Submit Shifts

Submit Shifts

Submit Shifts is a modernised process for timesheet management. It allows employees to submit hours they've worked daily via their Employee app, alongside extra information such as leave taken, comments and uploaded files e.g., medical certificates.

The employee can be rostered on, or not rostered at all. Once the shift is submitted, it will flow into Approve Shifts pending approval by an admin.

Additionally, you can have employees upload a physical timesheet to assist with shift approvals. These timesheets are also automatically attached to invoices that are sent out to clients.

In this article, we will cover:

• Enabling the Submit Shifts function in your platform
• Selecting which employees will be submitting shifts
• How employees can submit their shifts in their Employee App
• Setting an email or SMS reminder for employees to submit their shifts for the week
• Managing shifts that have been submitted by employees
• Additional settings that can be used with Submit Shifts to provide more flexibility
• FAQs

  Please note: If you're interested in using this, we recommend discussing its implications with our Support team first. You can do so by submitting a ticket.

Enable Submit shifts for use in your platform

Once you have enabled this setting, your platform will have the ability to use the submit shifts feature. However, this will not automatically be applied to all employees in your workforce. You have the option to select which employees you would like to use Submit Shifts, please see the sections below to see how this can be done per employee or in bulk.

  Please note: If you are currently using timesheets, you will not be able to use timesheets with Submit Shifts.

Enable the Submit Shifts setting in your platform:

1. From the main menu, navigate to  Platform Settings > Time & Attendance.
2. Within the Submit shifts section, locate the setting for 'Allow employees to submit shifts'.
3. Select 'Yes' to enable the setting. This will now show the 'Can Submit shifts' toggle on all employees' profiles.
4. To save your changes, select Save from the taskbar.
   
   

Select which employees will be submitting shifts

When enabling the Submit Shifts for your employees you have the option to enable it individually or in bulk. 

Let's look at the steps on both options below.

Enable Submit Shifts for an individual employee

To enable Submit Shifts for a single employee:

1. Navigate to People > Approved People or use the global search and find the desired employee. 
2. In the Overview tab, enable the 'Can Submit Shifts' toggle. 
   
   
   
3. Optionally enable the 'Can Edit Shift Position' toggle if the employee works multiple positions and needs to choose their relevant position when submitting shifts.
4. Once enabled, employees will be able to see a 'Times Icon' in their Employee App.
   

 

Enable Submit Shifts for multiple employees

This option will be useful when enabling allowing all employees on one roster or operation to submit shifts. Doing do in bulk will save you time!

To Bulk apply the Submit Shifts toggle:

1. Navigate to People > Approved people and select the desired employees. 
2. In Bulk Actions select 'Set Submit Shift Setting for selected'. 
   
   
3. Enable the 'Enable submit shifts for selected employees' and select Save. 
   
   
4. Optionally enable the 'Employee can edit shift position' toggle if the employee works multiple positions and needs to choose their relevant position when submitting shifts. 
5. Once enabled, employees will be able to see a 'Times Icon' in their Employee App.

  Please note: If you have salaried employees who have the 'automatic payment' option enabled, their working hours do not need to be approved by a manager on a daily basis. However, salaried employees can use the Submit Shifts feature to submit weekly allowances or reimbursements that flow to Approval Shifts for admin approval. 

 

If you still cannot see Submit Shifts in the Times menu?

If you have recently switched to the Submit Shifts feature on your platform and can't see the Times menu for an employee who is authorized to submit shifts, it's likely because of old timesheets that need to be located and managed.

  Contact us: You must either submit or delete old timesheets first before you can access the Times menu for the employee. If you need assistance, please reach out to the Support team for assistance. You can reach them via [e-mail]. 

How employees submit shifts

When employees use Submit Shifts, they can view and submit past shifts through the Times icon in the Employee App.

There are 2 ways in which employees can submit their shifts worked:

• • They are rostered for the shifts and will see the rostered shift in their Times section in the Employee App. At the end of the day, they will review the shift and submit it.
  • They can submit a shift that they weren't rostered for, but worked by adding the shift to their Times section in the Employee App.

  To see how employees submit shifts from their end, check out our Employee Help Guide here. 

Set a reminder for employees to submit their shifts *NEW

If your business uses the Submit Shifts feature, you will require your employees to submit their shifts for the week by a specific deadline before you can approve the shifts and process payroll efficiently. To encourage employees to submit their shifts on time, you may want to set up a weekly reminder for those who have not yet done so.

We recommend all businesses that use Submit Shifts configure the below reminder message to employees. This reminder message will:

• • Enhance employees' awareness of their shift submission status.
  • Prevent pay issues on upcoming pay runs.
  • Only be sent to employees who have the relevant 'Submit shifts' toggle enabled on their profile.
  • Only be sent to employees who have no shifts submitted that week.
  • Allows you to select a deadline for shift submissions, which will be included in the message template.

Once configured this message template will be sent to any employees (with the Submit shifts toggle on) who have not submitted any shifts for 7 days before the scheduled date. 

• Employees who have not submitted shifts yet

ID	Recipient	Default content
186	Employee	Reminder to submit your shifts for the week by the due date so payroll will not be affected.

To configure this reminder to employees:

1. Navigate to Communication > Communication Content and select the message template 'Employees who have not submitted shifts yet'. 
2. Within the Message Template you will be able to update the following: 
   • Send Email - Toggle Yes or No to enable or disable this Message Template.
   • Use Default Email Subject - Disable this setting if you want to enter your own email subject.
   • Use Default Email Content - Disable this setting if you want to enter your own email content. 
   • Send SMS - Toggle Yes to send an SMS as well as an email. 
3. Set the Day of the week and Time for the reminder to send each week. 
   • I.e. Set the reminder to send at 9 am each Friday morning.
4. Choose the Submit shifts due date to display to employees in the email/SMS message.
   • I.e. The email and SMS will state, 'Submit your shifts by Friday at 8 pm'.

In the example below, we are setting up a message template that will be sent via email and SMS on Friday at 9 am. This reminder is intended for employees who have not yet submitted any shifts for the week, informing them that the deadline to submit their shifts is Friday at 8 pm.

  Hot tip: This message template will only be sent to active and approved employees (not declined or terminated employees). This ensures clear messaging to your employees.

Managing shifts that employees have submitted

When employees submit the shifts they have worked, the information will be displayed in the following areas:

• • Rosters
  • Approve Shifts

  Please note: Shifts that have been submitted by an employee can be viewed in the roster but will need to be managed in Approve Shifts. 

To manage submitted shifts in Approve Shifts:

1. Navigate to Time & Attendance > Approve Shifts. A shift that has been submitted by an employee will have 'Employee Submitted' in the Rostered Shift column. 
   
   
2. You'll then need to action the shift by either approving, declining or editing the submitted shift.
3. After making changes to a shift, the roster will automatically reflect the update.

In this example, our employee Ria has submitted their shifts for the week, which we have approved in Approve Shifts. We can see this is reflected in the roster below. The approved shifts are indicated by the tick on the shift:

In this example, our employee Ria has submitted their shifts for the week, and we have declined 1 of their shifts in Approved Shifts. We can see this is reflected in the roster below. The declined shift is indicated by a strikethrough:

Additional options to use with Submit Shifts

When enabling Submit Shifts for your employees, you may want your employees to use these additional options: 

• • Can edit shift position - This can be used for employees who work multiple positions so they can select the relevant position for the shift they are submitting. 
  • Upload timesheet when submitting shift - This can be used for employees who need to upload a weekly timesheet when submitting their shifts. 
  • Submit shifts allows roster to be edited for rostered shifts - Employees submitting shifts can update the chosen roster on their rostered shift. The roster must be within the same Operation and location.

  • Require employees to provide reasons for leave in Submit Shifts - Employees will need to select an attendance reason when they submit leave for a shift they have not attended (submitted times for).

Let's look at these additional options in more detail below.

Allow employees to edit their shift position

The 'Can edit shift position' setting is beneficial for employees who have multiple positions. This allows your employees to be able to select the relevant position when submitting their shifts. This option will show automatically on an employee's profile 

This toggle can be enabled individually or in bulk. 

To enable the 'Can edit shift position' toggle for an individual employee:

1. Navigate to the relevant employee's profile either via People > Approved People or via the global search option. The employee must have the 'Can submit shifts' toggle enabled for the next option to show.
2. In the Overview tab, toggle the 'Can edit shift position' on. Or toggle it off to disable. 
   
   

To enable the 'Can edit shift position' toggle in bulk:

1. Navigate to People > Approved people and select the desired employees. 
2. In Bulk Actions select 'Set Submit Shift Setting for selected'. 
   
   
3. Toggle on the 'Enable submit shifts for selected employees' and toggle on the 'Employee can edit shift position' options. 
4. Select Save.
   
   

 

Allow employees to upload timesheets

Along with employees submitting their times, you can allow employees to upload a physical timesheet for the week.

To enable the timesheet upload option for your employees: 

1. From the main menu, navigate to  Platform Settings > Time & Attendance.
2. Within the Submit Shifts section, there are 2 settings that can be enabled:
   • 'Enable the 'Add Timesheet' feature on the employee Times page - This will allow employees to optionally upload timesheets from the Times section and enable the feature across all employees.
   • 'Require employee to submit a timesheet from the Times page' - Once enabled, the 'add timesheet feature becomes mandatory. A required indicator will visually display to employees encouraging them to upload a timesheet, however, the requirement is not enforced and employees can bypass it if necessary. 
     
     
3. To save your changes, select Save from the taskbar.

With these settings set to 'yes', employees can now submit physical timesheets that will feed into Approve Shifts and display in the Timesheet icon when attached, ready for your review and approval.

In this example, Clair has submitted her shifts for the week and has uploaded a physical timesheet. We can see this in Approve Shifts by hovering over the Timesheet icon below:

 

Allow employees to edit their roster when submitting times for a rostered shift

Using this feature allows employees to submit their times at the end of the shift and modify the roster they worked on if it has changed from the roster they were originally rostered on.

This is relevant in industries like labour hire, where an employee may be required to work for a specific time period without knowing the particular role or job they will be assigned to until shortly before their shift begins.

When using this setting, the following conditions must be met:

• • The shift must already be on the roster.
  • The employee must have the Submit shifts toggle enabled on their profile.
  • The employee will only be able to edit a roster within the same Operation or location.
  • Like the case of all submitted shifts, the time of the shift must be in the past.

To enable the edit roster option for your employees: 

1. From the main menu, navigate to Platform Settings > Time & Attendance.

2. Within the Submit Shifts section locate the setting 'Submit shifts allows roster to be edited for rostered shifts'.

   • Employees can only view and select the roster for their assigned location/s. Locations are a way of limiting which rosters employees can work. You'll be able to read more about locations here.
3. Select 'Yes' to enable the setting. This will now allow employees to select a roster within the drop-down selector when they are submitting a shift.
   
   
   
4. To save your changes, select Save from the taskbar.

With this setting set to 'yes', employees can edit the roster on their shift if they happen to work on a different roster for the shift. As mentioned above, the roster choices will be limited to rosters within that same Operation and location.

In this example, Alice was rostered from 9-2 pm on the TBR/Outside Bar roster. She ended up working on the TBR/Functions roster as they were short-staffed. At the end of the day, Alice submits her shift and edits the roster to be accurate to the one she worked on. This means her approving manager will not need to make this edit to her roster in Approve shifts, saving her manager time and reducing confusion.

 

Require employees to provide reasons for leave in Submit Shifts

Using this feature will require employees to choose a reason for applying leave to a shift in Submit Shifts. The available reasons are pulled from the attendance codes set in your platform. When an employee doesn't attend their rostered shift as normal, instead of submitting times worked they will instead submit the leave hours (if applicable).

This setting is enabled by default in your platform because most businesses require a reason for the standard process of employees requesting leave. 

If you do not want to capture attendance reasons for unattended shifts, please disable this setting.

To disable the leave reasons option for unattended shifts: 

1. From the main menu, navigate to Platform Settings > Time & Attendance.

2. Within the Submit Shifts section locate the setting 'Require employees to provide a reason when submitting leave'.
   

               

3. Select 'No' to disable the setting. Employees can now input leave for unattended shifts without the mandatory option to select a reason for not attending the shift.
4. To save your changes, select Save from the taskbar.

Some other options you may consider

A few other additional options you may consider your employees using when submitting shifts are the following:

• • Comments - Employees can add a comment about the shift, e.g. the employee was asked to leave early as it was slow, so they added this as a comment to the shift to let the manager know when approving. 
  • Documents - A document can be added to the shift, e.g. the employee added leave to their shift as they went home sick, and they can add a medical document for their manager to see while approving. 

Both of these options are a great way for the employee to communicate anything to their manager regarding their shift. 

FAQs

Can salaried employees use the Submit Shifts feature?

Yes, salaried employees can use the Submit Shifts feature.

However, it is important to note that Salaried employees can only use the Submit Shifts feature to submit weekly Allowances or reimbursements. These allowances or reimbursements will flow through to Approve Shifts for admin approval. 

Can employees submit shifts in advance?

No, employees can only submit their shift times for past shifts. This means that employees will complete their work for the day, and then submit their shift.

Can an employee submit multiple shifts on the same day?

Yes, they can! As long as the shift times don't overlap. 

Can my employees clock in and out as well as use Submit Shifts?

Ideally, you'll choose to use one of these methods for your business.

If you have Employee App clocking enabled for your employees, they can clock in/out for a shift or submit a shift. They will need to do one or the other for each shift though. For example, an employee cannot clock in for a shift and then submit that shift later in the day as the system will be expecting them to clock out.

If you would like Employee App clocking with geolocation to be used then consider using the Clocking option instead.