This article is intended for managers of Australian organisations.
In many industries, such as healthcare with NDIS customers, it's common to schedule sleepover shifts before and/or after shifts where the team member is actively working.
In this guide, we will cover:
- Important note about using sleepover allowances
- Background on sleepover shifts
- What is a non-worked area
- How to use non-worked areas for sleepover shifts
Important note about sleepover allowance
Deputy does not automate all sleepover allowance scenarios. It is advisable to conduct a manual calculation check to ensure payment accuracy when an employee is entitled to the sleepover allowance particularly if your employee performs work immediately before or after the sleepover shift, or the employee is interrupted to perform work during the sleepover shift.
For shiftworkers we advise that any shifts after a sleepover period is checked as the shift penalties may not apply properly.
As a requirement of the award:
- An employee must be rostered to work at least 4 hours before or after the sleepover. If however they are not rostered then the employer must pay the employee for at least 4 hours for at least one of these periods of work. Employers will need to manually adjust and apply the minimum shift engagement here.
- If an employee is required to perform work during the sleepover, the time worked must be paid at overtime rates with a minimum payment of 1 hour. Employers will need to manually adjust and apply overtime rates here.
Background on sleepover shifts as non-worked areas
Deputy allows managers to set up a non-worked 'sleepover' area in their Schedule to assist managers to schedule team members who may need to sleep over at their workplace or a client's location.
The purpose of the non-worked sleepover area is to:
- schedule a team member who is sleeping over but not actively working (therefore the hours scheduled in the non-worked sleepover area do not count towards overtime rates or stress triggers)
- apply a sleepover flat rate allowance to their timesheet.
The purpose is generally not to record sleeping hours, as such, but rather the sleepover shift feature can be used to automatically add a sleepover allowance to an adjacent shift where the carer has worked immediately prior to and/or after the sleepover shift.
To use the sleepover shift feature to add the flat sleepover allowance to the team member's timesheet
- the team member must have a SCHADS pay rate assigned
- the team member must be scheduled for a shift (that is at least 4 hours or longer than 4 hours) in a regular working area in Deputy immediately prior to and/or after a shift in the non worked Sleepover shift area within the same Deputy Location.
What is a non-worked area?
When you set up a non-worked type area, any shifts that occur in these areas will NOT be treated as a normal working area.
This means:
- The shift time worked in this area will not be calculated into the total ordinary time of any scheduled period or shown in reports such as Scheduled vs. Timesheet vs. Sales.
- Scheduling a shift in this area will not contribute to overtime rates or trigger stress profiles.
- The default shift cost will be $0 for shifts that occur in a non-worked type area.
To set up a non-worked area where the sleepover rate will apply, the word sleepover must also be included in the Area name as shown below.
How to use non-worked areas for sleepover shifts
1. Set up the location in Deputy as the patient name or sleepover site
You can add in the patient's home address so your scheduled carer can easily see where they're scheduled.
Tip: You can even add relevant notes about the patient care in the Location notes if required.
2. Set up the worked and non-worked sleepover areas
Add regular areas, as you usually would, for the shifts that team members will complete as active work in this Location.
In the same location, add a non-worked area for the shift team member will be scheduled as a sleepover. Ensure the word sleepover is included in this area and it will automatically be marked in Deputy as non-worked.
In the example below for Location Patient Gail W there are three areas set up:
- Evening care shift - the team members can be scheduled for active work in this area
- Sleepover Area - the team member will be scheduled for sleepover shifts here but they will not count towards worked hours or overtime rates.
- Morning care - the team members can be scheduled for active work in this area
3. Add the SCHADS pay rate to the relevant team members (AU)
To add the pay rate to an individual employee, open their profile on the People page then click on the Employment tab and Edit.
Click on the Pay details tab and select the applicable SCHADS award from the drop-down list in the Pay rate menu.
Any Sleepover areas configured should be listed.
Click Save.
You can also apply the SCHADS pay rate to multiple team members at once using Bulk actions on the People page if required.
4. Schedule the worked and sleepover adjacent shifts
When you schedule the team members in this location and you are wanting the sleepover shift allowance to apply, you need to schedule a shift in a regular 'working' area that is 4 hours or longer and adjacent to the shift scheduled in the sleepover non worked area.
In the example below, Ingrid has been scheduled in the patient's location for:
- a 3 hour evening care shift from 6pm til 9pm (actively working)
- a 9 hour sleepover shift from 9pm til 6am the next day (non worked area)
- a 4 hour morning care shift from 6am til 10am (actively working)
The shifts in this example fulfil the criteria that the active working shifts are longer than 4 hours and they are adjacent to the sleepover shift (ie. the active shift finishes at 9pm and the sleepover shift begins at 9pm).
Therefore when Ingrid's shifts are published, you will see they have been published successfully.
If your schedule does not fulfil the sleepover shift criteria then you will receive a warning when you publish the shift.
In the example below, Kat has been scheduled in the patient's location for:
- a 5 hour evening care shift from 4pm til 9pm (actively working)
- an 8 hour sleepover shift from 10pm til 6am the next day (non worked area)
When Kat's shifts are published, a warning will be displayed because there is no 4 hour or longer working shift before or following the scheduled sleepover shift. In this example, there is a one hour gap between the two shifts.
Another reason that the shifts may not publish as expected is if the shifts are not the required length to trigger a sleepover scenario. If you believe you have scheduled a shift the required length but it is still showing an error please check you have not inadvertently added an unpaid meal break to the shift as unpaid meal breaks will be deducted from the time for the total scheduled shift length and trigger the publishing error.
You have the option to return to the schedule, rectify the scheduling error and publish the shifts OR you can Publish anyway. Please be warned that if you do Publish anyway, then the sleepover allowance will NOT be applied to this timesheet correctly. However you may adjust the timsheets once they are approved. Please note that minimum shift engagement may also apply which you will need to manually apply.
5. Approve the timesheet
The team member clocks in and out of each of the scheduled worked and sleepover shifts separately which will generate the individual timesheets in Timesheets > Approve Timesheets.
When the manager clicks to Approve to approve the timesheets the sleepover allowance will be added automatically to the sleepover shift.
Frequently Asked Questions
Are keywords for sleepover areas case-sensitive or work with special characters?
No, the sleepover keyword is not case sensitive. You can use Sleepover or sleepover or SLEEPOVER as required.
We support special characters like "-" in the area name but emojis are not supported.
The sleepover shifts feature is not working for me as described - what am I doing wrong?
The sleepover shift flat rate will only be applied to a timesheet if all criteria are fulfilled:
- The team member has the SCHADS pay rate assigned to them
- The Non worked area with "Sleepover" in the name is set up correctly in the same location as the worked shifts the team member will be scheduled for
- The team member is scheduled for a 4 hour or longer active working shift immediately before or after the sleepover shift
What if my team member actually has to work during their scheduled sleepover shift?
The sleepover allowance is just to compensate for your team member sleeping over, not actively working during this time. But what if they find they need to work during these sleepover hours?
If you need a system to capture any hours the team member is called to actively work during the sleepover shift then you will also need to set up a shift question that the team members will be required to answer when they clock out of the sleepover shift.
1. System Administrators can add a shift question in Business Settings > Timesheets.
2. Click on New Custom Field.
3. Configure a new shift question with the following fields completed:
- Custom field type: Timesheet
- Active/Inactive: ON
- Field name: eg. "Active hours worked during sleepover shift"
- Field details: eg. Enter the number of hours you were required to active work during the sleepover shift. If you weren't required to work then enter 0. (You may prefer to ask your team to enter the number of minutes they worked if that is more relevant to your organisation)
- Type of field: number
- Validation: Required (if you want every team member completing a sleepover shift to answer this question.
- Display timing: Clock out and update.
- Tick the box(es) to select your Areas that are sleepover areas in your locations.
Click Save This Custom Field when you have configured your question
Now when the team member clocks out of their sleepover shift they will be asked to enter the number of hours they actively worked during the sleepover shift.
If, for example, the team member had to wake up to care for the patient for 0.5 hours during the sleepover shift, they can enter 0.5 into the shift question as shown in the example above and this answer will be recorded on the timesheet.
When the manager is approving the timesheets they will see the 0.5 hour answer recorded and can manually amend the sleepover timesheet to add the extra worked time to the timesheet before approval.
Note that the manager will have to manually check the SCHADS award minimum entitlement before amending the timesheet and selecting the correct pay rate to be applied for the extra worked hours.
Note: Approve your evening, sleepover and morning worked timesheets before amending the sleepover shift timesheet to add the extra nominated worked hours.
To add the extra worked hours during the sleepover shift click Unapprove Pay on the sleepover shift timesheet.
Click on the + icon in Base Pay Rates section.
Select the appropriate SCHADS pay rate for the time worked during the sleepover shift.
Enter a value for the amount of extra worked hours during the sleepover shift and click Approve.
You can see that the extra hour of OT has been added to timesheet with a warning icon to let you know that it has been manually added.
When we review the timesheet before it has been exported we also see the extra hour with a warning icon to show it has been manually added.