Handling Common Employee Scheduling Issues

Managers are required to handle scheduling issues on a routine basis. Aspects like leave, sick leave, overtime, shift work, and absenteeism all play havoc with an orderly schedule. While software is available nowadays to track every scheduling type, some scheduling issues require management intervention as well. We discuss how to handle common employee scheduling issues.

Coming To Work Late

Some employees are habitually late for work while others may have an occasional crisis that makes them miss their starting times. This can be very annoying when you have daily morning meetings with your staff or customers arrive before you are at full capacity to serve them. The same employees are often slow to return from lunch and generally practice poor time management.

Admittedly, some employees behave in problematic ways deliberately to get back at managers for real or alleged misdeeds (such as calling an employee in for frequent tardiness) and some employees have a passive-aggressive approach to perceived unfairness. However, the majority do not handle their time effectively.

Employees should be called in after the second incident of late-coming and informed that it will not be accepted. They should be advised to set their alarms for earlier or arrange other transport to ensure time-keeping is adhered to. The meeting should be noted on the personnel file for the employee so that exit procedures can begin if this continues.

Managing Overtime

Working hours are generally limited to 48 hours a week, although there are exceptions. If your business requires frequent overtime, you may be understaffed and exhausting your current employees, especially if their contracts require them to agree to work above the limit. In the long run, you could lose valuable employees with this practice.

On the other hand, employees may volunteer for overtime and go over the stipulated hours to increase income. If you pay more for overtime, you may exceed your staffing budget.

Shifts, Leave, and Sick Leave

It can be tricky to manage annual leave and shift work. This gets more difficult when employees swap shifts without management approval. For instance, they could exceed their hours, and you may have to pay overtime.

Bulk leaves should be prepared once a year, with employees being allowed to ask for two alternate periods. When dealing with out-of-turn requests, employees should be informed that leave is a right but when they take it is dependent on the job requirements. The manager should decide based on the seriousness of the need for leave and staffing levels.

When an employee is off sick, depending on the nature of the job, it sometimes involves rearranging entire shifts to provide adequate staffing. This is a common problem in call centres unless you have temp staff you can call in. Otherwise, service levels drop, and the manager is asked to explain to their seniors why they have not managed staffing levels better. You should always have a backup plan.

Abnormal sick leave must be dealt with by following the legal process.

Software Solutions

You can purchase time tracking software and software for scheduling employees. This will allow you to avoid exceeding an employee’s overtime limit and keep your salary budget on track. A system will keep track of days of leave already taken and the sick leave quota.

Managers should not be hesitant to use the applicable procedures to deal with employees who abuse time off.