Time Entry Rules

Time entry rules can be used to control how many hours an employee can enter on a timesheet, as well whether time entries are rounded or not. If any rule is violated an error will appear on the timesheet, and the timesheet cannot be submitted for approval until the rule violation is corrected.

You can control how many hours the employee may take per day or week with the following rules:

Rule	Description
Minimum hours per work day	The minimum number of hours that should be entered each work day. This rule is checked when the timesheet is submitted, and counts both work and leave hours in the day total. For example, if you enter 8.00 hours for this value then the employee must record 8 hours of work, sick, vacation, etc. for each day of the work week, or they will not be able to submit their timesheet. What is considered a work day is determined by the employee's Scheduled Work Days property on their employee properties page. See the Managing Employees topic for more information.
Maximum hours per day	The maximum number of hours that can be entered per day.
Minimum hours per week	The minimum number of hours that can be entered per week. This rule is checked when the timesheet is submitted, and counts both work and leave hours in the week total.
Maximum hours per week	The maximum number of hours that can be entered per week.
Minimum hours per period	The minimum number of hours that can be entered per period. This rule is only useful for timesheet periods that are longer than one week. This rule is checked when the timesheet is submitted, and counts both work and leave hours in the period total.
Maximum hours per period	The maximum number of hours that can be entered per period. This rule is only useful for timesheet periods that are longer than one week.

You can restrict how many hours of leave an employees may take per day by setting the following rules:

Rule	Description
Flex Time minimum hours per day	If an employee puts Flex Time hours on their timesheet, this is the smallest amount that can be taken in one day.
Flex Time maximum hours per day	The maximum Flex Time hours that can be taken in one day.
Holiday minimum hours per day	If an employee puts Holiday hours on their timesheet, this is the smallest amount that can be taken in one day.
Holiday maximum hours per day	The maximum Holiday hours that can be taken in one day.
Sick minimum hours per day	If an employee puts Sick hours on their timesheet, this is the smallest amount that can be taken in one day.
Sick maximum hours per day	The maximum Sick hours that can be taken in one day.
Vacation minimum hours per day	If an employee puts Vacation hours on their timesheet, this is the smallest amount that can be taken in one day.
Vacation maximum hours per day	The maximum Vacation hours that can be taken in one day.

Note that the above list will vary depending upon your configured leave pay codes. Also note that if you set the minimum and maximum to be the same for a given pay code, this implies the employee cannot take a partial day of leave. When generating a leave request for the given pay code the employee will not see the "Partial Day" option.

Rounding rules allow you to control rounding of punches:

Rule	Description
Round time entries to	The number of minutes to round time entries to, for example 15.
Rounding Mode	How rounding is done, either Nearest, Round Up or Round Down.

You can automatically deduct meal time from punches using the following rules:

Rule	Description
Automatic meal deduction	Check this option to automatically deduct the specified minutes from time entries. You might specify, for instance, that 30 minutes are deducted from time entries that are 8 or more hours. This is done by splitting the time entry into two parts, and taking the deduction from the middle of the time entry. In this way the employee's start and finish times, if entered, are always preserved.
Apply to entries at least	If automatic meal deduction is enabled then you need to specify the smallest punch that gets a meal deduction. For instance, you may only want a meal deduction for time entries that are 8 hours or larger.

Note that the punch having the meal deducted will be split into two punches, with a meal break in the middle. In this way the punch in and out times are preserved. The meal will fall in the middle of the punch, starting at the nearest whole hour.

For some payroll applications you may need to break or split time entries at midnight:

Rule	Description
Automatic midnight split	Check this option if you want punches that span midnight to be split into two punches - one ending on midnight and one starting at midnight. This will prevent hours that are worked after midnight from being booked to the timesheet period in which the punch was started.

The default timesheet rule controls which timesheet period the employee is presented with when they log into Pacific Timesheet:

Rule	Description
Default Timesheet	Check this option if you want to change the default timesheet period that loads when an employee logs in. Normally the current timesheet is presented, but you can alternatively have the previous timesheet, if not submitted, be presented. The mandatory option is for cases where you want the employee to fill out and submit their previous timesheet before moving to a new one.

Miscellaneous rules:

Rule

Description

Don't allow submitting time for inactive Projects, Tasks etc.

Check this option to enable an additional check when the timesheet is submitted that prevents employees from submitting time for inactive items such as projects or tasks. Pacific Timesheetalready prevents users from choosing inactive items when adding new rows to their timesheet, and will not carry forward inactive rows if using the "timesheet memory" or "copy previous timesheet" features. However, this rule does a final check of the timesheet when submitted to catch any items that might have been inactivated after any rows were added.

Note that this rule will only process when the timesheet is submitted. In addition, it will only run for the previous and current timesheet periods to avoid difficulty if a manager edits an older timesheet.