Migration to Statutory & Non-statutory with Absence Expiration

This article outlines the steps, to utilize the new feature Absence Expiration by enabling you to migrate to two absence balance to manage statutory & non-statutory in Shiftbase.

Introduction

This article is intended for customers looking to start utilizing absence balance expiration to start managing statutory & non-statutory absence balances. In this article we will be walking you through the steps to migrate from an existing absence balance system without expiration to a system with balance expiration for the years to come. 

We therefore have documented two methods to do so. This is due the possibility of you, the customer, being in current situation than others.

Please pick below the Chapter about the Method that represents your current absence balance setup. 

Content

Method 1: Customer with two existing absence balances

Method 2: Customer with one existing absence balance

Method 1: Customer with two existing absence balances

Step 1: Backup your Data - first

• We strongly advise you, the customer to create backups of the "Absence Balances" through our Reports for the years that will be migrated before starting the migration process. You can do so by:
  • Going to Reports in Shiftbase.
    • Select Time Off and select Balance Summary.
    • Enter the correct date. Example: You are looking to setup balance expiration as of 01-01-2025 - you now want to backup your current balances on the date 31-12-2024. Download the report and save it on your device. 

Step 2: Disable Integration

Step 3: Rename old Balances & set their accrual to Zero

• Edit the old statutory balance and change the name to i.e. “Statutory (Wettelijk) up to (tm) 2024”. 
  • Edit the Default Accrual of the old balances and set to zero (“0”) now whilst in the absence settings.

    • This will later enable easier reconfiguration of contracts.

• Edit the old non statutory balance and change the name to i.e. “Non-statutory (Bovenwettelijk) up to (tm) 2024”.
  • Edit the Default Accrual of the old balances and set to zero (“0”) now whilst in the absence settings.

Step 4: Create new Absence Balances

• Create a new Statutory Absence Balance.
  • Example 20 days (for 160 hours).
    • Set Up Expiration (to for example 6 months).
• Create a Non-statutory Absence Balance.
  • Example 5 days (or 40 hours).
  • Set up Expiration (for example to 5 years).

Step 5: Create new Absence Policy

• Edit the old absence policy and rename the old absence policy.
• Create a new absence policy utilizing the new balances for each contract type you are utilizing.
  • Add new balances to new policy.

Step 6: Create new Contract Type(s)

• Edit and rename all the old contract types you are looking to migrate.
• Create a new Contract Type utilizing previously configured Absence Policies for each Contract Type currently in use, and to be used after migration.

Step 7: Bulk Action - Change Contract Type(s)

• Through Bulk actions: Change contract change all contract types (old) as of 01.01.2025 to the new equivalent contract type created in Step 6 - do this action for every contract type that needs to be migrated.
  

  • Manually edit any employee that started after 01.01.2025 (since the Bulk Action looking at “Contract Start Date” there is no easier way to deal with employees activated post 01.01.2025. These contract types you have to manually change in the tab of the Employee under Contracts.

Step 8: Bulk Action - Correct Balances

• Through Bulk actions: Correct balances, move the values from the old balances to the new balances
  • Balance: select the old Balance
  • Date: put the date on the date before the new contracts, in our example 31.12.2024
  • Action: Select 'Transfer to' and select the new balance that you created before
  • Correction type: Change balance to

• • Click on Recalculate 
  • Select Change at the bottom of the page to move the values from the old balance to the new balance
  • Repeat this step for the 2nd balance

Step 9: Recalculate Balances

• For each employee, open the Contract tab in the employee's menu, and edit by clicking on the pencil icon the newly created contract created through the previous Bulk-Action. In the contract set all the accrual rates of the old balances to the correct factor (=0) by clicking on the Recalculate Icon. This is why we set the default accrual to zero, on the old leave balances and new balances in Step 3. Do the same with the new balances and set them to the appropriate accrual by clicking on the Recalculate Icon.  

Step 10: Check employee's balances

• Check all employees balances after this, if the old balance is still shown in 2025 and has a negative balance, this is your signal an existing vacation request in 2025 is still connected to the old balance (i.e. Statutory (Wettelijk) up to (tm) 2024) and needs to be edited and switched to the balance as of 2025.

Step 11: Change balance in Leave Requests

• Edit the leave request and change the old “Balance” to the new leave balance

Method 2: Customers with a single Absence Balance

Step 1: Backup your Data - first

• We strongly advise you, the customer to create backups of the "Absence Balance" through our Reports for the years that will be migrated before starting the migration process. You can do so by:
  • Going to Reports in Shiftbase.
    • Select Time Off and select Balance Summary.
    • Enter the correct date. Example: You are looking to setup balance expiration as of 01-01-2025 - you now want to backup your current balances on the date 31-12-2025. Download the report and save it on your device. 

Step 2: Disable Integrations

Step 3: Rename old Balance & set accrual to zero

• Edit the “Default Accrual” of the old balance and set to zero (“0”)

Step 4: Create new Absence Balances

• Create a new Statutory Absence Balance
  • Example 20 days (160 hours)
  • Set up Expiration (for example to 6 months).
• Create a new Non-statutory Absence Balance
  • Example 5 days (40hours).
  • Set up Expiration (for example 5 years).

Step 5: Create new Absence Policies

• Edit the old absence policies currently in use and rename them to old

• Create a new Absence Policies (for each you are migrating) utilizing the new balances for each Contract Type you are utilizing and doing this migration for
  • Add new balances to the new policy

Step 6: Create new Contract Type(s)

• Edit and rename the old contract types
• Create a new Contract Type(s) utilizing the previously configured Absence Policies for each Contract Type currently in use, and to be used after migration

Step 7: Bulk Action - Change Contract

• Through Bulk actions: Change contract change all contract types (old) as of 01.01.2025 to the new equivalent contract type created in Step 6 - do this action for every contract type that needs to be migrated.

  • Manually edit any employee that started after 01.01.2025 (since the Bulk Action looking at “Contract Start Date” there is no easier way to deal with employees activated post 01.01.2025. These contract types you have to manually change in the tab of the Employee under Contracts.

Step 8: Bulk Action - correct Balances

If you have remaining leave from 2024 you have to decide which amount is statutory and which amount is non-statutory. After you've determined which amount is statutory or non-statutory you can correct this into the new absence balances.

• Through Bulk Actions: Correct balance, move the values from the old balance to the two new balances, splitting the remaining amounts like you decided to do
  • Balance: select the old Balance
  • Date: put the date on the date before the new contracts, in our example 31.12.2024
  • Action: select the Option Change balance to and select the new balance that you created before
  • per Employee you can now enter the to be deducted amount that will move into the new balance in the table below per employee - Non-Statutory
  • Select Change at the bottom of the page to move the values from the old balance to the new balance
  • Do this step again if you also have a remaining balance going to the other new balance - e.g Statutory

Step 9: Recalculate Balances

• For each employee, open the Contract tab in the employee's menu, and edit by clicking on the pencil icon the newly created contract created through the previous Bulk-Action. In the contract set all the accrual rates of the old balances to the correct factor (=0) by clicking on the Recalculate Icon. This is why we set the default accrual to zero, on the old leave balances and new balances in Step 3. Do the same with the new balances and set them to the appropriate accrual by clicking on the Recalculate Icon.

Step 10: Check Employee's Balances

• Check all employees balances after this, if the old balance is still shown in 2025 and has a negative balance, this is your signal an existing vacation request in 2025 is still connected to the old balance in our example Holidays and needs to be edited and switched to the balance as of 2025.

Step 11: Change Balance in Leave Requests

• Edit the leave requests and change the old “Balance” to the new leave balance