Quickstart guide for admins
Welcome to absentify, the leave management system designed to make tracking employee time off easy and efficient!
This Quickstart guide for administrators will walk you through the various features absentify has to offer and how to customize them to your company's needs. By the end of this guide, you'll have a good understanding of how absentify works and how to use it to track staff leave. Keep reading to learn more!
If you haven't already created an account and filled out your company specifics, we suggest you check out our Startup guide for more information on setting up your account before continuing.
In this article, you'll be able to learn about the following functions to get your started with our absence planner app!
Sign in process
Overview page
My calendar view
Creating a request
Reporting and Insights
Editing your preferences
New features
Once you've registered your company, you can either continue to use absentify from your search engine, or access it through the Teams app.
It's easy to install the absentify app on your Microsoft Teams account! Simply go to Microsoft Teams > Apps > search for absentify > click Add. It will be installed automatically so you can start using absentify from your teams account.
If you are not already logged into your microsoft account, you will be prompted to do so. After which, you will be automatically redirected to the absentify dashboard.
From the Overview page, you'll have a clear layout of the upcoming weeks where you can see when and which type of leave employees are scheduled for.
Here you'll also be able to view the remaining yearly vacation allowance from all employee's deductibles in the blue bubbles next to their photos.
Flip though the selected time period to view previous or upcoming weeks by using the arrows in the top left corner.
Each leave of absence will be indicated by a symbol and certain fill color. To learn how to customize this, read our support page on Creating absence types.
To get quick look at the absence type, click on the leave request itself and a window will pop up displaying the following:
Leave type: which type of leave was requested and the date/time of the beginning and end of the absence
Status: which user is responsible for approving the leave and if it's been accepted, denied, or is pending
Taken from allowance: whether or not the leave was deducted from the vacation allowance and if so, how many days were deducted
Request created: the date and time that the request was submitted
As an admin you can cancel requests from all employees within your company by clicking the three stacked dots on the bottom left followed by Cancel request.
You'll be prompted to provide a reason for the cancellation before sending.
From the Overview page, you can search for any of your company's departments by using the Department search bar.
From the drop-down menu, you can select which department you want to view.
Some additional options include Absent today where absentify will automatically filter through employees who are not present today. To turn off the department filters, select All Departments.
You can view your own or the calendar of any other user by selecting them from the Overview page. You'll be able to see further stats about vacation deductible and time-off.
Under My calendar you will see an overview of the whole fiscal year. The following will be displayed:
Year: This section shows you all the data for your deductible leave.
Allowance: total vacation days received for the selected fiscal year
Carried over: total vacation days that have rolled over from previous fiscal year
Compensatory time off: total overtime overtime days worked that can be use as additional time off
Vacation: total vacation days logged for the selected fiscal year
Days remaining: total vacation days user is allowed to book for the selected fiscal year
Flextime: This section shows you all the data for the second type of allowance (if added)
Allowance: total allowance received for the selected fiscal year
Carried over: total days that have rolled over from previous fiscal year
Flextime: number of days used of the selected allowance type (in this case, "Flextime")
Non-deductible leave: This section shows you all the data for the non-deductible leave you've logged.
Public holidays: how many public holidays there are in the selected calendar year (these days will be displayed shaded in grey)
Absences: how many days of each specific absence you've taken for the selected year
Public holidays can easily be added to your company's calendar by navigating to Settings > Public holidays > Add public holidays or by reading our support article.
If you'd like to view the previous or following years, you can easily flip through by clicking on either the left or right arrows on the top left hand side
This feature is available for admins, but is limited to all other users, depending on their position (i.e. manager, approver, or a normal user). For more information on what's visible to which user, read our helpdesk article, permissions per user to learn more.
From both My calendar or Overview, you can create a request by either clicking Create request, a specific day, or a series of days. This will automatically open a window to book time off.
When booking time off, you'll have to specify the following:
Leave type: select the type of leave from the drop-down menu
Starting: specify when the leave will begin
Ending: specify when the leave will end
Reason: explain why you are requesting time off (optional)
If you are requesting to book off vacation time or another type of deductible leave, you'll also be notified how many days will be deducted from your overall vacation allowance before you send the request.
This is determined by the settings you've put into place when creating the request. By going to Settings > Leave types > Add new leave type, you'll notice there's a toggle switch when creating a new request to give you the option to specify whether or not the leave should be deducted from the yearly quota or not.
For more info on the different option available when creating a request, read our article Creating absence requests.
Once you've sent your request, you'll be able to see it logged in a faded color, which means it has not been approved yet. In the photo below, the request for vacation (yellow) hasn't been approved yet, but the request for a sick day (red) has.
As an admin you'll have the option to approve all of your own requests but other users' requests will need approval from their department manager/approver. This can easily be editing by navigating to Settings > Users > Edit > Approver or you can read our helpdesk guide, Selecting a user's approver, to learn more.
As an admin, you can create requests for any member of staff on their behalf.
You can create requests for employees by following the same steps you would for yourself, but instead selecting the employee's name from the roster.
To approve or deny time off requests from employees, either click on the request from the Overview page, or the bell in the top right hand corner view open requests.
If there are pending requests, you'll have the option to either approve or decline them.
If you decide to approve the request, it will disappear from the open requests page and show up in the user's calendar, but if you wish to deny a request, you'll be prompted to give a reason before you can click OK.
The request will then be deleted from both the open requests page as well as the user's calendar.
From the Insights page, you can gain valuable stats into leave patterns and trends, budget allocations, and employee burnout. absentify simplifies making informed decisions that optimize your team's productivity and overall well-being!
Here, you can view an overall outline from the employees within your department. This includes:
Booked: this is the total number of absence days booked for the year
Remaining: this the total number of contingent days that are left over after subtracting the booked days
Total allowance: this is the total of both Booked and Remaining days
Number of employees: the number of employees within the company
On the left side you can view which employees are a part of the department you've selected and who has a birthday coming up.
You'll also have the option to switch between viewing the insights only for certain departments, or to view all departments by making a selection from the drop-down menu.
The Annual Trend chart will show you which leave types are booked for each month of the current year.
You can easily filter out some leave types by clicking on them.
The Burnout Board is a useful tool because it shows you which employee urgently needs time off. This is calculated by factoring when was the last time the employee took a break and how long until they have an upcoming approved leave booked.
As soon as these employees are given time off, they'll automatically be removed from the Burnout Board.
This is a useful feature because it'll help you save time when assessing which employees should get priority when booking time off!
In the top right hand corner you can access your preferences by clicking on your personal icon and selecting Your Preferences from the drop-down menu.
Under "General", you'll have the option to change to following:
Language: select your preferred language from the drop-down menu
Time zone: select your time zone from the drop-down menu
Date format: specify how you'd like the date to be shown
Time format: specify whether you'd like a 12 or a 24-hour clock
Week start: select which day you'd prefer to have shown as the start of the week
Display calendar weeks: activate this toggle to see each week's number in your calendar view
In the upper right hand corner you'll see a present icon, which will open up a sidebar where you can see all of the most recent updates from absentify.
As an absentify user, you can like or comment on announcements and become a part of the absentify network!
You can also view current ideas or upcoming planned features. Visit our Roadmap to post your own ideas on how absentify could improve the user experience as well as see and comment on other absentify user's recommendations - we'd love to hear your feedback!
Add users
Set business hours
Set public holidays
Select a user's approver
This Quickstart guide for administrators will walk you through the various features absentify has to offer and how to customize them to your company's needs. By the end of this guide, you'll have a good understanding of how absentify works and how to use it to track staff leave. Keep reading to learn more!
If you haven't already created an account and filled out your company specifics, we suggest you check out our Startup guide for more information on setting up your account before continuing.
In this article, you'll be able to learn about the following functions to get your started with our absence planner app!
Jump to:
Sign in process
Overview page
My calendar view
Creating a request
Reporting and Insights
Editing your preferences
New features
Sign in
Once you've registered your company, you can either continue to use absentify from your search engine, or access it through the Teams app.
Download absentify on the Teams app
It's easy to install the absentify app on your Microsoft Teams account! Simply go to Microsoft Teams > Apps > search for absentify > click Add. It will be installed automatically so you can start using absentify from your teams account.
If you are not already logged into your microsoft account, you will be prompted to do so. After which, you will be automatically redirected to the absentify dashboard.
Overview
From the Overview page, you'll have a clear layout of the upcoming weeks where you can see when and which type of leave employees are scheduled for.
Here you'll also be able to view the remaining yearly vacation allowance from all employee's deductibles in the blue bubbles next to their photos.
Flip though the selected time period to view previous or upcoming weeks by using the arrows in the top left corner.
Each leave of absence will be indicated by a symbol and certain fill color. To learn how to customize this, read our support page on Creating absence types.
To get quick look at the absence type, click on the leave request itself and a window will pop up displaying the following:
Leave type: which type of leave was requested and the date/time of the beginning and end of the absence
Status: which user is responsible for approving the leave and if it's been accepted, denied, or is pending
Taken from allowance: whether or not the leave was deducted from the vacation allowance and if so, how many days were deducted
Request created: the date and time that the request was submitted
As an admin you can cancel requests from all employees within your company by clicking the three stacked dots on the bottom left followed by Cancel request.
You'll be prompted to provide a reason for the cancellation before sending.
Departments
From the Overview page, you can search for any of your company's departments by using the Department search bar.
From the drop-down menu, you can select which department you want to view.
Some additional options include Absent today where absentify will automatically filter through employees who are not present today. To turn off the department filters, select All Departments.
My calendar
You can view your own or the calendar of any other user by selecting them from the Overview page. You'll be able to see further stats about vacation deductible and time-off.
Under My calendar you will see an overview of the whole fiscal year. The following will be displayed:
Year: This section shows you all the data for your deductible leave.
Allowance: total vacation days received for the selected fiscal year
Carried over: total vacation days that have rolled over from previous fiscal year
Compensatory time off: total overtime overtime days worked that can be use as additional time off
Vacation: total vacation days logged for the selected fiscal year
Days remaining: total vacation days user is allowed to book for the selected fiscal year
Flextime: This section shows you all the data for the second type of allowance (if added)
Allowance: total allowance received for the selected fiscal year
Carried over: total days that have rolled over from previous fiscal year
Flextime: number of days used of the selected allowance type (in this case, "Flextime")
Non-deductible leave: This section shows you all the data for the non-deductible leave you've logged.
Public holidays: how many public holidays there are in the selected calendar year (these days will be displayed shaded in grey)
Absences: how many days of each specific absence you've taken for the selected year
Public holidays can easily be added to your company's calendar by navigating to Settings > Public holidays > Add public holidays or by reading our support article.
If you'd like to view the previous or following years, you can easily flip through by clicking on either the left or right arrows on the top left hand side
This feature is available for admins, but is limited to all other users, depending on their position (i.e. manager, approver, or a normal user). For more information on what's visible to which user, read our helpdesk article, permissions per user to learn more.
Create a request
From both My calendar or Overview, you can create a request by either clicking Create request, a specific day, or a series of days. This will automatically open a window to book time off.
When booking time off, you'll have to specify the following:
Leave type: select the type of leave from the drop-down menu
Starting: specify when the leave will begin
Ending: specify when the leave will end
Reason: explain why you are requesting time off (optional)
Hint:
If you are requesting to book off vacation time or another type of deductible leave, you'll also be notified how many days will be deducted from your overall vacation allowance before you send the request.
This is determined by the settings you've put into place when creating the request. By going to Settings > Leave types > Add new leave type, you'll notice there's a toggle switch when creating a new request to give you the option to specify whether or not the leave should be deducted from the yearly quota or not.
For more info on the different option available when creating a request, read our article Creating absence requests.
Once you've sent your request, you'll be able to see it logged in a faded color, which means it has not been approved yet. In the photo below, the request for vacation (yellow) hasn't been approved yet, but the request for a sick day (red) has.
As an admin you'll have the option to approve all of your own requests but other users' requests will need approval from their department manager/approver. This can easily be editing by navigating to Settings > Users > Edit > Approver or you can read our helpdesk guide, Selecting a user's approver, to learn more.
Creating requests for employees
As an admin, you can create requests for any member of staff on their behalf.
You can create requests for employees by following the same steps you would for yourself, but instead selecting the employee's name from the roster.
Managing requests
To approve or deny time off requests from employees, either click on the request from the Overview page, or the bell in the top right hand corner view open requests.
If there are pending requests, you'll have the option to either approve or decline them.
If you decide to approve the request, it will disappear from the open requests page and show up in the user's calendar, but if you wish to deny a request, you'll be prompted to give a reason before you can click OK.
The request will then be deleted from both the open requests page as well as the user's calendar.
Enhanced Reporting and Insights
From the Insights page, you can gain valuable stats into leave patterns and trends, budget allocations, and employee burnout. absentify simplifies making informed decisions that optimize your team's productivity and overall well-being!
Here, you can view an overall outline from the employees within your department. This includes:
Booked: this is the total number of absence days booked for the year
Remaining: this the total number of contingent days that are left over after subtracting the booked days
Total allowance: this is the total of both Booked and Remaining days
Number of employees: the number of employees within the company
On the left side you can view which employees are a part of the department you've selected and who has a birthday coming up.
You'll also have the option to switch between viewing the insights only for certain departments, or to view all departments by making a selection from the drop-down menu.
Annual Trend
The Annual Trend chart will show you which leave types are booked for each month of the current year.
You can easily filter out some leave types by clicking on them.
Burnout Board
The Burnout Board is a useful tool because it shows you which employee urgently needs time off. This is calculated by factoring when was the last time the employee took a break and how long until they have an upcoming approved leave booked.
As soon as these employees are given time off, they'll automatically be removed from the Burnout Board.
This is a useful feature because it'll help you save time when assessing which employees should get priority when booking time off!
Your Preferences
In the top right hand corner you can access your preferences by clicking on your personal icon and selecting Your Preferences from the drop-down menu.
General
Under "General", you'll have the option to change to following:
Language: select your preferred language from the drop-down menu
Time zone: select your time zone from the drop-down menu
Date format: specify how you'd like the date to be shown
Time format: specify whether you'd like a 12 or a 24-hour clock
Week start: select which day you'd prefer to have shown as the start of the week
Display calendar weeks: activate this toggle to see each week's number in your calendar view
Announcements and Ideas
In the upper right hand corner you'll see a present icon, which will open up a sidebar where you can see all of the most recent updates from absentify.
As an absentify user, you can like or comment on announcements and become a part of the absentify network!
You can also view current ideas or upcoming planned features. Visit our Roadmap to post your own ideas on how absentify could improve the user experience as well as see and comment on other absentify user's recommendations - we'd love to hear your feedback!
Related articles:
Add users
Set business hours
Set public holidays
Select a user's approver
Updated on: 05/11/2023
Thank you!