This article is written for users with an access level of Location Manager or System Administrator.

• How public holidays are managed in Deputy
• How to set a public holiday for all locations
• How to create a custom public holiday
  • Create a custom public holiday for different Locations and Areas
  • Create a custom public holiday for a partial day
• Public Holidays FAQ

Public Holidays are not automatically set in Deputy as Public Holiday dates differ around the world and in different regions.

Public Holidays in Deputy are used to pay your team members their public holiday rates, as set in your payroll system and by editing team members' pay rates on the People page in Deputy. Making a day a Public Holiday will apply their PH rates instead of their weekday or weekend rate.

If a day is marked as a Public Holiday, it will be marked as such for all of your locations and areas. If you need to split them into different locations or areas, you will need to create a Custom Public Holiday.

Setting a Public Holiday in the schedule will not automatically pay full-time staff who do not work the Public Holiday. You can manage this in your payroll system or see some of the other solutions described below.

If you have already approved timesheets before marking the Public Holiday in the Schedule, the regular pay rates will have been applied to your timesheets rather than your public holiday rates. To apply public holiday rates you will need to unapprove the timesheets and then approve them again after you have set the public holiday in the schedule.

1. On the Schedule page, select the day you would like to mark as a public holiday and click the date itself.

2. Toggle ON the Public Holiday option. You can also toggle it back OFF if you have made a mistake.

3. After marking a day as a Public Holiday you'll see the day marked with a light red background on the schedule, as shown below on Friday 10th.

When you set up a Public Holiday in Deputy as described above, it applies the Public Holiday as a full day to all locations in your organisation by default. If you need the public holiday to apply to only some locations or area or only part of a day then you will need to set up a custom public holiday.

Create a custom public holiday for different Locations and Areas

You can customise your public holiday to only apply to specific Locations and Areas rather than default to all Locations.

1. First, login to Deputy on the website.

2. Next, you'll need to select your URL in your browser and add:

/exec/administration/public_holiday

As an example, where your business is called "SPARK", and your Deputy URL is:

https://spark.au.deputy.com

Then you need to enter this in your browser:

https://spark.au.deputy.com/exec/administration/public_holiday

After changing your URL, hit enter on your keyboard.

3. You will now see a list of public holidays as shown in the screenshot below:

On the left, you will see the possible actions:

• The magnifying glass icon will allow you to view the Public Holiday setting
• The pencil and paper icon will allow you to Edit it,
• The red cross will Delete it.

Viewing a Public Holiday will allow you to see when it was created and by who.

Editing it will allow you to change it's name, the day it applies, and which areas and locations it will apply to.

4. To create a new Public Holiday, click New Public Holiday in the top left corner.

5. On the creation screen (which is the same as the Edit screen, should you make changes later) you can set:

• the name of the Public Holiday
• the date/times of day that it occurs (or select All Day if the public holiday applies all day)
• if it should repeat (weekly/monthly/yearly) and
• which Departments (another name for Areas) it applies to.

Note:

• if you don't select any departments (areas), it will apply to ALL locations and all areas.
• If you select one area (or more) it will apply only to those areas. You can use this feature to apply the public holiday directly to a few areas within a location and/or within multiple different locations.
• Later on, if you create a new Area in your organisation, you MUST come back and tick it here for the public holiday to apply to it. If this is not done, the public holiday will not be applied to this new Area.

7. Don't forget to click on Save This Public Holiday before you close the window.

Create a custom public holiday for a partial day

You can use a custom Public Holiday to create a Public Holiday that takes place as a partial Public Holiday by setting a specific time to start and finish.

/exec/administration/public_holiday

When we look at the Approve timesheets tab for the day of the public holiday we can see a team member that worked a shift from midday on Saturday 11th February until 1am on Sunday 12th February has the following pay rates automatically applied:

• 6 hours of Saturday pay rates from noon til 6pm on Saturday
• 6 hours of public holiday rates from 6pm til midnight on Saturday 
• 1 hour of Sunday pay rates applied from midnight Saturday til 1am Sunday.

Does Deputy pick up public holidays?

Not automatically due to all the different countries that we operate in. You can add public holidays manually to the Schedule.

If I assigned a public holiday in the schedule this year do I have to do it next year again?

Yes, the date or day of the week of public holidays can change from year to year so you will need to set it in the schedule every year.

If you have created a custom public holiday you can use the repeat yearly option if appropriate.

How does the Annual leave accrue if a team member is working a public holiday?

If you are using Deputy's leave accrual feature, it will accrue leave based on hours worked and does not differ based on the type of day worked.

If the public holiday is only for part of the day, what will happen in Deputy?

You will need to create a custom public holiday with the specific times that the public holiday starts and finishes. 

Shifts that occur partially in the public holiday partially outside the public holiday will have the applicable pay rates applied by Deputy according to the time settings you configure for the public holiday.

How do you manage public holidays for full-time team members? They get paid but do not have to work.

You can create a specific area (or location if you prefer) and call it something like "Public Holiday not worked" and then put all your public holidays into the schedule and then customise the public holiday settings to turn off public holiday rates in that specific area or reach out to our 24/7 support for assistance.

You would then schedule your team members in this "Public Holiday Not Worked" Location or Area so that they can get paid at their normal rates for that day.

If you choose Public Holiday for a particular day and someone doesn't work it because the office is closed, but needs to be paid at their normal hourly rate, not the P/H hourly rate. Can Deputy accommodate this? I'm concerned if I choose P/H for a certain day for all office team members that they will end up being paid a higher rate for that day when they are not entitled to it.

You can create a specific area (or location if you prefer) and call it something like "Public Holiday not worked" and then put all your public holidays into the schedule and then customise the public holiday settings to turn off public holiday rates in that specific area or reach out to our 24/7 support for assistance.

You would then schedule your team members in this "Public Holiday Not Worked" Location or Area so that they can get paid at their normal rates for that day.

Could you also do public holiday not worked as a leave type?

Yes, you could set up a leave type for public holiday not worked and then attach it as a leave entitlement to the relevant team members and then don't put the public holiday into the schedule but if you're having team members who are working on a public holiday and get public holiday rates it wouldn't work so this is only an option if your entire staff is NOT working on public holidays.

What if a full-time team member works a public holiday and they get paid the normal rate but they earn a TOIL?

You have to create a specific location and call it something like "Public Holiday not worked" and then put all your public holidays into the schedule and then reach out to our 24/7 support and they can turn off the public holiday rates in that specific location. After that, you can turn the location setting (in Notifications & Integrations) that accrues TOIL in that specific location.

For more information on managing leave please read Leave Management.

How can I use Deputy to obtain consent from employees to schedule them to work on a Public holiday?

Managers can use the Shift confirmation feature in Deputy when publishing shifts to seek permission from employees to schedule them on shifts that occur on public holidays if this is required by local regulations.

Read Seeking permission from your employees to schedule shifts on a public holiday for more detailed information.