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Rotas & live floor

Shift swaps & cover

Approve or decline the open-shift claims, cover requests and swaps your team raises, with you keeping the final say, so cover stops living in a group chat.

Open in WagePilot Available where the Requests module is enabled

Requests is where shift changes happen without the WhatsApp scramble. A staff member who can’t work a shift offers it up; an eligible colleague claims or covers it; you approve. Everyone sees the result on their rota, and you keep the final say. This page is your inbox for those decisions.

Staff member gives away the shift, a colleague claims it, manager approves: the rota updates and both are notified.

The three kinds of request

Open shift claim
Someone wants to pick up a shift that was broadcast or left open. There’s no colleague step, so it comes straight to you.
Cover request
Someone can’t work a shift and a colleague has agreed to cover it for them.
Shift swap
Two people trade shifts. The card shows both sides: who takes what, and what’s handed back.

Finding a request

Needs you
Waiting on your decision: open-shift claims, and covers or swaps a colleague has already accepted. These have Approve and Decline buttons.
Awaiting teammate
Raised but not yet accepted by a colleague. Nothing for you to do until it is.
Decided
Requests you have already approved or declined, with their outcome.
All
Everything, in one list.

Narrow any list with the type filter or search by name. When two or more open-shift claims are waiting, Approve n claims settles them in one go: each shift goes to the first person who claimed it, and anyone else who claimed the same shift stays in the list for you to decline. Swaps and covers are always reviewed one by one.

Each card shows the shift (day, time, role and site), who’s involved with an avatar, and how long ago it was raised. A swap also shows the shift being taken back.

Approving and declining

  1. 01

    Approve

    Tap Approve and the rota updates immediately. The shift moves to its new owner and everyone involved is notified. If approving would cause a clash, the button is blocked until you resolve it or decline.

  2. 02

    Decline

    Tap Decline to open a short form. Add an optional reason (it’s shared with the people involved) and confirm.

How you stay in control

  • Changes only become real when you approve them. Nothing reshuffles your rota behind your back.
  • Eligibility (role, site, availability) is respected upstream, so a request you’d never accept rarely reaches you.
  • Every approved change updates the rota and notifies the affected staff automatically.

Common questions

Why do some requests skip the “awaiting a teammate” step?
Open-shift claims have no colleague to wait on (one person is asking to take a shift that’s already free), so they come straight to your “Needs you” list. Cover requests and swaps wait in “Awaiting teammate” until a colleague accepts, then move to you.
Does the person I decline find out why?
If you add a reason when declining, it’s shared with the people involved. The reason is optional, but a one-line note (“need the cover at the other site that day”) usually saves a follow-up message.