EC Time Off - Transitioning from an "Account Creation Start Date" type to another

[antoniovp]

This technical article describes how to ensure a smooth transition from an existing Account Creation Start Date (e.g.Employee Hire Date) to a new option (e.g. based on Service Entry Date) and calculating the accrual entitlement according to the employees' Seniority within the organisation.

Why does this usually happen?

There could be several reasons, all relatable to two macro-categories:

1. Functional: e.g. The accrual methodology needs to be changed as a business requirement;


2. Technical: e.g. The Employee Hire Date is before the System Hire Date (EC Go Live), and Account Creation Start Date wrongly retrieves the System Hire Date.

 

How to transition from one option to another.

In this article, the steps will be based on some standard requirements, but you can rely on them also for similar implementations.

Requirements

1. Transitioning from "Employee Hire Date" to a Flexible date (e.g. Service Entry Date);
   
   


2. Accrual entitlement based on Seniority within the organisation (e.g. 0-5 years of Seniority → 20 days, 6-10 years of Seniority → 25 days, 10+ years of Seniority → 30 days.
   For the sake of easiness,  we will use the following values:

Implementation Steps

1. Export all employee times as a backup
   This is done in order to ensure that, if anything goes wrong during the implementation, you can keep a backup file which can be fully purged in order to restore the initial situation - this concept is always a best practice and can be extended to any other implementation.
   You can perform this action in Import and Export Data → Employee Time.
   
   


2. Identify the specific Time Type involved
   Make sure that there is full alignment on which Time Type(s) will be involved in the implementation.
   This is very important since the client could be using several time types.


3. Create an import file in order to Cancel all the relevant employee times
   The system doesn't allow to edit Time Account Type options if there are still active records in the system.
   Therefore, any record under the specific Time Type identified in step 2 needs to be erased from the system. This can be done using mass imports through the "Import and Export data" tool.
   Before the actual deletion, the records need to be set in Cancelled status.
   You will use a copy of the export pulled in Step 1, filter on the Time Type considered, remove the other records, set the status of the remaining records to CANCELLED.
   
   


4. Create an import file with Delete operator for the Employee Times identified in the previous step.
   
   You will make a copy of the file created in the previous step and add the operator DELETE in the relevant column.
   
   


5. Validate and import the file created in step 3.
   
   Navigate to "Import and Export data" → Import Data → Employee Time.
   Note: remember always to validate your file and check the results in "Monitor Job" before performing the actual import.
   After this step, all the relevant employee times will be set as Cancelled.


6. Validate and import the file created in step 4.
   
   Navigate to "Import and Export data" → Import Data → Employee Time.
   Note: remember always to validate your file and check the results in "Monitor Job" before performing the actual import.
   After this step, all the relevant employee times will be removed from the time accounts.


7. Check that employee times have been correctly deleted.
   
   In this step, you will Export all employee times again and check that the employee times with the time type chosen are not showing.
   This is performed as per step 1 ("Import and Export data" → Export Data → Employee Time).
   Filtering on the time type considered, no records should show.


8. Export all Time accounts as a backup.
   
   This is done in order to ensure that if anything goes wrong you keep a backup file to full purge to restore the initial situation - as already mentioned, this always the best practice.
   You can perform this action in Import and Export Data → Time Account.
   
   


9. Identify the specific Time Account Type involved
   
   The Time Account Type to be considered is tied to the Time Type determined in step 2.
   You can check this navigating to "Manage Time Off Structures" → "Time Type" → [Time type involved]. At the bottom, you will find the Time Account Type.
   
   


10. Create an import file with Delete operator for the Time Accounts identified in the previous step.
    
    It is necessary to delete the time accounts, otherwise, the system will not let any changes on the Time Account Type level.
    The file can be built starting from the backup file created in step 8, filtering on the relevant Time Account Type and specifying the Delete operator in column A.
    
    


11. Validate and import the file created in step 10.
    
    Navigate to "Import and Export data" → Import Data → Time account.
    Note: remember always to validate your file and check the results in "Monitor Job" before performing the actual import.
    Also, make sure that the external codes (Column I in this case) are not modified since the system will use these as keys to determine the specific time accounts.


12. Check that Time Accounts have been correctly deleted.
    
    In this step, you will Export all Time Accounts again and check that the Time Accounts with the time account type chosen are not showing.
    This is performed as per step 8 ("Import and Export data" → Export Data → Time Accounts).
    Filtering on the time account type considered, no records should show.


13. Amend the Time Account Type
    
    In this step, you will change the Account Creation Start Date to be flexible and based on the Service Entry Date.
    
    
    
    Note: the flexible account start date rule must be created in advance:
    
    


14. Create the seniority tables with values required
    
    In this step, you will create the seniority tables used to determine the accrual for each employee, based on their "Seniority" within the organisation.
    The tables are created in Manage Data → Seniority Table for Accruals.
    In the example below, the employee is entitled to 1.67 days if his/her seniority within the organisation is between 11 and 15 years.
    
    
    
    Note that you should always avoid overlapping time frames - e.g. the following seniority table should not start from 15 years, but 16:
    
    


15. Edit business rule for the accrual
    
    In this step, you will edit the business rule in order to take into account the seniority table during the accrual calculation:
    
    
    
    Note: IF conditions, rounding criteria and other options will depend on the client's specific requirements.
    The image above shows just the piece of business rule where the time account is created.


16. Time Off Calendars - Simulate Account creation calendars
    
    This is done in the tool "Manage Time Off Calendars".
    Make sure you save and simulate before running the actual calendar. You will need to check that the accounts have been created accordingly with the Service entry dates.
    The job report is available in the tool "Execution Manager Dashboard".


17. Time Off Calendars - Run Account creation calendars
    
    After having validated the outcome through the simulation in step 16, you can now run the actual calendars and check the outcome both directly in the employees' time off portlet or downloading the report in the tool "Execution Manager Dashboard".


18. Time Off Calendars - Simulate Accrual calendars
    
    This is done in the tool "Manage Time Off Calendars".
    Make sure you save and simulate before running the actual calendar. You will need to check that the accruals have been generated according to the seniority tables.
    The job report is available in the tool "Execution Manager Dashboard".


19. Time Off Calendars - Run Accrual calendars
    
    After having validated the outcome through the simulation in step 18, you can now run the actual calendars and check the outcome both directly in the employees' time off portlet or downloading the report in the tool "Execution Manager Dashboard".


20. Import back the Employee Times
    
    Now that time accounts have been created and accruals have been generated, it is time to import back the pre-booked employee times.
    You can create the import file starting from the backup file created in step 1 and filtering on the relevant Time Type.
    Note: make sure you do not fill the column related to the external code; external codes are always automatically generated by the system and should never be manually assigned.