This article describes how you can configure substitute requests and allow or block absence requests despite existing substitutions.

Configuring Substitute Requests 

Substitute requests are set up separately for each absence type in the settings. To do this, select an absence type in Settings > WORK HOURS AND ABSENCES > Absence and click on Edit in the General settings.

Under the heading Substitute required?, you can decide whether employees will be able to or are required to select a substitute when they request an absence.

To make it mandatory to specify a substitute when requesting an absence, activate the field Yes. If you select No, employees will not be able to select a substitute. If you select Optional, the field for selecting a substitute will be displayed, but employees will not be required to fill it in.

Note that neither access rights nor approval workflows are transferred to the substitute.

Depending on whether the substitute request is optional or required within an absence type, employees can or must specify a substitute in the absence request. Here, the employee requesting the absence is able to select any of their colleagues for whose public profiles they have at least viewing rights.

For example, if you have granted the All employees role viewing rights for all colleagues' Public profiles, then employees can select anyone in the workforce as a substitute.

Once the absence request has been submitted, the selected substitute receives a Task in the Tasks widget on their Dashboard and in the Inbox.

If an approval workflow has been defined for the corresponding absence type, the substitute must first accept the request to trigger the approval workflow defined. For more information about approval workflows, read our article Step 9: Creating Approval Workflows.

How Substitution Periods Are Displayed in the Calendar

The personal absence calendar of the employee on leave displays both, the approved absence and the substitute.

The substitute's personal absence calendar also displays the substitution period in grey to provide a clear overview:

Allow Overlapping Absence Requests for Substitutes

The selection Allow employees substituting for someone to request this absence? gives you the option to define whether employees will be permitted to request an absence for the period in which they are substituting for a colleague.

If you select Yes, employees who are already acting as substitutes during a certain period are still able to request an absence. This setting is useful for example for the absence type Sickness. This allows employees who are supposed to substitute for a colleague and get sick on that day to enter their sick days in Personio. Furthermore, this setting also enables your employees to apply for the absence type remote work and to complete pending tasks from home even if they act as a substitute for a colleague.

To prevent employees from submitting absence requests for any period in which they are already substituting for another employee, select No.

Users with the administrator role are always able to create absences for employees, even if they act as substitutes during the selected period.