WFM UK: Temporary Closures FAQs

Overview

This article details Frequently Asked Questions and their solutions for when a Location is being closed temporarily.

Can a Rota be Submitted to Payroll in Advance?

This current week’s Rota can be submitted to Payroll in advance, but future weeks cannot be submitted until the week starts. 

To do so, please ensure that the Global Setting Allow Completion of Rota Days in the Future is enabled, this is found in:
 

• Rotas > Administration > Global Settings 

To submit the week to Payroll, please complete all the days and divisions as normal, and submit to Payroll following the Company’s usual process.

Please Note: If you are a Labour Productivity or Advanced Schedules customer, the schedule can be submitted to Payroll in advance. The Rota Global Setting as detailed above will need to be activated, and then follow the normal Company’s process to submit. 


Can a Location be set as ‘Closed’ in Labour Productivity?

If you are a Labour Productivity or Advanced Schedules customer, the Location can be set as closed within the Forecast page. 
 

• This must be applied daily, and by each Location by selecting the Department Closed box

Please Note: This can only be completed for the current week, but will set the Actual Sales and required Staffing Levels to 0.

Please speak to your Fourth contact if the setting detailed above needs to be added to the system.


If employees are not working, will this impact their Holiday calculation?

Flexible Holiday Status

If the Flexible Holiday Status is being used for hourly paid Employees, this calculation considers the worked weeks, and will ignore the non-worked weeks. 

If employees are being paid an amount directly through Payroll which has not come from the Rota, these days and hours would not be included in the Holiday calculation.

It is recommended that if a Site is open, that employees are scheduled as normal. If employees are being laid off and an amount is being paid through the Payroll module, then the non-scheduled weeks will not be included in the Holiday calculation.

Casual Holiday Calculation

If the Casual Holiday Calculation is being used, this will still only accrue 12.07% of hours worked as normal, so the employee will need to have those hours scheduled as usual if they are working.

This can be overwritten in the future if required.


How can I bulk update hourly rates or salaries?

The Employee Batch Update screen can be used for updating rates of pay. 

This screen provides visibility of the rates of pay, and the information can be amended as required on mass, rather than having to go into each employee’s record. 

Please Note: An Effective Date must be entered if any changes are being made.

Please see the WFM - Using Employee Batch Update article for further information on using the Employee Batch Update screen.

Fourth’s Development Team can also upload new salaries, and new hourly rates. Please liaise with your Fourth contact for this to be arranged. 


If a group of Employees needs to be terminated, what’s the quickest way?

Fourth’s Development Team can action a mass termination, please speak to your Fourth contact for this to be completed. 


If I need to lay off staff, what is the process?

WFM - Statutory Guarantee Pay

The above article has been created to provide information and advice on this process. Statutory Payments can be made through Payroll, and a Payment Type can be created for this. There is no change needed to the Employee’s HR Record or Rota. 


How can I identify employees that have been laid off for our reporting?

A way of identifying employees for reporting purposes can be to create an Absence Type titled ‘Lay Off’ with no SSP or CSP settings ticked, and no Deduction set. 

This can then be used to purely report on the employees and their start date etc. The actual payment will need to be done in Payroll through the manual Payment Type. 


How can I update employees Contracted Hours/FTE?

Contracted Hours are used for Overtime and Lieu Hours calculations (if set up in the system), and display on the Rota as a guide to managers when scheduling. Contracted Hours do not influence the Holiday calculation. 

If contracted hours require amending, this can be completed within the employee’s Employment Details page, or Fourth’s Development Team can upload changes to contracted hours and Employee Contracts.

If overtime is being paid for employees who work above their contracted hours, please check the contracts to ensure that they are set to calculate after the contracted hours are worked. 

For Full Time and Part Time employees, the Holiday allowance is derived from the Job Title, and can be overridden at Employee level in order to pro-rata the Holiday for Part Time employees.

If the FTE is amended, the employee’s Holiday allowance will be adjusted. The FTE can be updated within the Employment Details page or through the Employee Batch Update by selecting the Attribute as Full Time Equivalent. 

More information about FTE and overriding FTE can be found in the following article - WFM - Overriding FTE Settings at Employee Level


We need to reduce salaried employee’s hours by 20%. Holiday allowances are not changing. How do we do this in the system?

If Salaries need to change, these can be amended in the Employment Details page or through the Employee Batch Update. 

If contracted hours are changing, these can be amended in the Employment Details page, or through an upload by Fourth’s Development Team. 

If Holiday allowances are not changing, then the FTE does not need to change, and the Holiday allowance within the Job Title will stay the same. 


What is the process for paying redundancy pay?

Please contact your Payroll specialist in the Bureau who will be able to help process this in the system. 

Fourth Products and Covid-19