WFM UK: Scheduling: External Shift Pooling

Summary

The Scheduling solution allows the publication of contractor shifts to integrated Flexible worker providers (Work Providers, Agencies), allowing them to fulfil those contractor shifts. This article explains how this works in the system, and the settings required to enable it.

Organisation Setting

The following setting will need to be applied by a system administrator.

• From the Scheduling homepage, go to Settings > Organisations
• Select Edit against the required Organisation
• Tick the box against Use Shift-Pooling External and then Save

Fig.1 - Use Shift-Pooling External Organisation Setting

Once enabled, contractor shifts can be published outside of the organisation. 

Scheduling Page

• To create a contractor shift, go to the Scheduling tab
• Select the contractor shift row

A new pop-up will open (see Fig.2)

Fill out all fields and the publish button becomes active. 

Please note that only shifts created for one employee can be published in the external shift pooling.

Fig.2 - Publish contractor shift

If the shift is created without being published (where it has only been saved), the shift icon will show a crossed-out eye (see Fig.3).

Fig.3 - Unpublished contractor shift

Once published, the shift's status becomes 'pending'.

A notification is sent to the integrated flexible worker provider to advise that the shift is available for fulfilment.

Fig.4 - Published shift with status "pending

The shift icon for the published shift is then no longer crossed out (see Fig.5). 

Fig.5- Published shift icon

When a worker requests to work the shift, the integrated flexible worker provider sends a message to Scheduling, containing the worker's name and worker ID. 

The status of the shift is changed to 'fulfilled'.

Fig.6 - Published shift with worker name and worker ID

The fulfilled shift icon becomes a solid 'fulfilled' eye (see Fig.7).

Fig.7 - Shift icon for fulfilled shift

When the shift is worked, a new message is sent to Scheduling containing the actual worked hours. The status of the shift then becomes 'actual' (see Fig.8).

Fig.8 - Contractor shift with status 'Actual'

If the worker cannot work the shift, the shift can be cancelled on the integrated flexible worker provider side. When this happens, the shift status in Scheduling will return to 'pending'.

Deleting Contractor Shifts

The contractor shifts with a status of 'Pending' or 'Fulfilled' can be deleted one-by-one or in bulk.

• To delete a contractor shift, open it and use the Delete button

Fig.9 - Deleting a contractor shift

• To do a bulk delete of contractor shifts, select the bin icon next to the contractor's row (see Fig.10)

Contractor shifts with the status 'Actual' cannot be deleted as they have already been worked.

A warning message will explain that the agency will be notified of the deletion - Fig.10.

For more information on bulk deletion of contractor shifts, please see here.

Fig.10 - Bulk delete option, warning message

A reconciliation report is available to summarise all the information about the shift part of the external shift pooling.

Users will need the user-level permission View Reconciliation Report to view the report.

Fig.11 - Reconciliation report