This article gathers the most frequently asked questions by the Personio users regarding both absences and attendances. This article is updated regularly to include additional questions and hot topics.
Why is Personio displaying the wrong absence entitlement for an employee?
In most cases, this has to do with the accrual policy assigned to the absence type.
You may have assigned the wrong accrual policy to the absence type, or you may have entered the wrong value when manually adjusting the absence balance. If the issue still persists after assigning the right accrual policy and readjusting the balance, double-check the settings for the specific accrual policy. Make sure that you have assigned the accrual policy from the correct time (from January 1st every year, or from the employee's work anniversary), as well as the granting method and carryover rules.
Why is the absence entitlement not prorated for an employee who is leaving the company?
If the employee leaves the company in the second half of the year, and they have been in the company for at least 6 months, they will get the full entitlement regardless of their proration settings.
How can I enforce my employees to request holidays on specific dates?
Personio does not currently allow you to enforce your employees to request vacation on specific dates. At the moment, you can only enforce your employees to use their carryover vacation time between certain dates (by setting an expiration date through the accrual policy settings). Alternatively, you can also enforce that all employees take the same vacation days per year by configuring company-wide holidays. For more information, check the question below.
How can I configure a company-wide Christmas holiday (example: 24th and 25th December)?
As explained in the question above, it is possible to set up company-wide holidays. These are days when the company is officially closed and all the employees are off work at the same time.
How can I block my employees from requesting holidays on specific dates?
Personio does not currently allow you to block your employees from requesting vacation on specific dates. As a workaround, you can set up an approval workflow for supervisors to manually reject any absence request that falls between certain dates.
What is the impact of the Consider time tracked during absences as overtime setting option?
In Personio, there are two different types of absences: actual absences where the employee is not working at all (example: "Paid vacation", “Sickness” and “Special leave”), and figurative absences where the employee is working but simply not that present (example: “remote work”, “Business trip” and “Training”). In that sense, the Consider time tracked during absences as overtime option must be activated only for the first type of absence (actual absences), so that when an employee registers their attendance during an absence, these hours get added to the overtime balance, and if applicable, also generate salary payment.
Why is the employee's monthly attendance balance not changing after they have booked some vacation days?
You may need to activate the Consider time tracked during absences as overtime setting option described in the previous answer for the absence type that they are trying to request. Alternatively, an approval workflow might be in place, and the absence request might still be waiting for approval from the employee's supervisor.
What does it exactly mean to retroactively change the carryover limit for vacation days?
If you update the carryover limit of an accrual policy, the changes will be applied retroactively to the entire absence history of all employees to which the accrual policy is assigned. As a result, the absence entitlement will be recalculated and may lead to wrong past data. That is why we rather recommend creating a new absence type with a new accrual policy that includes the updated carryover limit. This way, you will be able to assign the new accrual policy to the relevant employees from today on, so that past data remains unchanged.
What is the difference between tracked overtime, monthly balance and total balance?
If you activate the Track overtime setting option, an additional widget will appear in the employee's Attendance tab. In the Overtime hours widget, you will see three different balances. The hours under Tracked are the total of overtime hours recorded within the month without deductions. The hours under Month balance are the total of overtime hours at the end of the month, once overtime has been both approved and compensated (vacation days, payouts, etc). The hours under Total balance are the total of approved overtime hours since the setting option was activated.
How can I assign the accrual policy from a custom date in the calendar year?
Personio does not currently allow you to assign the accrual policy from a custom date in the calendar year. You can only assign it either from January 1st every year or from the employee's work anniversary (hire date). However, we are already working on this improvement.
Why is the accrual policy automatically assigned from the employee's work anniversary (hire date), even if I enter a different date when setting it up?
When you first assign an accrual policy for an absence to an employee, the accrual policy is always assigned from the employee's work anniversary (hire date). This cannot be modified by manually entering a different date.
How can my employees see other employees' pending absence requests to better plan their holidays?
Employees will only be able to see other employees' pending absence requests in the calendar if you grant them either Administrator rights or editing rights to the Absence tab. Employees with viewing rights to the Absence tab can only see other employees' absence requests in the calendar after they have been approved by their supervisors. Note that if you grant your employees editing rights, they will also be able to fully request absences, and to fully update and delete existing absences.
Why an employee's approved absence request shows no approver in the Personal Absence Calendar?
If an employee's approved absence requests shows no approver when clicked on through the Personal Absence Calendar, that is likely because the employee was able to skip the approval process due to having either Administrator rights or editing rights. Alternatively, it may also happen that the assigned approval workflow contains no steps, which will cause the absence request to be straight approved.
