Figure 1.1. Simple and Easy to Use Leave Application System

Borneosoft Leave Application System offers simple and easy to use for staff in any organization to apply leave. The approval process is also simple and easy to use with the approver can directly approve the leave from the email that is sent to the approver automatically. Its simplicity does not, however, compromise on its flexibility to accommodate organizations' different needs.

Borneosoft Leave Application System supports both full-time and part-time staff. Leave amount can be in days (for full-time) or hours (for part-time). For part-time staff, two working interval (shift) and two breaks per day can be created individually for each day in the week.

Organization can create different policies for different staff position and different leave type. There are two methods to calculate leave balance, accrual and entitlement methods. In the accrual method, leave balance is prorated over the leave cycle. In the later method, the leave balance is added and available at the start of the leave cycle.

Additional leave days (or hours) is added automatically at the start of leave cycle. The start of the cycle can be any day of the year (usually 1st of January) or the staff's joined date. Policy for unused leave can also be set easily. The carry forward unused leave can be based on the maximum number of leave cycle or based on the maximum number of the unused leave.

Borneosoft Leave Application System supports up to three level of approval. The approver can be pre-assigned or the staff can select the approvers from the approver list.

Figure 1.2. Applying Leave

Before any user can apply leave, the payroll must setup the leave application settings. To apply leave, click the Leave folder and click New () button, or you can access the menu File, 'Create New' and Leave. A blank leave form appears and you can select the leave type. The leave balance will be automatically calculated and displayed based on the user's staff post and the selected leave type.

Select the interval of the leave. If the leave amount is in days and the leave policy allows half-day leave, you can select whether the start/end in the morning or afternoon. If the leave amount is in hours, you can select the date and time of the start and end of the interval. The number of days (or hours) taken will be calculated automatically and displayed. The application will also check if there is any other leave overlaps with the requested interval. It displays the overlapping leave highlighted in red. It will also warn when the leave days (or hours) requested exceeds the leave balance. If the leave policy does not allow leave taken to exceed the leave balance, the requested leave will not be processed.

Figure 1.3. Applied Leave

If the leave policy allows the user to select the approvers, you can select the approver (1st, 2nd, or 3rd) from the approver list. To select each approver, click the select () button, and select the approver, and click 'Accept Selection' () button.

However, if the policy does not allow the user to select the approver, the approvers (1st, 2nd, or 3rd) will be retrieved from the approver and sub-ordinates settings, which have to be set by the payroll. If some of the approvers are blank, payroll user must set the approver and sub-ordinate setting appropriately.

The applicant can put comments in the comments box. If necessary, related documents, such as medical certificate, can be attached to the document list.

Click save to submit your leave application. The leave status becomes 'Pending for Approval' and further modification to the pending leave such as interval or approvers are not allowed. However, the applicant can cancel the pending leave by clicking the Cancel () button, or go to the Pending () folder and cancel the pending leave.

Figure 1.4. Approving Leave

Whenever a leave application is submitted or approved, the next level approver will receive email notifying such request and the pending leave will appear in the 'Pending My Approval' () folder.

If you are the approver, you can go to the 'Pending My Approval' () folder and select the pending leave (or multiple pending leave), and click Approve () or Reject () button. Or, you can open the pending leave and click the Approve () or Reject () toolbar button to approve or reject the pending leave respectively. Opening up the pending leave individually allows the approver to put some comments.

Figure 1.5. Approver Email

Figure 1.6. Approving Leave with Comments from Email

Figure 1.7. Approved Leave

The approver will also receive email notifying of the submitted leave application. The email contains link 'YES' and 'NO' that the approver can click to approve or reject the pending leave. There is also a pair of 'YES' and 'NO' links that when they are click a new window appears allowing the approver to input his/her comments.

When the approvers at all levels have approved the pending leave, the applicant will get the notification email. The approval records are kept in the history list inside leave details.

Figure 2.1. Superuser To Assign Payroll Role

Before users can apply leave, the superuser must assign payroll role to a user or some users 'Payroll User(s)'. Payroll user has different authorization from the superuser. Payroll user adds several attributes to users, such as staff post and joined date. Payroll user will also set the leave application settings such as Approver roles, holidays and non-working days, leave policies and leave types. In addition, payroll user is also able to export the leave applications or cancellations that have been approved, to be imported into the accounting system.

To assign payroll role, click menu Setting, 'Approver List'. Approver List window will open to select and add users to Payroll folder.

Figure 2.2. Approver List Window - Assigning Payroll Role

There are few settings the payroll user must set before creating leave policy. Payroll user needs to set leave type and staff post. The leave type and staff post initially contain built-in values that can be made 'Not Visible' if the values are not used. Payroll user can create new leave type and staff post specific to your organization. To customize leave type and staff post, click menu Setting, 'Staff Post, Leave Type'.

Figure 2.3. Customizing Leave Type

The built-in leave type covers most of the leave type commonly used. The built-in leave type label can be modified, but it cannot be deleted. Payroll user can only delete customized leave type. However, when it is detected that the leave type is in use, it cannot be deleted anymore until all reference to that particular leave type is removed. For example, if a particular customized leave type is being used in a leave policy, the customized leave type can only be deleted when it is no longer used by the leave policy.

You do not need to create different sub-type for a particular leave type. For example, if your organization has full-time and part-time employee and both can apply annual leave, you only need to create one leave type, annual leave. You specify the the implementation of annual leave in the leave policy.

Figure 2.4. Customizing Staff Post

The staff post allows each user to have different leave policy for each leave type depending on his/her post in the organization. There are few built-in staff post that serve as examples. You can use them or create new ones. You can make the built-in staff post hidden from users when they are not needed. Built-in staff post cannot be deleted. However, you can modify the label to suit your organization.

When it is required you can create different leave policies for different staff post. For example, you can create annual leave policy for junior staff, staff and senior staff. Each policy, for example, may have different setting such as the amount of annual leave entitlement.

When a user applies leave, he/she will select leave type available and the system will retrieve the appropriate leave policy based on the user's staff post and the leave type that the user select. All calculation for the number of days taken, leave balance or even to check if the applied interval overlaps with previous leave application are done automatically by the system, making it very simple and efficient for the user to apply leave.

Figure 2.5. Approver Assignment and Sub-ordinate Assignment

You need to assign users with 1st, 2nd, or 3rd level approver role to users in your organization. In most cases, your approver assignment reflects your organization hierarchy. You start the approver assignment by selecting and adding users to each approver folder, i.e., '1st Approver', '2nd Approver', and '3rd Approver'. You click the users that you have just added to the approver folder, and it opens subordinate list. You can then add users that need the approval from the selected approver.

Figure 2.6. Setup Leave Policy Main Window

There are few built-in leave policies that serve as examples how leave policy is defined. Each leave policy is implemented by pairing staff post and leave type. When a user select a leave type, the system will use the corresponding leave policy based on the user's staff post. It is not possible to create two or more leave policies for specific pair of staff post and leave type. There might be a situation where there are full-time and part-time staff for the same staff post. In this case, you need to create two customized staff post, one for the full-time and the other for part-time. You can then create leave policy separately for full-time and part-time staff.

To create leave policy, click the New button at the Leave Policy main window. You need to set:

1. Leave Policy Name.
   Enter the name that reflects the policy, such as 'Annual/Vacation Leave (Entitlement)'.
2. Leave Balance Calculation.
   Leave balance calculation can be based on accrual or entitlement. In accrual calculation, the leave days (or hours in part-time) are accrued from the start of the cycle. In entitlement calculation, the days (or hours) are added at the beggining at the leave cycle.
   For example, at the beginning of the cycle, 14 days are added. In accrual calculation, at the 30th day from the start of the cycle, the leave balance for annual cycle is 30/365 * 14 days. In entitlement calculation, the leave balance is 14 days throughout the cycle.
3. Taking leave more than balance.
   If 'Do not allow' is selected, the user will not be able to apply leave where the leave taken is more than the current leave balance he/she has. If 'Allow' is selected, the user will be able to apply leave even though it may exceed the current leave balance he/she has. Most implementation does not allow leave taken to be more than current leave balance.
4. Leave Amount.
   Your choice for the leave amount determine whether it is for full-time or part-time staff. Days is the leave amount for full-time staff and Hours is the leave amount for part-time.
   
   1. If you select days for the leave amount, you can set how many working hours in a day. In addition you can set whether staff is allowed to apply half-day leave. Half-day leave will be specified as morning or afternoon only. In situation where Saturday is working day, the option 'Saturday Working Day' needs to be set. It can also be specified if Saturday working day is considered as full day.
   2. If you select hours for the leave amount, you need to set the working intervals as well as the break intervals. You can specify up to two intervals each day.
5. Leave Policy Cycle.
   You can set the number of years the leave cycle span. In most cases (annual/vacation, sick, etc.), the leave cycle is 1 year. In other case such as in long service leave, you can set the cycle longer than a year. You also need to set the start of the cycle. You can set it as any day of the year. In most case, 1 January is chosen as the start of the leave cycle. You can also set the start of the cycle to coincide with the user's joined date. You also need to set the user's joined date.
   Depending of the leave type, you need to specify the number of days (full-time) or hours (part-time) are added at the start of the leave cycle.
6. Carry Forward type.
   The carry forward type determines how unused leaves will be carried forward to the next leave cycle. You can limit the amount of leaves by limiting the number of past cycle where unused leaves will be included as part of total leave balance. Or, you can limit the unused leave to not more than certain amount.
7. Approval Process.
   You can allow the users to select the approvers. Or, you can set the policy such that the approvers are pre-determined through the approval hierarchy. There are up to three-level approval to choose from. For the approval process to work, you need to assign approver (1st, 2nd and 3rd approver) to appropriate staff according to your organizational hierarchy.

Figure 2.7. Some Leave Policy Setting Can't Be Modified

Some of the leave policy setting cannot be modified after the policy has been used by the users to apply leave. The leave amount type, days (for full-time) or hours (for part-time) cannot be changed once the policy has been used by any user to apply leave. It is also not possible to change the interval of the leave cycle and the start of the cycle as this may affect the previous calculation of leave days. Other settings, however, are still modifiable. The new settings will only affect new leave applications.

Figure 2.8. Leave Policy Implementation

The leave policy will not be available to users until you implement the policy by adding pairs of staff post and leave type to the leave implementation list.

To add the leave implementation, click 'New' () button, a blank row is inserted at the top of the list. Select the staff post and leave type, and click 'Save' () button. The newly created leave implementation is not yet available to the users until it is made visible. To make the leave implementations visible, click the checkboxes and click 'Visible' () button.

Adding leave implementation with a pair of staff post and leave type that has been used in another leave policy is not allowed. The system will not save the duplicate leave implementation. It is not possible for a user to choose a leave type based on user's staff post and the user is provided with two or more leave policies.

Figure 2.9. States/Region Setting

When a user applies leave, the public holidays and non-working days are automatically excluded from the leave days calculation. The public holidays excluded from the calculation depend on the country that your organization initially select. In some countries, public holidays are different in different States or region. In order to calculate leave days accurately, states or region must be set. For Australia and United States, the built-in values are available. They cannot be deleted, but they can be modified or made hidden. If you are payroll user, you click Setting, States/Region to open the States/Region setting window.

Figure 2.10. Copying Built-In Public Holidays

The public holidays for United States and Australia are provided. You can copy these built-in public holidays. To copy the built-in public holiday, click Setting, Public Holiday/Non-Working Day, the Public Holiday/Non-Working Day window opens. Navigate to the sub-folder to the country (United States or Australia) and click the select all checkbox to select all entries. Click 'Copy Built-in' to copy the built-in public holidays.

Figure 2.11. Copied Built-In Public Holidays

The copied built-in public holidays are not yet available for calculation until they are published. To publish the public holidays, select the checkboxes and click Publish, or you can click at the Publish () button individually at each row.

The public holidays, which are common to ALL states, have no states or region set. Users will have access to common public holidays in the country that the organization has selected and the states'/region's public holiday that corresponds to users' states/region.

Built-in public holidays cannot be deleted but they can be made hidden by setting it to Draft (not published). If desired, the label, states/region and the date can be modified. It is advisable to create customized non-working day instead of modifying built-in public holidays to avoid confusion.

Figure 2.12. Customized Non-Working Day

To create customized non-working days, click the 'Non-Working Day' folder and click 'New' () button, a new blank row is inserted at the top of the list. Non-working days, such as factory shutdown are entered in the 'Non-Working Day' folder that applies to all users.

To enter non-working days that span more than a day, enter the first one, copy it and modify the date.

You need to publish the customized non-working days for them to be available to users.

Figure 3.1. Payroll Folder

Payroll user has an additional 'For Payroll Processing' () folder. It contains approved leave from all users. All approved leave related data can be easily exported by clicking the export () button. It will opens the export window where you can select fields that you want to export.

Figure 3.2. Export Window

Figure 3.3. Approved Leave in Spreadsheet

Figure 3.4. Leave Records

Figure 3.5. Exporting Leave Records

Figure 3.6. Leave Records in Spreadsheet