Time Tracking

The Time Tracking feature in the flair Employee Hub is an easy way to keep a record of the hours that employees have spent at work.

How To Set Up and Use the flair Time Tracker

Employee HubSalesforce

Introduction to Time Tracking
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The Time Tracking feature in the flair Employee Hub is an easy way to keep a record of the hours that employees have spent at work.

What Is Time Tracking Used For?
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Time tracking allows employees and managers to document working hours, breaks, and overtime. It’s an effective way to help employees demonstrate their working time, while also checking that they are taking enough breaks and are fairly compensated for overtime.

Time tracking is also important to demonstrate compliance with labor laws and is required by law in some countries.

Time Tracking With flair
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flair supports three common types of time tracking:

  1. Digital Clock In / Clock Out: Employees can clock in, record breaks, and clock out using the flair Employee Hub or mobile app. This offers a more modern and efficient alternative to paper or spreadsheet-based tracking.
  2. Project-Based Tracking: With time tracking in flair, you can track time spent on specific projects alongside ordinary working hours. This helps you keep track of billable hours for a particular project, so that you don’t run over time or budget.
  3. Tracking With Physical Devices: flair also supports time tracking with physical devices. For example, employees can clock in with a card, badge, or chip when they arrive at work. Their time is then synched with the flair time tracking app.

How To Set Up Time Tracking
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To set up time tracking, you first need to enter the flair HR app in Salesforce. Click on Attendance in the navigation bar and then select Workloads. This will show you any workload templates you have created.

Defining employee hours in workflow templates Salesforce

Click on New Workload Template to add a new set of working hours for specific employees. Here you can define how many hours employees are required to work on a weekly or monthly basis. You also have the option to schedule break times.

Defining weekly hours, shift lengths, and break times in a workload template in Salesforce

Setting Up a Time Framework
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While creating your workload template, you may need to set up a time framework to define certain rules for overtime and breaks. This can help you comply with the applicable labor laws in each region where your organization operates.

To create a time framework, click on Add Time Framework from within your workload template. Alternatively, you can click on the HR Admin page in your main navigation bar and select Time Frameworks.

Click New and you can then configure how overtime is calculated and compensated, set minimum break times, set automated break reminders for employees, and more.

A time framework in Salesforce lets you define break time rules to comply with local labor regulations

Assigning Approval Responsibilities
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At the end of a week, timesheets are automatically sent to an employee’s manager for approval. The manager of an employee is defined by who holds the Parent Position in the company hierarchy. You can find and edit this hierarchy on the Company Structure page of the flair HR app. You can also view an employee’s main manager and any additional managers in the Contract section of an employee’s record in the flair HR app.

View an employee's manager and additional managers in flair

You can easily assign additional managers to an employee on the Staff & Docs page. Open Staff & Docs from the App Launcher or navigation bar, then select the Additional Managers tab. Here you will see a list of managers and the employees they are managing. Along the top row, you will see different kinds of manager responsibilities, such as Absence Approval and Time Entries Approval.

To assign additional managers, click the Assign button. Select a manager and an employee, then choose which permissions the manager should receive. Managers will Time Entries Approval will also receive the employee’s timesheet for approval at the end of each week.

View and assign additional managers with timesheet approval responsibility

Time Limits for Time Tracking
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Preventing overworking promotes a fair and equal work environment while also contributing to cost efficiency and compliance with labor regulations.

To restrict employee time tracking to agreed-upon work patterns, use the Time Limits feature on the flair HR app on Salesforce. Here’s how it works.

  • To set time limits for time tracking, go to any Time Framework you have created. They can be found under the Attendance section on the HR Admin page or via the App Launcher.
Time Framework
  • Next, click on the Time Limits tab within your chosen Time Framework.
Time Limits Tab
  • The Time Limits tab gives you three configuration options to apply to the flair employee Time Tracking feature:

    Don't restrict: This option allows employees to track time without any limitations, granting them the flexibility to do so at any time and for any number of hours.

    Restrict daily hours based on workload: Daily tracking restrictions are activated based on working hours specified in the workload settings. This means employees can only track time during their agreed working hours also known as their workload.

    Restrict daily hours with custom duration: Limit the number of daily work hours by setting a customized duration. Set the limit using the Maximum Daily Restriction Custom Minutes field. For example, by specifying 480 minutes, employees will be restricted to tracking a maximum of 8 hours of work per day.

3 Time Limit Settings
Custom Minutes Field

**Time Limit Entry and Notifications
**To keep people informed about your company’s time tracking limit, it is possible to apply notifications if the limit has been reached. The two options are:

  • Automatically clock out and notify both the employee and manager
  • Continue tracking time, notify both the employee and manager
Notifications Time Limit
  • You can also restrict employees from filling out time entries in advance using the checkbox highlighted below.
Checkbox Time Limit

How It Works
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Time Tracking Overview
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The Employee Hub Overview section provides employees with essential information regarding their work hours. It displays the number of hours worked by the employee in the current week, as well as the remaining hours. Any break rules established by the organization are presented. Moreover, employees have the option to review their past weeks' work hours and view their scheduled working hours for upcoming weeks.

Employees can also refer to the Absences section. This section encompasses various types of planned absences, such as sick leave, vacation, and public holidays. These absences are automatically subtracted from the originally scheduled working hours.

Time tracking starts when an employee clicks on the Start Tracking button. If the employee wants to take a break, they can press the Pause button and simply press Play again once they have returned. When the employee is ready to clock out and end their day, they simply press the Stop button and their working hours will be displayed in the weekly overview.

Change Requests
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If the employee forgets to clock in, clock out, or track a break, they can manually change their start time, end time, and breaks. The proposed changes are then sent to the timesheet manager for approval.

How to make changes to time tracking entries in flair

It is also possible for employees to add notes to a shift. For example, they may want to explain why they worked irregular hours on a certain day, or let their manager know why they have requested a change.

To learn how to set up time tracking in your organization, read our set-up guide.

Start Time Tracking in the Employee Hub
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To start tracking your hours, log in to your Employee Hub and select Time Tracking in the menu on the left. Then click Start Tracking. You can also start tracking time instantly from your Dashboard.

Start tracking time in the flair Employee Hub

In the Overview, you will see all your tracked hours for the current week. You can also view hours tracked in previous weeks and your scheduled hours for upcoming weeks.

While your time tracker is running, you will see your working time at the bottom-right of every page in the Employee Hub.

If you want to take a break, simply click the Pause button. Click Play to restart time tracking once you return to work. Clicking on the blue arrow will show an overview of your currently tracked day and allow you to write a note about your time-tracking activity.

Depending on which country you work in, you will have different rules on minimum required break times. In the Break Rules box on the left of the Overview, you can see the rules your organization has set regarding break times.

What if I Forget To Track My Time?
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Forgot to clock in or had lunch without pausing your time tracker? No worries. You can correct your hours by clicking on your recorded times and editing them. You can also click on Add Break to enter your break times. Your new times will be shown as Pending Changes until a manager has reviewed your corrections.

Mobile Time Tracking
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You can also use the flair mobile app to track your working hours on the go. This is ideal for remote workers, traveling workers, and people in jobs that spend little or no time at a computer.

You can start tracking time from the home screen of the mobile app by clicking the play button ▶️. Press pause ⏸️ to take a break or stop ⏹️ to clock out for the day.

By opening the Time Tracking tab at the bottom of the screen, you can view your tracked hours for the current week, as well as previous time entries. Tapping the question mark icon at the top right of the screen will show you the break-time rules set by your organization.

Tap on a specific day to see what time you clocked in, took your break, and clocked out on that day. If you forgot to log your working hours, you can tap on Edit in the top-right corner to submit a change request to your manager. You can also leave a comment to explain the reasons for the change.

If you are using iOS 16 or later, our time tracker is also compatible with Apple’s Live Activities feature. This means that you can view and control your time tracker from your phone’s lock screen.

Download our free mobile app for iOS and Android.

Slack Time Tracking
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flair offers a Slack integration to make time tracking even easier. Check the Apps page in Slack to find the flair app. If it is not there, you may need to install it from the Slack App Directory. Once the flair app is enabled for your Slack workspace, you will see flair in your list of apps.

You can start tracking time from the app Home screen. Under the Time Tracking section, you will see your clock-in, clock-out, and break times for the current day. Below this, you will see various buttons that allow you to start ▶️ tracking time, take a break, or clock out ⏹️ for the day.

If you choose the Clock Out (Comments) button, you will have the option to add a comment for the person reviewing your timesheet. This can be useful if your tracked time was different from your usual schedule.

When your timesheet has been approved, you will receive a notification in Slack showing you a summary of your tracked time during a specific week. You can click on View in Employee Hub to see more details.

Time Entry Cost Center Assignment
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Assigning a cost center to a time-tracking entry allows you to allocate an employee’s working hours to specific admin areas within your organization. Cost centers are useful for internal reporting and keeping track of expenses per department or team.

Here’s how to assign a cost center to a time entry in the Employee Hub.

  • Navigate to the Time Tracking page and input your working hours using the Add Time Entry button.
  • It will then be possible to choose a cost center using the Assign Cost Center button.
  • Click Save to finalize your entry.
Cost Center image

Assigning a Project Cost Center
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Cost centers for projects can be useful for enhancing budget precision, optimizing resource allocation, and streamlining client billing. Let’s take a look at how to assign a cost center to a specific project.

  • Go to the Projects page in the Time section of the Employee Hub.
  • Enter the project details and any notes via the Add Entry option.
  • Select the appropriate Cost Center and then select Save Changes.
Project Cost Center

Block Time Tracking During Absence
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During some types of absence, such as paid vacation and sick leave, you may want to prevent employees from tracking time. To do this, when creating a new absence category or editing an existing one in Absence Settings, simply check the box labeled “Time Tracking Restricted”. This will disable time tracking during this type of absence.

Check "Time Tracking Restricted" when creating an absence category to prevent time tracking

Timesheets
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If you have sufficient permissions, you can view, edit, and approve timesheets, either in Salesforce or in the Employee Hub.

View and Approve Timesheets in Salesforce
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To get a detailed look at all the recorded working hours in your company, open the flair HR app and use the App Launcher to find Timesheets.

You can use the filter icon in the top-right corner of the page to refine your search.

Use filters to refine your search for timesheets in Salesforce

When you have found the timesheet you want to take a look at, click on the entry in the Period column. This will show you a detailed view of an employee’s weekly timesheet.

All dates and times in the timesheets are displayed in your organization’s time zone. You can change your time by clicking on your avatar in the top-right corner of the Salesforce window, opening Settings, and selecting My Personal Information > Language & Time Zone from the menu on the left.

How to change your organization's time zone in Salesforce

Within the timesheet, you can see the following information:

  • Status Icon: These icons show whether the time tracked on each day was on, above, or below target, or if it was a non-working day. Up to one hour of overtime will be indicated as on track.
  • Day and Date: The day and date of the time entry.
  • Time Worked: How much time was tracked on this day.
  • Target Time: How much time the employee was expected to work on this day.
  • Difference: The difference between Time Worked and Target Time.
  • Balance: If the Time Balance feature is enabled, this column shows the employee’s accumulated time balance on each day.
  • Time Entry: This column shows when the time tracking was started and ended on each day, as well as any breaks. Project time entries will also appear in this column.
Viewing a timesheet in Salesforce

You can see even more information about daily time entries by clicking the arrow > on a row or by clicking the Show Details toggle, which expands all rows of the timesheet.

Additional information includes the timestamp, the person who created the time entry, and the origin of the time entry, e.g. Salesforce or Employee Hub. You can use this information to see the history of a time entry, including any changes that might have been made.

On the right side of the page, you can see a bar graph visualizing the time recorded per day. You can also see the total time tracked, cumulative time balance, absence and public holiday hours, and more.

If you have the necessary permissions, you can click the Approve button to approve the hours in this timesheets.

View and Approve Timesheets in the Hub
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To view employee timesheets in the Employee Hub, use the left menu to find Team > Time Management > Controlling

There you will see an overview of time fulfillment and days worked by each employee. Clicking on an employee will give you a more detailed view of their timesheets and allow you to make changes and approve timesheets. You can also approve multiple timesheets in one go by checking the box beside each timesheet that you wish to approve.

Approving Change Requests
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When an employee makes a change to their timesheet, you will receive a notification via email. You can view all open change requests in the Employee Hub by clicking on Time Tracking > Change Requests.

Here, you will see more information about the proposed change. Then you can simply select whether or not to approve the request.

Change requests will also appear on the My Team section of the Employee Hub, alongside other items that require approval.

The My Team overview shows all pending items for approval

Reapproving Timesheets
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Sometimes, an employee might make a change to their working hours after you’ve already approved a timesheet. For example, if you approved an ordinary working week in advance, but an employee was off sick on one of these days, the working total working time will change.

If this happens, all you need to do is log into the flair HR app and click Timesheets. Select the timesheet for the week during which a change was made. Now, on the right-hand side where the Approve button normally appears, you will see a Re-Approve button. Simply click this button to reapprove the timesheet.

Reapprove altered timesheets in flair

Managing Employee Overtime
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To check employee overtime as a manager go to the My Team tab on the Manager side of the Employee Hub.

Next, select an employee and toggle to the Time Sheets tab. There you will find an overview of that particular employee’s absences, holidays, and overtime. Check weekly details or dive deeper into the working hours of each day.

A second way to review employee overtime is to open the Time Tracking page and go to the Controlling panel. Here you can click on an individual employee’s name and see the same working hours statistics presented through the My Team page.

Reviewing Overtime as an Employee
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For a concise overview of your overtime as an employee, simply access the Employee Hub's Time Tracking page. In the Overview section, you'll find a detailed analysis of your daily and weekly working hours. You can also scroll to review data from previous weeks. Overtime hours are prominently displayed in red on the chart, while regular, allocated working hours are depicted in green.

Overtime Setup
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Overtime management is a crucial aspect of workforce organization, and assigning employees to a Time Framework helps ensure an organized approach to handling overtime or additional hours.

Organizing Overtime Using Time Frameworks
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Let’s take a look at setting up overtime for your company using a Time Framework.

Create Compensatory Time Category

  • Create an absence category for compensatory time or overtime in the flair HR app. All the overtime employees accumulate will be accrued within this category.

  • To do this go to the HR admin section and select Absence Categories and Policies. Select Create on the Absence Categories panel. In this case, we are creating an Overtime compensation category. Make sure you tick the Compensatory Time box to make this category accrues all the overtime an employee works.

Time Framework Template

  • The next step is to create a Time Framework, where you will define your company overtime rules. Go to the HR Admin page and select Time Frameworks. You can either create a new Time Framework or adjust an existing one.

  • After setting up and clicking into a Time Framework, you can access the Overtime menu, which allows you to personalize the overtime rules according to your preferences. Within this menu, you can choose the method for calculating extra hours by selecting an option from the Overtime Calculation drop-down box. You have three choices: daily basis, weekly basis, or a combination of daily and weekly maximums.

  • If overtime is anything that exceeds workload hours, check the Weekly Overtime Based on Workload box.

  • Or, enter the threshold in the Calculate Weekly Overtime After field to determine the number of hours at which overtime begins. For example, for some people, after 40 hours then the overtime rates apply.

  • Under the Compensatory Time field, you can set the rate of overtime as a percentage of an employee’s wage. For example, overtime can be calculated at 100% of the standard wage. Any extra hours after this can be calculated at 150%, for example, using the Extra Hours Premium field.

  • Once you are happy, click Save.

Assign Employees to a Time Framework

  • To Assign an individual or a group of employees to a Time Framework, go to the Employee Workloads tab in the flair HR app.

  • Next, select the correct framework under the Time Framework field beside an employee’s name. Then click Apply and then select Save.

  • To assign a Time Framework to a group of Employees you can tick Select All rather than ticking individual employee names.

  • Please note, if you are unable to see the Time Framework field in the Employee Workloads tab, click on the Settings cog icon. This icon, to the right of the Employee Workloads Search bar, will allow you to display more fields such as a Time Framework.

Using the Hourly-Based Workload Template
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The Hourly Workload Template has been designed to deliver more freedom while making sure your team's workloads are managed effectively. Perfect for managing freelancers and project workers, it offers more control over flexible workloads and schedules.

Create An Hourly Based Workload

  • When creating a new Workload template, simply select the hourly option from the Workload Models dropdown menu.
  • This is an ideal option for those with non-fixed hours such as shift workers, freelancers, working students, or project based workers.

Time Balance
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The Time Balance feature in flair gives you an easy way to see how an employee’s recorded working time compares with their target working time. It provides employees and managers alike with a clear overview of overtime and undertime. Excess time balance can be withdrawn, which means it is converted to compensatory time off (also known as time off in lieu).

Time Balance Settings
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To start using the Time Balance feature, open the flair HR app. Use the App Launcher 𓃑 to open the Time Frameworks page. In flair, a Time Framework outlines the designated working hours for employees.

To enable Time Balance for an existing Time Framework, select a framework and then open the Time Balance tab. Alternatively, you can create a new Time Framework by clicking New.

Set up the Time Balance feature in a flair Time Framework

In the Time Balance tab, you will see the Time Balance settings for your selected Time Framework. Let’s take a closer look at each of the settings.

To understand time balance calculations, it’s important to know the difference between workload hours and target hours. Workload hours are the time that an employee is expected to work during a normal week or a month. This is defined in a Workload Template. Target hours are the workload hours, minus any absences or public holidays.

General Settings
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Time Balance general settings
  1. Time Balance Calculation

    a) Do not track: The time balance will not be tracked.

    b) Based on daily workload: Any tracked time that differs from an employee’s target time (workload hours minus absences and holidays) will contribute to the time balance. For example, if the daily target time is 8 hours and an employee works 8 hours 30, the resulting time balance will be +30m.

    c) After a specific amount of time: The time balance calculation is based on a specified amount of time, regardless of the employee’s workload. For example, if you enter 7h into the Start Calculating After field, the target time will be this number minus any absences or holidays. In this case, an employee who works 6 hours receives -1h time balance, while an employee who works 8 hours receives +1h time balance. This setting can be used when overtime is included in an employee’s contract.

By default, Time Balance Calculation is set to Do Not Track. Selecting one of the other options will enable the Time Balance feature for the selected Time Framework and you will see more settings.

  1. Auto Balance Reset: This setting determines when the accumulated balance is automatically withdrawn and reset to zero. You can choose to reset or withdraw the balance at the end of every month, quarter, or year, or immediately once the timesheet is approved. Later, in the Withdrawal section of the settings, you can define what happens with the remaining time balance at the end of a reset period.

  2. Negative Balance Withdrawal: Here you can choose what happens if there is a negative time balance at the end of the reset period.

    a) Reset negative balance to zero: Resets the negative balance and starts the next accumulation period from zero.

    b) Withdraw negative balance to compensation and reset: Converts the negative balance to compensatory time, then resets the time balance to zero. This will subtract allowance from the absence category used for compensatory time off.

    c) Carry over negative balance to next period: The negative balance is not reset and remains at the beginning of the next period.

Daily Calculation Settings
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Time Balance daily calculation settings
  1. Maximum Daily Working Time: Sets the maximum working time per day that will be contributed towards the time balance.
  2. Daily Threshold: Define an amount of time after which the time balance should be counted. This will be added to the daily target time. For example, if an employee has a daily target time of 8 hours and a Daily Threshold of 1 hour, no time will be added to the time balance until the employee has tracked 9 hours in a day. This can be used to avoid the need to create another time framework for part-time employees.
  3. Don’t Deduct Negative Deficit: If this box is checked, time deficits (undertime) will not be deducted from the employee’s time balance.
  4. Daily Premiums: Activating this setting allows you to define premiums for overtime. You can set two premium levels. For each level, you can choose after how many minutes the premium becomes active and a multiplier for the time tracked after this amount. For example, if you set Premium Level 1 as 60 minutes with a Multiplier of 1.5, any overtime tracked that exceeds 60 minutes will be multiplied by 1.5. In this case, if an employee has a daily target time of 8 hours and tracks 9.5 hours in a day, 2 hours will be added to their time balance.

Accumulation Settings
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The accumulation settings are related to the period you defined earlier in the Auto Balance Reset field. You can customize update frequency and set accumulation thresholds and caps.

Time Balance accumulation settings
  1. Accumulation Period: This field is defined by the period chosen in the Auto Balance Reset field and cannot be changed.
  2. Time Balance Update: This setting determines when the time balance is updated. You can choose to update the time balance immediately or once the timesheet is approved.
  3. Threshold: The Threshold sets the minimum amount of overtime that must be accrued within an accumulation period before it is counted in the time balance. For example, if you set a threshold of 4 hours, any overtime of 4 hours or less during the period will not be counted in the time balance.
  4. Time Balance Caps: Use the Positive Cap Minutes and Negative Cap Minutes to set the maximum and minimum amount of time balance that can be accumulated. Any time balance outside of this range will not be counted.

Withdrawal Settings (Overtime Compensation)
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In the Withdrawal (Overtime Compensation) section, you can decide how the accumulated time balance is compensated at the end of a period.

The Auto Withdrawal Period field is synchronized with the Auto Balance Reset option in the General Settings. It determines when the time balance is automatically withdrawn.

The Compensation Method setting determines how the time balance is compensated. There are two options:

No Compensation: The time balance is not compensated and is removed at the end of a period.

Time Balance withdrawal settings

Compensatory Time: If you choose this option, the remaining time balance will be converted to additional time off.

Time Balance withdrawal settings
  1. Absence Category: Here you can choose which Absence Category the compensatory time should be added to.
  2. Minutes of Time Balance Spent: Define how many minutes of time balance are equal to either one hour or one day of time-off allowance. If you chose an hourly Absence Category, the Minutes of Time Balance Spent contribute to one hour of absence allowance. If you chose a daily Absence Category, they will convert to one day of allowance.
  3. Conversion Explanation: The gray box at the bottom demonstrates the withdrawal. In this example, Overtime is an hourly Absence Category, so every 60 minutes of time balance will add 1 hour to an employee’s Overtime absence allowance.

Time Balance Overview and Manual Withdrawals
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Once you have defined your time balance settings for specific time frameworks, you can see an overview of employees’ time balance using the Time Balance tab in the Navigation Bar.

Overview of all time balances in flair

The Time Balance menu tab will show you a full list view of an employee’s time balance on a given day. You can filter by name, time framework, location, and department. You can also toggle Only Today’s to see today’s time balances or browse different months. The Withdrawn column shows you how much of the time balance was converted to compensation or lost on any given day.

The refresh ⟳ icon allows you to update the time balances in the list view. Clicking the Hide 0 Balances checkbox will filter out all list entries where the time balance equals zero.

The Periodic Withdrawals menu tab shows you an overview of previous and upcoming time balance auto-withdrawals. If a change is made to a timesheet after the auto-withdrawal, you may need to re-withdraw the balance. To do this, simply click the down arrow next to the list entry and select Re-Withdraw to withdraw the additional balance.

Periodic time balance withdrawals in flair

In both the Time Balance and Periodic Withdrawals tabs, you can take a closer look at an employee’s tracked time by clicking on the respective timesheet in the Timesheet column. This will display a detailed view of the employee’s weekly timesheet. For each day, you can see the tracked time, target time, and the cumulative time balance for that day. Clicking the + icon on a timesheet day allows you to manually add a time entry or withdraw the available time balance from that day.