Availability

Availability describes days and hours when employees can work shifts. Availability can be entered as a weekly template, a date-based location template, or single-day overrides. Availability is separate from the Leave Management system where absences go through an approval process.

Availability is used as a guide during the scheduling process. Changing availability will not affect currently assigned shifts.

It's possible to limit availability too much such that no shifts are assignable. Do not attempt to restrict times down to a single shift length as changing work times and shift strategies by schedulers might cause there to be nothing available to work.

Availability Calendar

The availability calendar show the combined, effective availability of all templates, overrides, and granted leave. It does not allow editing. Users must edit on the templates or overrides pages.

Availability Templates

An availability template represents a generic, recurring 7-day week. Each template describes the available days On/Off, the day Priority (1 = lowest, 9 = highest), and optionally limited Times available to work. There's also optional preferred times that managers can use for scheduling.

There are two types of templates:

1. Global - applies the same rules to all locations
2. Local - applies to a single location

In addition, templates can be Date-Based so that they're only in effect on those dates.

The absence of a template simply defaults to all days/times as available. Setting up availability is optional and sometimes not needed according to how the organization schedules.

Adding a Template

To add a new template:

1. Click the Add button at the top of the page
2. Select a Scope (Global or location)
3. Optionally enter a date-range for a date-based template
4. Click Save

Editing a Template

Templates are edited using the template page. Select a template to view/edit from the drop-down at the top of the page.

Choose values in the drop-downs to toggle days On/Off or set Priority.

To edit the times, click the down-arrow in the Available column to reveal time entry boxes.

You can enter multiple blocks of available times. When editing, the page will always give you a few extra boxes in case you want to add another block.

Time blocks can be open-ended by leaving the start or end time blank. For instance, if available until 3 PM, you might just enter the end time of 3 PM.

After making changes, you must click Save to update the template.

Deleting a Template

To delete a template:

1. Select/Open the template using the drop-down
2. Click Delete and confirm

Availability Overrides

Overrides act as date-based exceptions to the availability defined in the template(s). Each override is global or for a single location, is for a single date, and specifies if the override is On or Off availability. If an On override, blocks of time may be entered.

To add an override, go to the Overrides page, then

1. Click Add
2. Enter or select a Date
3. Specify the Scope
4. Choose On or Off
5. Optionally enter time blocks (if On)
6. Click Save

Editing Overrides

To edit an override:

1. Click Open in the actions column of the overrides list
2. Make changes
3. Click Save

Deleting Overrides

To delete an override:

1. Click Open in the actions column of the overrides list
2. Click Delete

Volunteer Lists

A volunteer list is a simple sign-up list that helps managers limit scheduling to only those in the list. Volunteer lists are per location.

To see volunteer lists, select a Location from the drop-down at the top of the page.

To add or remove yourself from a list, click the Open button in the Actions column.

Choose Yes or No for the volunteer value, click Save.

Some lists are date-based and will be limited to volunteering only on those dates.