Where are the planning settings?

In Planning → Configuration → Settings, or in the Settings app under Planning. They are set per establishment and are reserved for planning administrators.

Where do the roles of the planning come from?

They are the staff roles of the Employees app. In Planning → Configuration → Roles, click Add a role and pick one from the list; a role is never typed in Planning.

What is a critical period?

A time of day the establishment watches closely — rising, lunch, bedtime, the night — with the staff each role must supply during it, either a fixed headcount or one person per number of residents present.

What is the difference between a hard and a soft preference?

The automatic planning never breaks a hard preference (“never on Wednesdays”). A soft preference only weighs on the choice (“rather mornings”).

Why does a part-time staff record show a warning?

Because the person is planned beyond the hours of their contract, this week or this month. The warning suggests a contract amendment may be needed.

Configure the planning¶

The planning is configured once by a planning administrator, then adjusted at the margins: a new role to plan, a critical period, a different typical week.

Settings¶

Open Planning → Configuration → Settings (or the Settings app, section Planning). The settings apply to the current establishment.

Setting	What it does
Schedule email	The email each staff member receives with their shifts.
Open shifts	When ticked, the staff take a published shift without anyone, if they hold its role. On by default.
Rest between two working days	The hours the automatic planning leaves between the end of a working day and the start of the next one. 11:00 by default. Taking an open shift respects the same rest.
Hours balance	The period over which the hours performed are set against the contract: Month, Quarter (default) or Year.
Weekly flexibility	How far a full-time contract may be planned above its week (5:00 by default); its hours are then held over the period of the hours balance. A part-time contract gets none.

The Configuration block of the same page links to the Roles, Critical periods and Schedule templates.

Roles to plan¶

A shift is always planned for a role (nurse, care assistant…). The roles are the staff roles of the Employees app; Planning only says which of them it plans.

Open Planning → Configuration → Roles.
Click Add a role, pick the role from the list, then choose its Team and its Colour.
Click Add.

In the list, drag the rows to set the order of the roles in the schedule, and change the team or colour in place. To stop planning a role, select it and click Remove from the planning: the role stays a staff role, the schedule no longer shows it.

Team — the team an open shift of this role belongs to until someone takes it. It decides which users see the shift.
Colour — the colour of the role’s shifts in the schedule.

New roles are created and renamed in the Employees app, under Configuration → Roles.

Staff records¶

The schedule plans staff members (employees). On each staff record:

Work tab — the person’s Role. It is planned as it is.
Planning tab, Roles — Other planning roles: the roles the person can also stand in for, besides their own.
Planning tab, Hours — read-only figures: Contract hours per week, Part time, Planned this week, Planned this month, Due this month and the Hours balance with the date it is counted from.
Planning tab, Scheduling preferences — the person’s preferences (see below).
Nursing Home tab, Scheduling — Preferred Shift, Personal weekly maximum (the most hours this person may be planned in one week; empty = the contract plus the weekly flexibility for a full time), Can Work Night Shifts, Can Work Weekends.
Nursing Home tab, Sectors — the Assigned Sectors: the automatic planning prefers a person in the sector they are assigned to.

A Shifts button at the top of the record opens the person’s shifts.

Contract amendment warning

When a part-time contract is planned beyond its hours this week or this month, a yellow banner appears at the top of the staff record: an amendment to the contract may be needed. A full-time contract never gets the banner: its extra hours are held over the period of the hours balance.

Scheduling preferences¶

Preferences are entered on the staff record (Planning tab) or for everyone in Planning → Staff preferences, grouped by staff member.

Field	Meaning
Strength	Hard: the automatic planning never breaks it. Soft: it only weighs on the choice.
Availability	Unavailable or Available.
Day	The day of the week; empty = every day.
From / To	The hours concerned.
Sector	Only shifts of this sector; empty = any sector.
Valid from / Valid until	Limits the preference to a period.
Note	A free comment.

A hard Available preference restricts that day to the shifts that start within its hours. A hard unavailability shows in red in the list, an availability in green.

Critical periods¶

A critical period is a time of day when enough staff must be present. Open Planning → Configuration → Critical periods and create one:

Give it a name (rising, lunch, bedtime, night…) and its Hours. An end before the start means the period ends the next day.
Choose the Sectors it watches; empty = the whole establishment.
Tick the Days it applies to.
Under Staff needed, add one line per role:
- Rule — Fixed headcount, or Per residents present;
- Staff — the people needed at the same time (with Per residents present, the minimum whatever the occupancy);
- Residents per staff member — with Per residents present only.

The planned hours of the role during the period are set against the staff needed × the length of the period. Only shifts held by someone count.

Note

With Per residents present, the residents counted are those staying in the rooms of the period’s sectors that day, minus the residents absent that day (hospital stay, leave).

The schedule then shows, above the shifts, whether each period is covered. See Build the schedule and Hours, balance and coverage.

Schedule templates¶

A schedule template holds the empty shifts a typical week needs. Open Planning → Configuration → Schedule templates and create one:

Applied to — Week (applied to one week) or Month (applied to every day of a month, week after week).
One line per shift: Day, From, To (an end before the start = a night ending the next day), Role, Sector, Label (AM, PM, Night…) and Quantity (identical shifts to create).
Shifts per week counts the shifts the template lays.
A note says what the template is for.

Applying a template never touches existing shifts. See Build the schedule.

Users’ access¶

On each user, the Staff planning field sets the access level: No access, User — their team, published shifts, Manager — every shift, no settings or Administrator — everything and the settings. See Staff planning.