Managing employee availability can be challenging during critical periods, especially when multiple unavailability requests leave you short-staffed. Peak seasons, holidays, and special events require full coverage, but when too many employees mark themselves as unavailable, finding staff to fill shifts becomes difficult.
With Connecteam's capability to Block Unavailability, managers can mark specific days where employees cannot request to be unavailable. By preventing unavailability submissions on critical dates, you can better control your scheduling and avoid understaffing situations.
💡 Tip: If you’re new to Connecteam, we recommend reading this article to better understand Unavailability in the Job Scheduler.
In this article we will go over:
How To Block Unavailability Requests in Your Job Scheduler Step By Step
Navigate to the Job Scheduler and select the days you want to block employees from marking unavailability
Click the three dots icon next to the specific date
. Select Block Unavailability. In the pop-up window, you can: set specific hours to block or toggle on All Day - to block the entire day. You can add a note explaining the reason (for example, 'New Year's'), then click Confirm to save your settings.
Once blocked, your employees won't be able to mark unavailability for that time.
** Blocking Unavailability is only available on the Advanced Plan and above**
How Does Blocking Unavailability Look for Users
Users won't be able to mark their unavailability on blocked days. A block icon will appear near the date, and hovering over it shows whether the entire day or specific hours are blocked, along with your note.
When Users Try to Mark Unavailability On the Mobile App
When an employee tries to mark their unavailability through the mobile app on a blocked day, they'll see a message explaining that the admin has restricted the ability to mark unavailability on that date. The message will also include any note the admin added.
How to Unblock Unavailability for a Date
To unblock a date that was previously blocked for unavailability:
Click the block icon next to the blocked date
Select the edit icon
Click Unblock at the bottom of the window
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