Leave
Staff ask for leave in the Agoo Workspace app and the right people approve it, from Ghana's legal minimums, with working days counted by the Labour Act, deputies while approvers are away and the leave year end done for you.
Agoo is in early access. This page describes the feature as it ships to early-access organisations; screens are illustrative.
Leave in Agoo is part of attendance. Staff ask for leave on their phone, their line manager (or whoever your organisation chooses) approves it on theirs, and someone on approved leave shows as On leave on Today and the timesheet, not absent. Every balance shows how it was worked out. Leave is on every plan, in the Agoo Workspace app and in Console → Attendance → Leave.
| What | What it does | Status |
|---|---|---|
| Leave types | Ghana's eight types to start with, each one yours to change, and as many of your own as you need | Now, on every plan |
| Balances and the ledger | A balance for each person and type, with every day granted, taken, given back or adjusted | Now, on every plan |
| Requesting leave in the Workspace app | Staff see their balances, ask for leave with the days it counts and what's left, add a certificate, and cancel | Now, on iPhone, iPad and Android |
| Recording leave | HR records leave for someone, approved at once, and Agoo emails them | Now, on every plan |
| Who approves leave | The line manager, the line manager then HR, HR only, or no approval; sick leave and other types can simply be recorded | Now, on every plan |
| Custom approval chains | Up to five steps: the line manager, their manager, HR or a named person | Now, on Enterprise |
| Deputies and moving on | A deputy while an approver is away, approvals that follow a manager on leave, and requests that move up when nobody decides | Now, on every plan |
| Approvals in the Workspace app | The Team tab: who is in today, approvals with a swipe, the team calendar and deputies | Now, on iPhone, iPad and Android |
| Private kinds of leave | Sick and maternity leave show as Away to managers; only HR and the person see the kind | Now, on every plan |
| Leave notifications | Waiting, approved, declined and cancelled, by push and email, and a daily summary for approvers | Now, on every plan |
| Sickness during leave, recalls and ending early | As the Labour Act says (s.24 to s.26) | Now, on every plan |
| Certificates | Medical and maternity certificates, kept privately for the person and HR | Now, on every plan |
| The year end | Carry-over, expiry and the new year's allowances, done for you | Now, on every plan |
| Calendar and export | Who is away each month by site or team; balances and leave to CSV, Excel or PDF | Now, on every plan |
| Leave webhooks and API | Leave events by webhook (Growth and above) and leave in the API (Pro and above) | Now, in the developer preview |
Ghana's leave types
Every organisation starts with these types. Change any of them, or add your own, in Attendance → Leave → Types.
| Type | Starts as |
|---|---|
| Annual leave | 15 working days a leave year, paid: the Labour Act's minimum (s.20). You can give up to 60. Given at the start of the year, and in proportion for someone who joins. |
| Maternity leave | 84 calendar days (12 weeks), paid, with a certificate (s.57(1)), and 14 more days after an abnormal birth or for more than one baby (s.57(3)). Can't be declined. |
| Paternity leave | 5 working days each time. This is your policy: Ghana's law doesn't set paternity leave yet, and 5 days is what the Labour Bill proposes. |
| Compassionate leave | 5 working days each time, as the Labour Bill proposes. Also your policy, not yet law. |
| Sick leave | No fixed allowance, because the Labour Act sets none. Recorded rather than approved, and can't be declined. A certificate after 3 working days in a row. |
| Study leave | No allowance; needs approval. |
| Unpaid leave | No allowance; needs approval. |
| Other leave | No allowance; needs approval. |
Agoo keeps these defaults in line with the law. If a legal minimum changes, a type still at the old value follows it, and nobody is ever left below a minimum the law sets.
What you can set for each type
- Name, colour and pay code, and whether it's paid. The pay code, such as
LV-ANNUALorLV-SICK, is what payroll files put this leave under, at 1.0 if it's paid and 0 if it isn't. A file can't be made while leave in it has no code. - Working days or calendar days. Most leave counts working days. Maternity leave counts every day, as the Act does.
- The allowance: so many days a year, so many each time (such as paternity leave), or none (such as sick leave).
- How the year's days arrive: all at the start of the leave year, or a share each month. Choose whether someone who joins mid-year gets a share in proportion.
- Carry-over: all unused days, up to a number, or none, and whether carried days expire some months into the new year.
- Going below zero, up to a number of days, and half days.
- Certificates: never, always, or after a number of days.
- Who it's for: a minimum length of service, and the kinds of employment it applies to.
- Approval: whether it goes through who approves leave or is simply recorded (approved as soon as it's asked for), and whether it can be declined.
- Private: for kinds such as sick or maternity leave. Managers see the leave as Away, never its kind or balance; only HR and the person see what it is. See Private kinds of leave.
A type you no longer use can be archived, and restored later. Leave already taken keeps its type.
Unused annual leave
By default Agoo carries all unused annual leave into the next year. You can cap it or let carried days expire, but whether annual leave can be forfeited is legally uncertain in Ghana, and an agreement to give up annual leave is void (Labour Act s.31). Agoo says so before you save.
How days are counted
- Working days only. Leave counted in working days skips the public holidays you observe, your closed days, and the days the person doesn't work: their roster, or your working week (Labour Act s.22). A week of annual leave over a public holiday uses four days.
- Calendar days count every day, for types set that way.
- A holiday announced later inside approved leave gives the day back by itself, within the hour.
- A weekend inside annual leave stays a rest day on the timesheet.
The leave year
Your leave year is the calendar year by default, as the Act counts it (s.20). You can start it in another month in your attendance rules, such as September for a school.
When a new leave year begins, Agoo does the year end by itself, within the hour after midnight:
- Carries each person's unused days over by each type's rule.
- Records what isn't carried as expired.
- Gives everyone the new year's allowances.
- Later in the year, expires carried days that weren't used in time, if your type says they expire.
A year end is never done twice. Attendance → Leave → Year end shows what would happen if the year ended today, and every year end so far.
Someone who joins during the year gets a share of the year's allowance for the months left, rounded up to a half day. Someone who leaves gets leave in proportion to their time that year (s.30), worked out from the Left on date in People. On Pro and Enterprise, the annual leave they have left is paid out in the payroll file for the period they leave in, in days under LV-PAYOUT; a balance below zero isn't deducted. Annual leave is never paid out while someone is still employed (s.31).
Balances and the ledger
Every change to a balance is a line: a grant, a month's accrual, days taken, days given back, a carry-over, an expiry or an adjustment. Each line says who made it and why, and lines are never changed. A balance is the sum of the leave year's lines, so it always adds up.
Attendance → Leave → Balances shows each person by type: entitled, carried over, taken, adjusted, expired, the balance, days booked ahead and days waiting for approval. Open a person to see their own Leave panel, with every line, their requests and Record leave and Adjust.
To correct a balance, choose Adjust, add or take away days, and give a reason. The reason stays with the line.
Ask for leave in the Workspace app
Staff ask for leave on Me → Leave in Agoo Workspace, on an iPhone, iPad or Android phone or tablet. Leave shows a card for each kind of leave with what's left this leave year, what's booked and what's waiting for approval, and every request with where it stands.
Tap Ask for leave
Choose the kind of leave, the first and last day, and a morning or afternoon if it's a half day and the type allows it.
Check what it counts
Before anything is sent, the app shows the days it counts (working days skip public holidays, your closed days and days the person doesn't work), the balance before and after, any public holidays inside it, the person's own shifts on those days, and who will approve it. If something's wrong, such as more days than they have left, it says so in a sentence and doesn't send it.
Add a note or a certificate, and send
A note is optional (up to 500 characters). A certificate can come from the phone's camera or its files, as a PDF or a photo up to 10 MB, now or later. For maternity leave after an abnormal birth or for more than one baby, the app adds the 14 extra days (s.57(3)). Going over a per-occasion allowance, such as paternity leave, needs a short reason.
The request goes to whoever approves it, who is told at once. A kind of leave that's simply recorded, such as sick leave, or any leave when your organisation has no approval step, is approved as soon as it's sent. The person hears when their leave is approved or declined, with the reason for a decline.
Cancel a request that's still waiting, or approved leave that hasn't started: the days go back to the balance and the approvers are told. Leave that has started can't be cancelled in the app; HR ends it early.
Asking for leave and cancelling need a connection, because balances and who approves are checked when it's sent. With no signal, the app says so, and still shows the balances and requests it last had ("Updated 10:42").
Record leave for someone
Open Attendance → Leave
Choose Record leave, or open the person and choose Record leave on their Leave panel.
Choose the type and the days
Pick the type, the first and last day, and a half day if your type allows it. Agoo shows how many days it counts and what's left.
Save
It's approved at once, and by default the person is emailed: what kind of leave, when, how many days, whether it's paid, what's left, and whether HR needs a certificate.
Agoo refuses leave that would take someone below their balance (beyond what the type allows; adjust the balance first if that's right), that overlaps leave they already have, or that goes over a per-occasion allowance without a reason. Only the Owner may record their own leave, and nobody decides their own request.
Who approves leave
Each organisation chooses who approves leave, in Console → Attendance → Settings → Who approves leave. Only Owners, Admins and HR can change it.
| Choice | Who decides |
|---|---|
| Line manager (default) | The person's line manager |
| Line manager, then HR | The line manager first; once they approve, HR |
| HR only | HR |
| No approval | Nobody: leave is approved as soon as it's asked for, and the record says so |
| Custom chain (Enterprise) | Up to five steps, each the line manager, their manager's manager, HR or a named person |
Whatever you choose:
- Types that are simply recorded, such as sick leave by default, are approved at once. Set it per type in Attendance → Leave → Types.
- Someone with no manager goes straight to HR.
- Nobody decides their own request, and an HR step never goes back to someone who decided an earlier step of the same request.
- HR can decide any step. When HR approves, any HR steps after it are done too. Whoever manages attendance at the person's sites can decide a line manager's step, as before.
Each request shows its steps: who decided each one, when and with what note, and who it's waiting with now. The person sees them in the app.
When you choose, you also set If nobody decides and A daily summary to approvers (below). The setup wizard and Home's Set up staff time card ask who approves leave until someone confirms it. See Attendance rules and setup.
Approve or decline a request
Approvers get a notification (push to the Workspace app, or an email without it) as soon as a request needs them. They decide in either place:
- In the Workspace app, on Team → Approvals: swipe a request right to approve it or left to decline it, or open it to see the days, the balance before and after, who else in the team is away then and their shifts. Decline asks for a reason.
- In the Console, on Attendance → Leave → Approvals: Waiting for you lists what you can decide now, with each request's steps, and Decided by you what you decided. HR and attendance managers also have All waiting, everything waiting at their sites. Home shows how many are waiting for you, and so does the bell.
Declining needs a reason (3 to 300 characters), which the person sees. Maternity and sick leave can't be declined. If someone else decides a request while you're looking at it, Agoo says so and refreshes it.
Requests also lists who is on leave now, upcoming leave and past leave.
When an approver is away
Requests never sit with someone who can't answer:
- Someone to cover. An approver names a deputy for some dates (a year at most): in the app, Team → Cover → Name someone; in the Console, Name a deputy under Cover while you're away on Attendance → Leave → Approvals. While the dates run, the deputy can decide anything waiting for that approver and is told about it; Agoo tells the deputy when they're named. End the cover early at any time. HR can name a deputy for anyone.
- On leave or gone. When an approver is on approved leave today, or has left, their requests go to their own manager, then to HR, and come back when they return. Nobody has to set this up.
- Moving on. A request nobody decides moves up one level (to the approver's manager, then HR) after the time you choose in If nobody decides: after 24 hours, 48 hours, 72 hours (the default) or a week, or Off, when it waits.
- The daily summary. Once a day, from 08:00 on your working days, approvers with requests waiting get one email listing them. It's on by default: turn off A daily summary to approvers in Who approves leave for everyone, or each approver turns off Daily summary of requests waiting in Account → Notifications.
Every request says why it's someone's to decide: their own, as a deputy for a named approver, moved on to them, or as HR.
Private kinds of leave
Some leave says something about someone's health. For types marked private (sick and maternity leave by default), a line manager sees only Away, everywhere: on Today, the timesheet and its export, the roster, the team calendar, approvals and notifications. Only HR and the person see what kind of leave it is, and its balance. Managers can still approve private leave that needs approval; they see the dates and the days, not the kind.
Integrations never see the kind either: the API and webhooks show private leave as away, with no reason, and never a certificate.
When plans change
- Cancel leave that hasn't started. The days go back to the balance. The person can cancel their own in the app too, and the approvers are told.
- End early when someone comes back before their leave ends:
- Recalled: you called them back in an urgent necessity. They keep the rest of their leave to take later (s.25), and you reimburse reasonable expenses the recall caused (s.26).
- Back early: they chose to return. The days they didn't take go back to the balance.
- Sick during leave: when someone has certified sickness during their annual leave, record it on the leave. Those days become sick leave and go back to their annual balance (s.24). The timesheet shows them as sick leave.
- In an approved timesheet: once someone's timesheet for a period is approved, leave on its days can't be approved, recorded, cancelled, ended or changed until it's reopened, so payroll's numbers don't move. Leave waiting for approval inside a period holds up that period's timesheet, so decide it first.
Certificates
Add a PDF or a photo of a certificate to any leave, such as a medical certificate or the certificate maternity leave needs (s.57(1)). HR adds one in the Console; the person adds their own in the Workspace app, from the phone's camera or its files, when they ask for leave or later. A type can ask for one always or after so many days: the app says so when it's needed, and when HR records leave that needs one, the person's email says so.
A certificate is about someone's health, so Agoo keeps it privately:
- Only the person and HR can open it. Their manager, other staff, integrations and the API never can.
- Each one added, opened or removed is recorded in the audit trail.
- It's deleted 24 months after the leave ends unless you choose between 30 days and 2 years in retention. A legal hold on the person keeps it.
- HR can delete one sooner, for example when the person asks.
The calendar and exports
Attendance → Leave → Calendar shows a month by site, with public holidays and closed days shaded, so you can see who is away before you approve more leave. A manager's Team → Calendar in the Workspace app shows the same for their own people, with approved and waiting leave.
Export balances and leave to CSV, Excel or PDF from Attendance → Leave. The timesheet export says which type of leave each day was (Away for a private kind, except to HR).
Who hears what
| Who | Hears | How |
|---|---|---|
| Whoever a request is waiting with | A request waiting for them, including one that moved on to them or that they cover as a deputy | Push to the app, or email without it |
| Approvers | A daily summary of what's waiting, if your organisation keeps it on | |
| Approvers | The person cancelled leave they'd asked for or had approved | Push, or email |
| The person | Their leave was approved or declined, with the reason; HR recorded leave for them | Push, or email |
| A deputy | Someone named them to approve while they're away | Push, or email |
| Owners and HR | The leave year end's summary | |
| Owners and HR | Agoo applied a new legal minimum to a leave type still at the old one, such as more weeks of maternity leave in law |
On a locked phone, a leave notification never names the kind of leave, and if your organisation leaves names out, it doesn't name the person either. Each person chooses how their alerts reach them in Account → Notifications.
Who does what
| Who | Can |
|---|---|
| HR, Owners and Admins | Manage types and who approves leave, record, cancel and end leave, record sickness during leave, adjust balances, add and remove certificates, decide any step, name deputies for anyone, see the year end |
| The person's line manager | See their team's leave (private kinds as Away) and decide their requests, in the app's Team tab or the Console (Team leave if their role doesn't read attendance) |
| Their manager's manager | Decide requests that moved on to them, or while the manager is away |
| A deputy | Decide what's waiting for the approver they cover, while the dates run |
| Whoever manages attendance at a site | Decide a line manager's step for people at that site |
| The person | See their balances and requests, ask for leave, add a certificate and cancel, in the Workspace app |
HR here means the built-in HR role. Changing types, who approves leave and the leave year needs a role that covers every site.
Setting it up
When you set up staff time, the setup wizard asks when your leave year starts, how many days of annual leave you give, what happens to unused annual leave (carry it all over, carry up to a number of days, or none) and who approves leave. Home's Set up staff time checklist keeps Leave types, allowances and carry-over and Who approves leave until you confirm each. See Attendance rules and setup.
Absence
If someone doesn't clock in for a shift and has no approved leave, Agoo marks them absent once the shift has ended; until then they're Not in yet. A manager can authorise the absence, paid or unpaid, and the board and timesheet update.
Privacy and retention
Leave records are kept for 7 years by default, as the Labour Act asks employers to keep a record of the leave each worker is due and takes (s.27). Choose between 1 and 10 years in retention. Each request's approval record (who decided each step, when and with what note) is kept with it. Leave types, balances, the ledger, year ends, approvals, deputies and who approves leave are in your organisation's full export. Asking, deciding, moving on, changing who approves and naming or ending a deputy are each recorded in the audit trail.
For developers
Leave is in the API on Pro and above: leave types, requests (list, get, record, decide, cancel) and each person's balances, with the scopes attendance:read and attendance:manage. The webhooks leave.requested, leave.approved, leave.declined and leave.cancelled are on Growth and above. See the developer changelog and webhook events.
Shifts and overtime
How shifts flag lateness, and how Agoo counts overtime, rest-day and public-holiday work by the Labour Act, with extra time approved in the Console or the app before it counts.
Timesheets and payroll
Approve each person's hours at the end of every period, lock them for payroll, reopen with a reason when something was wrong, and export them for payroll by your own pay codes.