• Before you set up leave policies
• How to access leave policies
• Deputy default leave policies
• Add a new leave policy
• Configuring leave policies - Standard free features
  • Policy name and group
  • Paid or non-paid leave
  • Tracking leave in hours or days
  • Hide leave policy
  • Exporting leave
• Configuring leave policies - Leave management+ features
  • Leave accrual options
    • Does not accrue
    • Hourly
    • Fixed
    • Based on regular working hours
    • Adding a tenure-based rule
  • Leave balance options
    • Set a maximum yearly accrual
    • Set a maximum leave balance limit
    • Rollover or reset leave
  • Additional options
    • Request outside of current leave year
    • Accruing leave while on leave
    • Calculate average working hours
• Final steps

 

Before you set up leave policies

Before starting to set up leave policies please be aware of the following:

• Only System Administrators can add and configure new leave policies for their organisation in Deputy however, Location managers can add leave policies to their team members via their employee profile.
• Currently, it is not possible to archive or delete leave policies but the functionality to archive leave policies may be introduced in the future.
• To use all the features described in this article, your organisation will require an add-on subscription to Deputy HR to access Leave Management+. If you do not have a Deputy HR subscription you can still set up standard leave policies but will be limited to the basic features as described in Introduction to Leave Management.

 

How to access leave policies

1. System administrators can open the drop-down menu under their name to select Business settings

2. On the Leave tab, click on View leave policies.

 

Deputy default leave policies

Your Deputy account will come with 10 leave policies added by default:

• Annual Leave (Vacation)
• Bereavement (Compassionate)
• Community Service Leave
• Long Service Leave
• Other Paid Leave
• Sick (Personal/Carer's) Leave
• Time Off In Lieu
• Unpaid Leave - Leave
• Unpaid Leave - No Show
• Unpaid Leave - Sick

Keep in mind that these policies are just suggestions and we recommend consulting your legal or HR advisers to review the settings. You can further configure any of these default policies by hovering over the required leave policy and clicking Edit.

Alternatively, you can add and configure your own completely new leave policy:

 

Add a new leave policy

1. Click on Create leave policy.

 

Configuring a leave policy - standard free features

On the next pop up you can complete the fields to configure how you want your leave policy set up. Let's explore each of these fields and how they affect your leave policy.

 

Policy name and group

Set your leave policy name.

You can use the optional policy groups to organise your different leave policies:

• Leave this field empty if you don't want to use leave policy groups OR
• select an existing group OR
• use the drop-down to create a new leave policy group

 

Paid or non-paid leave

Select Yes if employees will be paid when taking this leave.

 

Track leave in hours or days

Select whether you will track this leave policy in hours or days for each team member.

Important: once you have set up a leave policy, selected either the hours or days tracking option and assigned the leave policy to a team member where leave is accruing, then the policy is considered 'active' and it is no longer possible to return to this leave policy and swap over from tracking in days to hours or hours to days. Please be sure to choose this option carefully when configuring your leave. If you decide to change between tracking leave in hours or days, you would need to set up a new leave policy and assign it to your team members.

 

Hide leave policy

If you select yes, this leave policy will be hidden from team members when viewing and requesting leave.

You might choose to hide a leave policy when you want managers to be the only ones to manage a leave entitlement. An example of this might be 'Jury duty' leave entitlement, where managers can request and approve this leave on behalf of team members but the team members can't view or request that leave themselves.

 

Exporting leave

If you are exporting your leave to payroll you may wish to configure how this leave policy will export:

• with the associated pay condition
• with an export code (please specify the code)

If you choose to export your leave with an associated pay condition it will use the associated pay condition export code (if set). The decision to choose this option depends on what code your Payroll system is configured to receive.

 

Configuring leave policies - Leave management+ features with Deputy HR subscription 

IMPORTANT: If you do not have the add-on Deputy HR subscription then you will be able to explore the different settings available, but you will not be able to configure and save any further settings as described below as you will find that they are grayed out.  If you have a Deputy HR subscription and configure the additional settings shown below as part of Leave Management+ but later cancel the subscription, you will find that your existing settings are stored but grayed out and inactive. Futhermore, if you have set up automatic accruals configured then accruals will crease on the date you lose access to Deputy HR. Any future-dated leave request deductions will also not be actioned on and after the date you lose access to Deputy HR.  If you later re-subscribe to Deputy HR, the settings you previously set up will be restored and active. Automatic accruals will resume on the date Deputy HR was re-subscribed but no 'make up or extra' accrual calculations automatically occur for the dates where Deputy HR was inactive. If required, managers would need to manually update leave balances to account for the period where Deputy HR was inactive.

 

Leave accrual options

All new leave policies you create will default to "Does not accrue" but you can select the method you would like to use to calculate how much leave your team members accrue under this leave policy.

 

Does not accrue 

If you choose to create a leave policy that does not accrue leave, you can also further select a check box that also prevents leave from being deducted from this policy as well.

Note: even if this check box is selected to create a leave policy that does not accrue or deduct leave, managers can still manually update leave balances in the team member's profile.

 

Hourly accrual

If you need your leave policy to accrue leave based on the hours your team members work, select Hourly.

You have two choices - per hour worked or per threshold worked:

Per hour worked

To accrue leave according to the hours worked, click on Per hour worked.

You can set:

• the rate at which this policy will accrue leave (numerical entry)
• whether the rate is accrued as straight hours or as a % of hours that the team member has worked
• whether you want team members to accrue this leave on overtime hours they work in addition to ordinary hours worked.
• tenure based rules.

Per threshold worked

To accrue leave according to a threshold of hours worked, click on Per threshold worked.

You can set:

• the amount of leave that is accrued (in hours or days according to how the leave policy has been configured)
• The number of hours that need to be worked to reach the threshold to accrue the leave
• whether you want team members to accrue this leave on overtime hours they work in addition to ordinary hours worked.
• tenure based rules.

 

Fixed accrual

If you need your leave policy to release a fixed amount of leave you can configure:

• how many hours will be released (or days depending on what you selected here)
• how often the hours or days are released - you can choose from every:
  • week
  • month
  • quarter or
  • year
• whether they are released starting on a specific date or your employee's hire date
• tenure based rules

Note: If you choose a specific date for fixed leave to be accrued it will only added to your employee's balances the next time that date passes. Learn more.

Note: If you choose to release the fixed leave on an annual cycle you can also select an optional check box if you want the leave policy to release pro-rata amounts of leave for team members who join your organisation part-way through the fixed leave accrual period. Learn more about pro-rata fixed leave accrual.

 

Accrual Based on regular working hours

If you need to configure a leave policy that accrues leave based on the team member's regular working days you can set

• the number of days or weeks of leave allowed for a standard full-time entitlement. Part time team members with agreed hours will receive a portion of the full time entitlement
• whether the leave will be released each year on:
  
  • a specific date
  • the employee's hire date
• whether you want team members who join your organisation part-way through the year to accrue pro-rata amounts of the leave entitlement. Read more about pro-rata leave accrual.
• whether you want to add a tenure-based rule.

For more details on setting up this option please read: Set up a leave policy that accrues leave based on regular working hours (US)

 

Adding a tenure-based rule

When adding a policy that is based on:

• hourly
• fixed
• based on regular working hours

there is the option to add a tenure-based rule.

A tenure-based rule allows different amounts of leave to be accrued depending on how long the team member has been with your organisation.

Note: for this policy to function you will need to have your team member's Hire date entered accurately in their employee profile.

To add a tenure-based rule to a leave policy, click on the Add tenure-based rule link in the leave accrual section of the leave policy.

Add the time frame from the hire date you would like the leave policy to begin accruing at a different amount and also enter the new leave accrual amount.

You can click Add another rule to set up as many tenure rules as you like.

Read Tenure-based leave rule FAQs.

 

Leave balance options

Set a maximum yearly accrual

You can turn on and set an optional maximum yearly accrual for the maximum amount of leave your team members can accrue for this leave policy.

1. Click Set max yearly accrual.

2. Type the amount of leave you wish to set as your maximum yearly accrual in the field below. Resets on January 1.

Note: this setting can be enabled independently of Max leave balance level, or in conjunction with it.

 

Set a maximum leave balance level

You can turn on and set an optional maximum balance for the maximum amount of leave your team members can accrue for this leave policy.

1. Click Set max balance.

2. Type the amount of leave you wish to set as your maximum balance in the field below.

Note: this setting can be enabled independently of Max yearly leave accrual, or in conjunction with it.

 

Rollover or reset leave

Choose whether you want to rollover or reset the leave balance for this leave policy.

1. You can rollover the entire balance on:

• a specific date OR
• the employee's hire date 

2. You can rollover a nominated portion of the balance on:

• a specific date OR
• the employee's hire date 

This option may be useful for organisations where the worker's contract specifies how much of their annual leave entitlement they can carry over to the following period.

3. You can also reset the leave balance on:

• a specific date OR
• the employee's hire date 

Note: If you have configured a leave policy that releases leave on a specific date and that date is the same as the date you have configured to reset the leave balance for that leave policy then Deputy will always perform the reset action BEFORE releasing leave.

 

Additional options

Request outside of current leave year

If you create leave policies with this option selected then your team members will still be able to request leave in the next leave accrual year as well as the current one.

If you set up a leave policy with this option enabled, you can view the leave balance for both the current and future leave year in the employee's profile. The leave balance for the current and future year can be viewed on the Deputy mobile app by the manager and the employee (if the ability to view leave balances has been enabled for your team).

 

Accruing leave while on leave

You can turn on the option for this leave policy to accrue leave while the team member is on leave if required. You can select which leave types will continue to accrue leave when the team member takes leave from this leave policy:

• all leave types
• paid leave only
• unpaid leave only
• specific types of leave only that you can select from the drop-down.

 

Calculate average working hours

Read Set up a leave policy that calculates average working hours for your team member (US) for a more detailed explanation of this leave policy configuration option.

 

Final steps

Once you have configured your leave policy options, don't forget to click Save.

Now you are ready to assign your leave policy to your team members.