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Beebole’s time-off management lets you define absence types, assign individual allowances, and track balances in real time. Your team records time off directly on their timesheets — each entry counts against the balance as soon as it’s recorded — and the approval workflow lets managers review every absence.
Time off in Beebole is tracked through absence types — categories like vacation, sick leave, or parental leave that you define to match your organization’s policies.

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Understanding absence types

An absence type represents a category of leave your organization recognizes. Common examples include vacation, sick leave, parental leave, and personal days — but you can create as many types as you need. Each absence type can be configured with:
  • A name — The label your team sees when logging time off (e.g., “Vacation”, “Sick Leave”).
  • A unit — Whether absences are tracked in Hour or Day units.
  • An allowance — The amount of time off each person receives per period.
  • An accrual policy — Rules describing how time off accumulates over the allowance period. See Accruals.

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Creating absence types

1

Open the Time Off settings

Go to Settings > Time Off.
2

Add a new absence type

Click Add Time Off Type, enter a Name for the absence type (e.g., “Vacation”, “Sick Leave”), and click Add Time Off Type.
3

Choose the unit

In the Units panel, select whether this absence type is tracked in Hour or Day units. The change is saved automatically, and the new absence type is available for allowances and timesheet entry.
Create separate absence types for each leave category your company offers. This gives you granular reporting and lets you set different allowance rules per type.

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Archiving absence types

When a leave category is no longer offered, archive its absence type instead of deleting it — past time-off records stay intact while the type disappears from day-to-day use.
  1. Go to Settings > Time Off and open the absence type.
  2. Click the ⋯ action menu next to its name, then Archive.
To restore an archived type, click Show Archived in the list, open the archived type, and click the ⋯ action menu, then Unarchive. The same menu also offers Duplicate, Rename, and Delete.

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Setting up allowances

An allowance (Beebole’s term for a time-off quota) defines how much time off a person receives for a given absence type within a specific period. You can set allowances on the organization for everyone, on a tag for a group, or on an individual person.
1

Open the Absence allowances panel

For an organization-wide default, go to Settings > Account Settings. For a group, click Tags in the sidebar and open the tag. For one person, click People in the sidebar and open their profile. Each shows an Absence allowances panel.
2

Add the allowance

Click + Add new allowance and select the absence type.
3

Define the period

Set the start and end dates of the allowance period (e.g., January 1 to December 31 for an annual allowance).
4

Set the amount

Enter the amount the allowance grants. Each field states the unit it is counted in — days or hours, following the absence type’s own unit — so an hour-based allowance can’t be mistaken for a day-based one. Every change is saved automatically — there is no save button.
To give specific people a different allowance, add one on their profile under People — person-level allowances override tag-level ones, which override the organization default. See People.

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Carrying unused time off forward

Unused allowance can carry into the next period. Two fields on the allowance control it:
  • Valid until — How long the carried balance remains usable after the period ends.
  • Carry forward limit — The maximum amount that carries over. Leave it at 0 for no cap.
The carried balance counts everywhere the allowance does: booking limits respect it, and the Absence quotas report shows it per person, including the Valid until and Carry forward limit columns.

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Tracking balances

Beebole tracks time-off balances based on allowances, accruals, and recorded absences. Available, Consumed, and Accrued sit at the top of each card in the Absence allowances panel, right after the absence type, and every figure carries its unit — days or hours — in the input and in the card’s summary line: The Carry forward limit states its unit the same way. Balances update as team members log time off on their timesheets and when you adjust the Accrued field on the allowance.

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Negative balance controls

By default, Beebole prevents people from booking more time off than their available balance. You can change this behavior per allowance. To let a balance go below zero — useful for organizations that handle overdrawn leave manually or at year-end — open the allowance in the Absence allowances panel and check Allow negative balance. The change is saved automatically. When the box is unchecked, Beebole blocks time-off entries that would push the balance below zero.
If you allow negative balances, monitor them regularly. Beebole can send notifications when a person’s balance goes negative — see the notifications section below.

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Time off and people costs

Time off counts toward people cost totals. A leave day is valued with the person’s cost rate for that day — Beebole multiplies the absence duration by the rate exactly as it would for a regular time entry — so leave appears in budgets and profitability reports alongside billable work, even though no project time was tracked.
There is no per-type switch for this today: every time off type is treated the same way in cost calculations. Time off never affects billing amounts — only costs.

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Absence approval

Time-off entries follow the same approval workflow as regular time entries. When a person records an absence on their timesheet and submits it, the assigned manager reviews and approves or rejects it. Approval does not gate the balance: every recorded time-off entry counts against the allowance immediately, even before it is reviewed. Approving locks the timesheet; if an absence is rejected, the person can edit or remove the entry, which restores the balance.
The approval workflow for absences is part of Beebole’s general timesheet approval process. See Approvals for details on configuring approval stages and managers.

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Absence notifications

Beebole can send automatic notifications related to time off to keep managers and administrators informed. They are configured per absence type, in the Time off notifications panel:
  • Going negative — Triggered when a person’s balance drops below zero.
  • Requesting in advance against accruals — Triggered when someone requests time off they have not yet accrued.
  • A frequency alert — Triggered when a person takes this absence type more than a set number of occurrences in a Month or Year.
To configure them, go to Settings > Time Off, click the absence type, and check the alerts you want in the Time off notifications panel. Changes are saved automatically. See Notifications for the full setup.

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Recording time off on the timesheet

Team members record absences directly on their timesheets, just like regular time entries.
1

Open the timesheet

Click Timesheet in the sidebar and select the relevant week.
2

Add an absence row

Click Add a row. Select the absence type (e.g., “Vacation”) instead of a project.
3

Enter the time off

Enter the number of hours or days for each day of the week.
4

Submit the timesheet

Click Submit to send the timesheet for approval. The time off counts against the balance as soon as it is recorded.
If your organization tracks absences in days, a full day off equals the number of hours defined in the person’s work schedule.

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Related content

Accruals

Configure how time-off allowances accrue on a recurring schedule.

Public Holidays

Define non-working days so they don’t consume time-off allowances.

Work Schedule

Set working hours so day-based absences calculate correctly.

Approvals

Understand how absence entries flow through the approval workflow.
1

Open the timesheet

Navigate to Timesheets and select the relevant week.
2

Add an absence row

Click the [+] button to add a new row. Select the absence type (e.g., “Vacation”) instead of a project.
3

Enter the time off

Enter the number of hours or days for each day of the week.
4

Submit the timesheet

Click Submit to send the timesheet for approval. The time off counts against the balance once approved.

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Frequently asked questions

Yes. Add an allowance in the Absence allowances panel of a person’s profile under People. Person-level allowances take priority over tag-level ones and the organization default.
It depends on the allowance. If Allow negative balance is checked, the person can continue booking time off and their balance shows a negative number. If not, Beebole blocks the entry.
Time-off entries follow the same approval workflow as regular timesheet entries. Absences count against a person’s allowance as soon as they are recorded — approval reviews and locks the timesheet but does not change the balance. See Approvals.
Each absence type uses a single unit — Hour or Day. If you need both, create separate absence types (e.g., “Vacation (days)” and “Medical appointments (hours)”).
Accrual policies describe how leave accumulates over time rather than being granted all at once. Accrued time is reflected on the allowance through its editable Accrued field, a manual adjustment to the accrued balance. See Accruals.