This guide will walk you through the three necessary steps to creating your system for authorising overtime. This is the recommended method, where unauthorised overtime will be ‘held’ in its own special Rate until it is authorised by an appropriate Focus User. The three steps are:

• Creating an ‘unauthorised overtime’ rate
• Shift Rule - Creating the overtime Rule
• Shift Rule - Setting the Exceptions trigger

Creating an ‘unauthorised overtime’ rate

Creating a specific ‘unauthorised overtime’ rate is not an essential step. You could simply have one ‘overtime rate’ and authorise overtime within that rate.

The reason that a specific rate for ‘unauthorised time’ is best practice is that you can exclude the rate from your Payroll. This creates a system where overtime must be authorised if it is to be paid. The process of authorisation means moving the time from the holding rate of ‘unauthorised overtime’ to one of the rates that will be included in the next Payroll run.

1. Select ‘System’ from the Menu Bar.
2. Select ‘System Setup' from the System folder.
3. Select ‘Rates’.
4. Create a new Rate - increase the ‘No. of Rates’ by one and, if required, give the new rate a name (eg. UnO/T). Please note, there is a six-character limit. Choose a colour for the new rate to differentiate it from the other rates.
5. Save.

Shift Rule - Creating the overtime Rule

1. Select ‘Rules’ from the Menu Bar.
2. Select ‘Shift Rules’ from the Rules Tree.
3. Select the appropriate Shift Rule.
4. Select ‘Overtime-1’.*
5. In ‘Rate Bands’, underneath the usual rate, select the newly-created ‘unauthorised overtime’ rate.
6. Set ‘From’ to the time when you wish any ‘unauthorised overtime’ to begin (this is usually the time when the usual rate ends).
7. Set ‘To’ to the time when you wish any ‘unauthorised overtime’ to end. This is the maximum amount of overtime that an employee can work.
8. Save.

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* If the Shift Rule is set up to account for flexible working hours, select ‘Overtime-2’ instead. In ‘Overflow Hours’, next to the usual rate, change the ‘To Rate’ to the newly-created ‘unauthorised overtime’ rate. This means that after the specified working hours, the usual rate will change to ‘unauthorised overtime’.

Shift Rule - Setting the Exceptions trigger

1. Still in the Shift Rule, select ‘Exceptions’.
2. In ‘Targets’, tick ‘Enable’.
3. Select ‘More Than’.
4. Select the newly-created ‘unauthorised overtime’ rate.
5. Changing the time to 00:15 gives a 15-minute leeway for employees to clock out after their usual shift finish time. When clocking out after this time, an employee will be considered to have been working ‘unauthorised overtime’ and it will flag up as an exception which needs actioning. This time can obviously be changed to your own requirements.
6. Save.

Additional information

Your system is now ready to go. See ‘How do I authorise overtime?’ to learn how to use the system.

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