HS Scheduling: House Shifts

Overview

House shifts are unassigned shifts in the scheduler, that are available for employees to try to pick up. If a schedule is posted with house shifts, employees who are not already scheduled within the duration of those house shifts will see them as available for pick up. Managers can then approve or deny their requests. House shifts will appear in the House Shift Manager at the bottom of the scheduler.

For more information on this process or if you are missing the House Shift Manager please see HS: Shift Approvals.

Fig.1 - House Shift Manager [select image to enlarge]

Creating House Shifts

• Templates - This feature allows you to quickly apply a set of predetermined shifts to a schedule. When a template is applied, any unassigned shifts will appear in the House Shift Manager. Then they can be assigned to employees. To learn more about using templates please see HS Scheduling: Creating and Applying Templates
• Copying Schedules - If one week's schedule is copied into another, there may be differences in employee availability. For example, the target week could have some approved time off or a new availability change. If an employee is not considered available to work, their shift becomes a house shift. To learn more about copying schedules please see HS Scheduling: Copying Schedules
• House Shifts are Manually Created - Anyone with access to edit schedules can turn an assigned shift into a house shift by selecting it and pressing the H key on their keyboard. There is also an option in the menu called Convert to House Shifts - which will convert all assigned shifts to house shifts

New house shifts can also be created through the menu:

• On the week in question, open the menu and select Create House Shift. Alternatively, you can use the keyboard shortcut - [CTRL + SHIFT + H]. For more information on keyboard shortcuts see HS Scheduling: Keyboard Shortcuts
• In the window that opens, select the date and choose the start and end times
• Select the Job, Location, and Schedule from the drop-down menus
• Once this is done select Save

The house shift will appear in the House Shift Manager.

Fig.2 - Creating a house shift [select image to enlarge]

Editing and Assigning House Shifts

• Double-click any house shift to open the Edit House Shift window
• The shift Start and End times, Job, Location, and Schedule can be changed

Fig.3 - Editing a house shift [select image to enlarge]

• To assign a house shift, click and drag the shift onto the Scheduler. Any employee that is available to work that shift will be highlighted
• Drop the shift on the cell to assign it

An employee must be assigned the job code and schedule of the shift.

Questions about why a shift cannot be assigned to a specific employee? See HS Scheduling: Unable to Assign Shifts to Employees. {insert link}

Fig.4 - Assigning a house shift [select image to enlarge]

The Smart Select feature can also be used on house shifts. To learn more about this feature see HS Scheduling: SmartSelect. 

Deleting House Shifts

House shifts can be deleted individually.

• Select the house shift and press the Delete key on your keyboard. For more information on keyboard shortcuts see HS Scheduling: Keyboard Shortcuts
• If the entire schedule (assigned and unassigned shifts) needs to be deleted, use the Delete Schedule option in the menu. To learn more about this feature see HS Scheduling: Delete a Schedule.