What do you do when someone can't come into work?

Best Practice Tip

You could try having a policy that allows employees to swap shifts. While it is not a requirement, allowing your employees to swap shifts amongst themselves ensures that the hours they are rostered to work suit them and means that you do not always have to be in charge of covering shifts when someone can’t work. A ‘swap policy’ should be a written guideline which outlines when and how employees can swap shifts amongst themselves. 

Things that you should consider when developing a ‘swap policy’ include:

• How can employees notify you of their intention to swap shifts?
• Do you need to authorise all swaps?
• How much notice is required?
• How will the swap be recorded?
• Would you allow employees to swap days across classification levels?

Bear in mind that you cannot make it a requirement that your employees find someone to cover their shift if they are unable to come to work.