When creating shifts for your employees, it's important to know who is available to work. SocialSchedules allows managers to quickly view an employee's availability or unavailability directly from the Scheduler.
Reviewing availability before assigning shifts can help reduce scheduling conflicts and ensure shifts are assigned to employees who are available to work.
How to View Employee Availability
Navigate to the Scheduler.
Locate the employee and the date you would like to schedule.
Hover your mouse over the employee's scheduling cell for that day
The cell text will change to indicate the employee's availability or unavailability information. If no data is displayed, this means the user has no availability or unavailability defined for the day.
Shift boxes are also shaded to reflect employee availability or unavailability at a glance
Types of Availability / Unavailability
For each type of employee availability / unavailability, the shift cell will show either All day (for full day), or the specific times the employee is available or unavailable (e.g. 2:00pm - 5:00pm).
Available
Employee availability is displayed in green. It indicates that the employee has set availability for this day (meaning, they are exclusively available to work for their employer).
Unavailable
Employee unavailability is displayed in dark grey. It indicates that the employee has marked themselves as being unavailable to work on this date.
Time off
Both approved and pending time off requests are displayed on the Scheduler. Click to view further details. Pending time off requests can also be approved or declined from this view.
Working other department
This indicates an employee has a shift in another department within the same company. Both draft and published shifts are shown here.
Busy
'Busy' indicates either:
The employee is already scheduled to work a shift for another employer.
The employee has marked themselves as available to another employer during that time period.
Because SocialSchedules supports employees working for multiple employers, the system uses this information to help prevent scheduling conflicts.
What Should I Do If an Employee Shows as Unavailable?
If you believe the employee should be available, there are a few things you can check:
1. Check Existing Shifts for Incorrect AM/PM Times
An employee may appear as unavailable if an existing shift has an incorrect start or end time. An accidental AM/PM mix-up can cause a shift to extend into the following day, making the employee appear unavailable when you try to schedule them.
For example, an employee may have been scheduled for 9 PM to 6 AM instead of 9 AM to 6 PM on October 22. Because the shift starts at 9 PM and extends into the next day, the system may treat the employee as already scheduled during part of October 23, which prevents you from creating a shift for that day.
To troubleshoot this:
Navigate to the Scheduler and locate the employee's schedule for the day before they appear unavailable.
Review their existing shifts (especially the day prior) and check whether the start and end times are correct. Pay particular attention to AM/PM selections.
If you find an incorrect time, edit the shift and correct the start and end times.
Try scheduling the employee again on the affected date to see if the issue has been resolved.
2. Check Availability Across Other Employers
Ask the employee directly whether they are working for another employer that also uses SocialSchedules. If they are, they should review the availability settings associated with that employer, as those settings may be preventing you from scheduling them during that time.
Once the employee updates their availability, the Busy status may no longer appear, allowing you to schedule them as needed.
Tips
Always review availability before assigning shifts.
Hover over scheduling cells to quickly identify potential conflicts.
If an employee appears as unavailable unexpectedly, check their existing shifts for incorrect AM/PM times
If an employee appears as Busy unexpectedly, confirm whether they work for another employer using SocialSchedules.
Encourage employees to keep their availability settings up to date across all employers.
Using availability and Busy status indicators can help you create more accurate schedules and avoid conflicts before they occur.