Request and Approve Time Off

Your team can ask for holiday or other days off in BakeOnyx. An owner or manager approves or rejects each request. Approved days show on the weekly schedule, so you can see who is off before you plan shifts.

Staff ask for time off from a phone, tablet, or computer
Owners and managers get an email for each new request
The person gets an email when the request is approved or not approved
Approved days show as Off on the schedule grid
BakeOnyx warns you if you add a shift on a day off

Plan: Time off is part of the Scale plan. It is also available during your free trial.

Ask for Time Off

Go to Schedule in the left menu.
Open the Time off tab.
Click Request time off.
Select the Type: Holiday, Sick, Personal, or Other.
Select the First day off and the Last day off. For one day, use the same date in the two fields.
For one day only, you can select Half day — morning or Half day — afternoon.
Write a note if you want to (for example, "family wedding").
Click Send request.

Your request shows under Waiting for a manager until an owner or manager makes a decision. Every role can ask for time off, including custom roles such as Driver.

Note: A request cannot overlap time off that you already asked for or that is already approved. Cancel the old request first if your dates change. You can ask for the morning and the afternoon of the same day in two different requests.

Approve or Reject a Request

Owners and managers (and custom roles with the Manage staff scheduling permission) make the decisions.

Go to Schedule → Time off. The tab shows a number when requests are waiting.
Find the request under Waiting for a decision.
Click Approve or Reject.
Write a note to the person if you want to (for example, "Short staffed that day").
Click Approve or Reject again to confirm.

The person gets an email with your decision and your note.

Note: A manager cannot approve their own time off. Another manager or the owner must make the decision. The owner can approve their own time off.

Who Decides a Request

The owner selects this in Settings → Team → Staff self-service → Who approves requests:

Their manager (default): the request goes to the manager the person reports to. Only that manager (and the owner) can decide. If no manager is set, any manager can decide.
Any manager: any manager can decide.
Owner only: only the owner decides.

Other managers see Their manager decides this request. See My Schedule, Line Managers and Staff Self-Service.

Add Time Off for a Team Member

Owners and managers can record time off for someone else, for example a sick day after it happened.

Go to Schedule → Time off.
Click Add time off.
In Team member, select the person.
Fill in the type and dates, then click Add time off.

Time off that you add for someone is approved immediately. You can use past dates.

See Time Off on the Schedule

Open the Schedule tab. On the weekly grid:

Off — Holiday (filled chip) shows approved time off.
Requested — Holiday (dashed chip) shows a request that waits for a decision. Only owners, managers, and the person who asked can see it.

If you add a shift for a person on a day off, the shift form shows a warning. You can still save the shift. Time off never deletes shifts. If a person has a shift on an approved day off, move the shift to someone else.

Cancel Time Off

Staff can cancel their own request while it waits, or approved time off that has not started.
Owners and managers can cancel any waiting or approved time off.

Click Cancel next to the time off, then click Cancel time off to confirm. The days are removed from the schedule grid.

Who Sees What

Staff see only their own requests and notes. On the grid they see who has approved time off, but not the notes.
Owners and managers see all requests and all notes.

Holiday allowance: to track how much holiday each person has left, see Holiday Allowance, Closed Days and Pay Period. To see your time off in your phone calendar, see My Schedule, Line Managers and Staff Self-Service.