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ℹ️ Important read: Create or edit shifts ; Create and use Shift types

It is your responsibility to ensure compliance with the relevant rules for sick leave or other types of statutory leave and to configure Planday to be suitable for the particular circumstances of your organisation and employees. If you are unsure, please obtain professional legal advice.

SSP (Statutory Sick Pay) is not supported in Planday. You can use a shift type to track which shifts employees are off sick, but the pay calculations need to be handled outside of Planday.

Use shift types

You can use shift types to record leave types other than annual leave, such as sick leave.

Create shift types

You may already have shift types set up for paid sick leave and unpaid sick leave. If not, you can create shift types for sick leave by going to Settings > Schedule > Shift types. Click on Create.

Then, configure the shift type.

1. General settings

Name: Give the shift type a name, such as “Sick leave - paid” or “Sick leave - unpaid”.
Salary code: Assign a salary code to ensure the shift type is easily identifiable in the payroll report. Learn more about Salary codes in How to set up Salary codes. Leave this field blank if it does not apply.
Rate adjustment: To pay the full wage when this shift type is applied, set the rate to 100%. If no payment is required (e.g. for unpaid sick leave), enter 0%.
Description: Add a description for internal reference, especially useful if multiplel Schedule managers work with shift types. The description is only visible when editing the shift type.

2. Additional settings

Allow conflicting shifts: Leave this unchecked to receive a warning in the Schedule if you try to schedule the same employee for 2 shifts simultaneously.
Allow booking: Uncheck this box for statutory leave.
Overwrite when applying a template: Uncheck this box for statutory leave.
Include in Schedule print: Check this box if you if you want the shift type to be included when printing or downloading the schedule.
Include in Schedule message: When sending messages to employees regarding a specific day’s schedule, the shift type will be included.
Count hours in payroll report: Disable this option for shift types that don't need to be included in in the payroll report’s total hours, typically for unpaid sick leave.

3. Include all hours on this shift type in the following functions

Payroll supplements: Check this box if hours from this shift type should be affected by Payroll supplements.
Break: Check this box if breaks should apply to this shift type. Read more about setting up and working with breaks.
Meal contribution: Check this box to apply meal contributions or deductions for this shift type. Set these up by going to Settings > Payroll > Meal contribution and deduction.
Affects salaried employees: Enable this option if the shift type should also apply to salaried employees.

Apply shift types to the days employees are on sick leave

When employees call in sick, apply a shift type to the days they are sick.

Tip: You can use the multi select function if an employee is sick several days.

How do I make sure shifts are covered when an employee calls in sick?

To cover shifts for employees who are out sick, follow these steps:

Copy the original shift and set it to open so other employees in the same employee group can request it. To copy a shift, hold Alt/Option (Mac) or Alt (Windows) and drag the shift to the new location on the schedule until a green plus sign appears.
Apply the sick leave shift type to the original shift.

Report on sick leave

Use a Schedule statistics report

You can export a schedule statistics report by going to Reports > Schedule statistic reports.

Then, click “Generate report” under “Hours per employee”. Set the following filters for your export:

Select employees via: Employees, Employee groups or Departments. If you select Employees, you can click on the arrow to select specific employees.
Date Range and Working Days: Define the period and specific days to include.
Include shift types: Select the applicable sick leave shift types.
Status: Choose All, Approved or Not approved.
Include normal shifts: Uncheck this option.
Subtract Breaks: Decide whether to subtract breaks.
Include all employees: Choose whether to include all employees, even those without a sick leave shift type for the selected period.

This Excel report will display specific dates and the total hours of sickness for employees who took sick leave.

Alternatively, you can export a Schedule Statistics report and select the Shifts per Employee option. This report allows you to identify trends in employee sickness based on the days of the week. For instance, you can see how many Mondays an employee has been sick during the selected period.

FAQs

We use the shift type “Sick leave”. However, the number of hours is still counted in the total hours of the week.

If you don't want sick leave hours to count toward the weekly total, adjust the shift type settings as follows:

Go to Settings > Schedule > Shift types.
Edit the shift type for sick leave.
Untick the box “Count hours in the payroll report”.

How do I register a long period of sickness? Do I have to apply a shift type to every shift?

To register a long sickness period, create shifts with the sick leave shift type in the schedule.

You can also create a schedule template and apply it across multiple weeks.

I’m using the new accrual method for irregular workers. How does it work with sick leave?

If you’re using up the 12.07% accrual method for irregular workers, register statutory leave shift types such as sick leave, maternity leave, paternity leave, etc. under Settings > Leave & Overtime > Accrual calculation setup to ensure correct accrual accrual of leave within a Pay period.

Learn more in How to set up the UK 2024 accrual method.

Can I sync statutory leave like sick leave or maternity leave through the Xero integration?

It’s not currently possible to sync sick leave or other leave types (besides holidays) through the Xero integration. To manage sick days, label them on the schedule in Planday using a shift type. Then, add the statutory leave period directly in Xero by going to Payroll > Leave > New > Statutory leave, This will allow Xero to calculate the pay accurately. For more information, click here.

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