Leave: time off requests, approvals and who is away

Staff request leave and their manager or a leave approver decides. Approved leave shows on the calendar, blocks bookings and leaves workshop capacity. Colleagues see who is away, never why.

Where it is

People → Leave — Request leave, Waiting on you, My leave, Who’s away, Team balances
My time → Leave — Your own requests and balances, on your phone

Settings for this

Settings → Team (Reports to) — Who each person reports to: that manager is told about their requests
Settings → Team → Roles — “Approve leave, and see why people are away” and “Manage workers, PINs, balances…” (balances)
People → Workers → Roster — A roster makes leave cost the real hours of each day (an RDO costs nothing)
Settings → Workshop → Trading Hours — Public holidays inside leave cost nothing

Sidebar Team › People, tab Leave. On a phone, My time (avatar menu) has the same Request leave button.

Step by step: ask for leave

Press Request leave.
Type: Annual leave, Sick leave, Carer's leave, Unpaid leave, Long service leave, Parental leave, Compassionate leave, Time off in lieu, RDO, Training, Public holiday or Other.
First day and Last day. For a half day, set the first day to From midday or the last day to Until midday.
Check what it costs: the box shows the days and hours, skipping your non-working days, rostered days off and public holidays. If you have a balance on record it shows that too, and warns if this is more.
Also away then lists colleagues already off. Note is anything the approver should know.
Press Submit request. It shows as Pending in amber.

Who hears about it

Your manager (the person you report to) gets a bell. If you don't have one, every leave approver does. Set reporting lines in Settings → Team: edit a person and pick Reports to (needs an owner, admin or Manage workers, PINs, balances…).
You get a bell when it's approved or declined.

Step by step: approve or decline

You need Approve leave, and see why people are away.

Open People → Leave, or tap the bell (it opens the request at the top, under From your notification). Requests also wait in Approvals with everything else you approve, where Approve and Decline work too (see Approvals).
Under Waiting on you, check the dates, the type, the note and who else is away.
Press Approve, or Decline and say why (they'll see it), then Decline request.

Nobody approves their own request: it says "Your own request — another approver decides it."

Booking leave for someone else (a phone call from home sick): press Request leave, choose them under Who, and tick Approve it now to make it take effect at once. The button reads Book leave.

What approved leave does

It shows on the calendar's Leave layer and in Who's away (and Home's Who's out).
It comes out of that person's workshop capacity, so the scheduler doesn't count on them.
It blocks that person's booking links.
On Timesheets the day shows Away, and approved leave goes in the Payroll hours CSV.
Pending leave shows in amber and blocks nothing.

Reasons are private. Colleagues see that someone is away, never the type or the note. Only approvers and the person see why.

Withdraw or cancel

Before it starts, press Withdraw on it under My leave.
Once it has started, only an approver can cancel it ("Started — ask an approver to cancel").

Balances

Team balances (needs Manage workers, PINs, balances, and lock exported timesheets) holds hours remaining for annual leave, sick leave, long service and time in lieu. Type a figure and press Enter. BuildTrack records leave; it never accrues or calculates entitlements, and approving leave doesn't change a balance. Enter them by hand from payroll.

Technicians can also have leave added from Settings → Workshop → Technicians (their absences): your own goes in as a request, someone else's as approved.

If something's not right

"That range has no working days in it": the dates are all days off on your roster or closures. Check the dates.
"You already have … leave from … to …": those days overlap a request you've already made. Change the dates or withdraw the other one first.
Can't see Waiting on you? You don't have the approve permission. Ask an owner.