Staff availability request

[pizza-jockeys]

Are there any plans in the pipeline for the availability section of teams to be more thorough?

It would be really useful if our team could set their availability by day and monthly, instead of weekly and that being limited. 

We are finding that our team are requesting time off - which should be used purely for holiday - for small requests like uni commitments, other jobs and birthdays etc. This gives us an inaccurate view of how much time off they are actually taking that is considered to be proper holiday. 

This would be a super duper helpful addition to team for most hops businesses I can imagine... any thoughts?

[pizza-jockeys]

Also that requests provisionally show on the rotas in order to identify clashes before actually accepting holiday requests.

It would be really helpful to be able to see what is going to work not work before accepting and notifying the team members. To have it show up on the rota as a request would be mind blowing and save lots of time😎

[Breffni]

Hi @pizza-jockeys  😊👋

Those are excellent points and features that I believe would be valuable for many of our sellers.

Thank you for providing the context as well. This type of information helps our product teams emphasise the importance of prioritising specific feature requests.

While I didn’t find any upcoming updates in my initial search, I’ve reached out to our Shifts team to see if they have any additional insights.

I'll let you know once I hear back. 

[pizza-jockeys]

Thank you! It would be much appreciated and like you say very valuable to current users as separating holiday requests from availability is really useful!

[NickHunter]

Hi Breffni

Can I add some bits to this thread?  

We’re seriously considering switching to the Team App for scheduling and communication, moving away from Planday, which we’ve used for over six years. While we’re excited by the integration capabilities Team offers, particularly with live sales from Square, I wanted to highlight a few areas where Planday currently holds an advantage. My hope is that these suggestions might guide tweaks to the Team app’s functionality to better meet our needs.

1. Sales Forecasting for Scheduling

•In Planday, we can input and forecast our daily sales for the week ahead.

•This allows us to build rotas while tracking wage percentages daily and weekly, giving us a clear view of staffing efficiency.

•With this information, we can adjust shifts accordingly—either cutting or increasing hours to align with business needs.

•Currently, the Team app doesn’t provide this feature, which limits our ability to manage wage costs effectively during scheduling.

2. Staff Availability Management

•Planday allows team members to update their availability/unavailability up to three months in advance.

•This flexibility empowers staff to plan their lives around the business while also giving us the ability to schedule far in advance.

•The Team app only allows us to see fixed availability, and staff must submit time-off requests for any changes. While functional, it’s less agile and could be enhanced to support dynamic availability updates.

3. Employer Costs Forecasting

•In Planday, we can apply a customisable percentage to labor costs (e.g., 10%, 12%, or 15.5% for NI and employer contributions).

•This ensures more accurate forecasting and cost mitigation when creating schedules.

•Adding a simple field to input employer cost percentages in the Team app would make a significant difference and seems like an easy adjustment to implement.

What We Love About Team App

•The integration with Square and live sales data is a standout feature!

•However, it feels slightly clunky when reviewing staff availability and scheduling workflows. Streamlining this would enhance the overall experience.

We’re really impressed with the Team app’s potential and would love to see these adjustments incorporated. If you’d like, I’m happy to discuss this further or test any updates on the app to ensure they meet user needs effectively.

[pizza-jockeys]

Absolutely!

As a multiple restaurant owner I agree with you on the points above. The planday app features combined with squares integrations would be an absolute godsend. 
The above mentioned features would really boost teams and make it a much more effective tool!

Becky