Submit shifts and verified shifts

If you decide that Submit Shifts is suitable for your business, you'll need to determine how you'll utilise this feature. This includes:

• Which employees will be submitting shifts? - See the section below for instructions on how to do this, either for each employee or in bulk.
• Do you require supervisors to sign off on employees' shifts upon completion? - See the section below for instructions on enabling Supervisor Verification on specific rosters.
• Which additional features (upload timesheets, change position, etc.) do you need to use to gather the relevant information from your employees? - See the section on additional features below.

  Please note: If you are currently using Timesheets as your main workflow for time-tracking in foundU, you will not be able to use Timesheets with Submit Shifts.
 

Enabling submits shifts in your platform

If you are ready to use this feature in your business, you'll need to enable its use on your platform. This will open the relevant menu for your employees to submit times from their Employee App. However, this will not automatically apply to all employees in your workforce; we will cover this in the next section.
 
To enable the Submit Shifts platform setting:

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.
   
   

  Hot Tip: If you have also chosen to implement the Supervisor shift verification workflow on your platform, a few extra settings will need to be enabled. Please refer to the relevant section below.

  If you would like to see other options for tailoring your Submit Shifts settings, then please see our full article on Time & Attendance settings!

Depending on how you run your business, there may be situations where only some of your employees, or those on specific rosters, submit their shifts. Your next step will be to inform your platform which employees should be able to submit a shift from their Employee App.

You will have the option to enable this individually or in bulk. Let's examine the steps for both options below.
 

Enable submit shifts for an individual

To enable Submit Shifts for a single employee:

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

 

Bulk enable submit shifts for employees

This option will be useful when allowing all employees on one roster or operation to submit shifts. Doing so 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 require daily approval from a manager. However, salaried employees can use the Submit Shifts feature to submit weekly allowances or reimbursements that are sent to Approve Shifts for manager 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 authorised 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 contact the Support team for help. You can reach them via help@foundu.com.au. 

Depending on how you operate your business, you or some of your clients may require an employee's shift to be verified by a site supervisor or manager.

With the optional Shift Verification feature, employees will need to request a digital signature from their supervisors on their submitted shift hours via the Employee App. Supervisors can sign off and add comments as needed. Once submitted, the verification can be seen in the Approve Shifts section along with other details of the employee's submitted hours.
 

Using shift supervisor verification

Once enabled (see steps at the bottom of this section), all employees who use Submit Shifts on this roster will see an extra step to capture a manager's signature when submitting their shift. The supervisor can also optionally leave a comment on the shift.

This feature helps labour hire businesses monitor employee shifts at specific sites. Once employees begin work, the company loses oversight of start times, finish times, and breaks. It then depends on employees and clients to provide this information for billing and payment purposes. Shift Supervisor verification combines the data entered by the employee in Submit Shifts with the confirmation from the site manager or client.
 

The process for the Shift verification feature is as follows:

1. The supervisor or manager is provided with a summary to review of the shift times, break times, position, and roster the employee has submitted.
2. The supervisor then signs off by entering:
   • Manager/supervisor name - This free-text field cannot be left blank.
   • Manager/supervisor signature - This free-text field cannot be left blank. This will be stored as an image against the shift.
   • Manager/supervisor Comments - This optional field allows managers to add additional shift details or provide feedback. 
3. In the event that a supervisor cannot sign, the employee will select:
   • The 'Manager/supervisor unavailable' tick box, and
   • Provide a free-text comment as to why the manager was not there.
4. All data above will be accessible in Approve Shifts and can be viewed by selecting the sign-off icon. This data can also be exported via the Approve Shifts CSV export (excluding bulk signatures).

  Hot Tip: Submitted shifts with verified signatures cannot be edited by employees to prevent data corruption; employees must contact an admin user to make any changes to these shifts.

  To understand the experience of Verified shifts, take our virtual walk-through below. This illustrates both the employee and admin experience!

Enabling verified shifts

Enabling the Verified shifts feature will occur in two places. You will need to enable the platform-wide setting in Time & Attendance settings and also enable the shift verification setting on the specific rosters you wish to use.

To enable the Shift supervisor verification on your platform:

1. From the main menu, navigate to  Platform Settings > Time & Attendance.
2. Within the Submit shifts section, locate the setting for 'Enable shift supervisor verification'.
3. Select 'Yes' to enable the setting and save the changes by choosing 'Save' from the taskbar. You are now ready to select rosters for Shift verification, which you'll enable per roster

Enabling this feature per roster gives you the control to set up your Operations and Rosters to meet different requirements.
 

To enable Shift supervisor verification for a specific roster:

1. From the main menu, navigate to  Work > Rosters.

2. Select the ellipsis next to the roster you'd like to edit to open and edit your Roster Details.

   

3. Select the tickbox to enable 'Require supervisor sign-off on submitted shifts'.
4. Save roster to update and enable this feature. You will need to repeat these steps for each roster you wish to activate it on.

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:

• For shifts that they are rostered for, they can view their rostered shift in the Times section of the Employee App. At the end of the day, they will review and submit the shift.
• For shifts that they aren't rostered for, they may submit a shift by adding it to their Times section in the Employee App.

  To understand the employee experience for Submit Shifts, including Shift verification, check out our Employee Help Guide here. 

When employees submit shifts, the info appears in Approve Shifts and the Roster. Submitted shifts can be viewed in the roster but must be managed in the Approve Shifts menu. The process of approving, declining, or editing shifts is similar to other shifts in foundU, but key information should be reviewed before approval.
 
To manage submitted shifts in Approve Shifts:

1. Navigate to Time & Attendance > Approve Shifts. A shift that an employee has submitted will have the person icon in the Worked Shift column. Hover over this icon to see start, finish and break times.

   

2. You'll then take action on the shift by either approving, declining, or editing the submitted shift.
3. If this roster uses Shift Verification, you can view these details in the signature icon and access further information in the Employee Communications drawer. 
   • A blue signature icon indicates that the supervisor has verified the shift.
   • An orange signature icon - Indicates a warning that the shift was not verified.

In this example, both Jessie and Lola have submitted their shifts for Wednesday. Before approving, the admin reviews the shift and break details by selecting the person icon. They then verify the details and notice that Jessie's shift was not verified on-site, as indicated by the orange icon. 

  To understand how changes made to Submit Shifts appear on the roster after they are managed in Approve Shifts, please refer to our guide on Rostered Shifts - Status, Warnings & Errors.

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, consider setting up a weekly reminder for those who have not yet done so.

We recommend that all businesses using Submit Shifts configure the reminder message below for 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 for 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. Select 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 (excluding those who have been declined or terminated). This ensures clear messaging to your employees.

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.
• Allow employees to submit unrostered paid breaks - To avoid confusion, you can prevent your employees from adding paid breaks when they submit shifts that aren't on the roster. 

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 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 by either selecting People > Approved People or using 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, 2 settings 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 be fed into Approve Shifts and displayed in the Timesheet icon when attached, ready for your review and approval.

In this example, Kun has submitted his shift and uploaded a physical timesheet. The Timesheet icon in Approve Shifts will show any shifts with uploaded timesheets. You can optionally click to view the physical timesheet.

 

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 from the drop-down selector when 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, Lola was rostered on the Afternoon Shift roster. She ended up working on the Day Shift roster as they were short-staffed. At the end of the day, Alice submits her shift and updates the roster to ensure it is accurate for  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.

 

Allow employees to add paid breaks

From time to time, you may need to call employees in without prior notice or ask them to stay late. Usually, there isn't enough time to make changes to the roster in advance.

In these situations, your employee may be eligible for extra breaks. To avoid confusion on which type of break to select, enabling the 'Allow employees to submit unrostered paid breaks' setting will hide the Paid break option from the employee when they submit their shifts. 

To hide the paid break option from your employees: 

1. From the main menu, navigate to Platform Settings > Time & Attendance.
2. Within the Submit Shifts section, locate the setting 'Allow employees to submit unrostered paid breaks'.

3. This setting is set to 'Yes' by default, which means your employees can select paid breaks for unrostered shifts. To update this setting, select 'No'.

   

4. To save your changes, select Save from the taskbar.

 

Some other options you may consider

A few additional options you may consider for your employees 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 great ways for the employee to communicate anything to their manager regarding their shift. 

  If you would like more information on tailoring your Submit Shifts settings then please see our full article on Time & Attendance settings!

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. 

If my business uses the Supervisor shift verification feature, where can I view the data and/or signatures from these shifts?

If you use this feature you'll be able to view the shift verifications on each submitted shift in Approve shifts. This can be viewed

• Individually on a shift  - By selecting the signature icon and viewing the information in the Employee Communications drawer. This is the best option to view signatures.
• In bulk - In the Approve Shifts CSV export - Be sure to select the following selections in your export:
  • Source - To show 'employee submitted'.
  • Verified by - Shows supervisor name.
  • Verified comment - Shows comment made by supervisor or employee in the event that manager was unavailable.