Leave management
Glossary
Leave management
Employees are entitled to workplace leave, and can take it for many reasons – illness, a holiday, to take care of a sick family member, or to take care of new children. The National Employment Standards (NES) outline the minimum leave allowed for each employee. However, an award, registered agreement, or contract can entitle an employee to more leave than the NES, but no less.
As outlined by the National Employment Standards, employee leave begins to accrue from their first day of employment, even if the employee is working through a probation period. Employee leave accumulates uniquely based on award, contract, and hours worked. Casual workers aren’t entitled to paid leave, but part-time and full-time workers are entitled to different amounts of leave.
Leave also varies in type. Part-time and full-time employees are entitled to:
- Paid annual leave: typically 4 weeks per year, or 5 weeks for shiftworkers. This time can be claimed when sick, when going on holiday, or when sitting community service (jury duty).
- Sick leave: unpaid time can be taken off when unwell, or an employee can use a portion of their paid annual leave.
- Carers leave: unpaid time off to take care of an unwell family member, or a portion of paid annual leave used
- Parental leave: new parents can take 12 months unpaid leave from an employer who they’ve already worked for more than 12 months with. An additional 12 months can be requested.
- Long service leave: this leave varies by state, but awards long serving employees with time off.
This can be confusing to get your head around as an employer, especially when you will be dealing with a range of employee contracts.
Hence, the best way to manage employee leave is to implement a HR software with integrated leave management tools. Roubler offers full leave management through our mobile app. Managers simply login to view the leave accrual of all staff members. Our intelligent software will dictate exactly how much leave employees have earnt based on their contracts and hours worked. Alternatively, managers can set unique accrual entitlements of a per hour worked or per pay run basis.