Apply for leave

Go to Leave → My leave and select Apply for leave. You can also start from a balance card or table row — clicking one opens the same form with that leave type already chosen.

Fill in the request

1. Leave type — pick from the list. Types that need evidence are labelled (document required). Greyed-out types can’t be used right now: they have no policy configured for you, you haven’t met the minimum service, they’re blocked during probation, or it’s an off-in-lieu type with no days left.

2. Date range — a two-month picker. Weekends and off days, public holidays and blackout windows are marked with coloured dots and a legend: Holiday, Off day, Blackout. Hovering a day shows the holiday name, or Blackout: {name}.

   Holidays and off days are marked, not blocked — you can include them in a range, they simply don’t count as leave days.

3. Half day — tick this for a half-day request. The picker switches to a single Date, and a Portion choice appears: Morning (AM) or Afternoon (PM).

4. Check the day count shown on the right — Working days: 3 · of 12 available, or Half day: 0.5 · of 12 available. The first number is what will be deducted; the second is what you have left on that leave type. Ask for more than you have and both turn red with an explanation.

5. Reason — required on some leave types (the label shows an asterisk), optional on others.

6. Covering colleague — appears on leave types that ask for one. Choose the scope with My department / Whole company, then pick a person.

   Colleagues already on leave over your dates are greyed out and labelled — on leave then, so you can’t pick someone who won’t be there. On some leave types the person you name is then blocked from booking their own leave for those dates; the helper text under the picker tells you when that applies.

   Whoever you pick is notified that you named them, so they know about the commitment — and they’re told again if you later change or remove it.

7. Supporting document — appears on types that require evidence, such as sick or hospitalisation leave. PDF or image, up to 10 MB.

8. Select Submit.

A toast confirms Leave request submitted, and the request appears under My requests as Pending.

Note

A half-day must be a single day and must fall on a working day. If you need a half-day at each end of a longer absence, file it as separate requests — one PM half-day, one full-day range, one AM half-day.

You can book an AM and a PM half-day on the same date as two requests. What you can’t do is book the same portion twice.

How days are counted

The day count is not the length of the date range. It’s the number of working days in that range, which means:

• Your own rest days are skipped. These come from your assigned shift — if you work Saturdays, your Saturdays count as leave days even though a colleague’s don’t.
• Public holidays on the organization’s calendar are skipped.
• A half-day counts as 0.5.

The form previews this with exactly the same rule the server uses, so the number you see before submitting is the number that gets deducted.

Warnings you may see in the form

Three warnings appear inline, in red, as you fill the form. The first stops you submitting; the other two don’t — they tell you the request will be rejected so you can fix it first.

• Probation — {Type} cannot be taken while you’re on employment probation. Submitting will be rejected. Submit is disabled.
• Notice period — Needs 5 working day(s) notice; this request only gives 2. Pick a later start date.
• Blackout — Selected dates overlap the “Year-end freeze” blackout (2026-12-20 to 2026-12-31). Submitting will be rejected.
• Over balance — This request is 2 day(s) more than the 3 you have available. Submitting will be rejected.

Rules the server checks on submit

Some rules can only be checked when you submit. If one fails, the request isn’t created and a red toast explains why. The most common:

Message	What to do
Requested 5 days but only 3 available	Check your balance and shorten the request, or ask HR about an adjustment.
An existing annual leave request overlaps this date range	You already have a request of that type covering some of those dates.
Requires at least 5 working days notice	Move the start date later. Notice is counted in working days from today.
{Type} cannot be backdated more than 3 day(s)	The type limits how far into the past you can file. Ask HR to file it for you.
Exceeds max consecutive days (14)	Split it into shorter requests, or ask HR.
Requires 12 months of service	You’re not eligible for this type yet. Your balance card shows the date you become eligible.
Department cap reached on 2026-07-30: max 2 for this leave type	Too many people in your department are already away that day. Pick different dates.
Cannot apply for leave in a future leave-year — its balance is not yet available	You can book any date inside the current leave year, but next year’s entitlement doesn’t exist yet.
Leave cannot be applied during the “Year-end freeze” blackout period	Those dates are closed for applications.
The covering colleague you picked is already on leave from … Pick someone else.	Choose a colleague who’ll actually be there. The picker greys these out once both dates are set.
You’re the covering colleague for Annual Leave leave from … which can’t be left uncovered.	You agreed to cover someone over these dates on a type where that’s binding. Pass the cover to a colleague and apply again — see below.

Note

The form warns you about the balance before you submit, but it does not check for overlaps — a clash with one of your own existing requests is only caught on submit.

If you’re covering someone and then need leave yourself

On leave types where cover is binding, being someone’s named cover blocks you from booking leave over the days you’re covering. You don’t have to chase anyone to get unblocked, though — you can pass the cover on yourself. Open the leave request you’re covering, use Change on the Covering colleague row to nominate a colleague, and then file your own leave. The person you hand it to is notified, and the original requester keeps their cover.

You can hand it on but not remove it: dropping cover entirely is the requester’s call or HR’s, since on some types their leave isn’t valid without it.

Two things are never blocked:

• Leave that has already started, or that you’re filing for today or earlier. Refusing it wouldn’t put anyone back at the desk — it would only stop the absence being recorded. So falling ill mid-commitment never stops you filing, on any leave type, and sorting the cover out becomes the follow-up rather than the precondition.
• Note this covers the day itself only. If your leave runs on past today into days you’re still covering, those later days are blocked until the cover moves.

What happens next

Submitting places a hold on your balance: the days move into pending, so they aren’t bookable twice, but they aren’t counted as used until the request is approved.

The request is routed to an approver by your organization’s leave workflow — often your designated leave approver or reporting manager. If that person is themselves on leave, the approval may be automatically re-routed to their manager or to HR, depending on how your organization configured out-of-office handling.

You’ll get a notification when a decision is made. Open the request from My requests at any time to see where it is and who it’s with.

Tip

If your approver isn’t set up, the submit fails with a clear message — Cannot submit — you have no assigned manager. Please contact HR. That’s a configuration problem, not something you can fix from the form.

Attachments and the document check

When a leave type requires a document, the file you attach is stored against the request and approvers can open it with View.

If your organization has the AI document check switched on, the attachment is also read automatically to pull out the issuer and the certified period. The approver sees one of:

• A grey confirmation — Document scan matches the request, with the issuer and certified dates.
• An amber flag — Document dates do not match the requested period., Document day count does not match the requested days., or Could not read the certified period from the document.

This check never blocks anything. It’s a prompt for the approver to look closer, and a mismatch is often innocent — a certificate prints calendar days while your request counts working days.