absence
When you create or approve absence for your employees, you also have the option to add compensation to their time balances. You can do this at the bottom of the page where you also decide what should happen to the employee's shifts during the absence period.
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If the employee has shifts during the absence period which you choose should give 0 hours, the number of hours those shifts were supposed to last will automatically be subtracted from the time balance (provided that attended hours are used to calculate this). In such cases, you can add a positive compensation for the same number of hours if the absence should not affect the time balance.
On public holidays, a compensation can also be useful if you do not assign shifts to your employees on these days in the rota. When you create absence for your employees, you can simultaneously choose to add compensation for the number of hours they were supposed to work.
If you add or approve time-based absence, it will not automatically be subtracted from the time balance. If the absence should affect the time balance, you have the following options:
- Subtract the hours by adding a negative compensation to the time balance.
- Adjust the meeting time accordingly when adding the absence. In this case, a compensation is not needed.
- Set the entire shift to give 0 hours and add positive compensation for the number of hours the balance needs to be adjusted by.
If you would like to get an overview of all the latest absence requests, you will find a notification bar at the top of the employee list. Tap on it to see all current absence request in order to approve or reject them:
Before you can finally approve an absence request, you have to to make a decision on what should happen with the persons shifts in the period and how the hours should be counted. This will appear, when you click on "Approve".
Finally, in the menu item "Employees", you can also access the absence calendar through the tab "Absence". In the calendar overview, unapproved absences will be marked with an exclamation mark:
By clicking on the day in the calendar, you will be led to the more detailled list view of the calendar. Tap on "Handle" in order to approve the absence:
Before you can finally approve an absence request, you have to to make a decision on what should happen with the persons shifts in the period and how the hours should be counted. This will appear, when you click on "Approve".
Edit and delete absences
If you want to edit or delete the absence of an employee, this can be done through the person's user profile or the absence calendar.
In order to edit absences via a user profile in a browser or the app, go to "Employees”. Find the employee in question in the list, and then click on their name:
Then go to the tab “Absence” on their profile and go through the list of your employees’ "approved absence". Here you will be able to edit and delete the absences of that person, if you wish:
Before you finally delete an absence which has shifts registered in its time period, you have to make a decision on what should happen to these shifts:
It is also possible to manage absences directly in the absence calendar. In the browser, the calendar is found under “Absence” in the top menu.
You start by searching for the time period, that the approved absence is in. You can change the monthly overview in the upper right corner of the calendar.
Then simply click on the colored mark of the absence that you want to manage. Now the following box appears, where you can edit or delete the absence.
