What is Leave Management Software & What is its Benefits to Enterprises?

Employees cannot be expected to work 365 days a year. Apart from the weekly leaves and holidays employees will find some reason to ask for a leave to attend to personal matters, due to ill-health or for any other reason. Enterprises may or may not grant leave depending on their policies. Manual process involves the superior officer either sanctioning or denying the leave. It could be time consuming and could also result in accusations of favoritism or prejudice. This is where automated leave through leave management software proves useful.

Automation

Software for managing leaves is usually automated in that an employee can access the browser based self-service interface and put in a request. He can even use his mobile from home to apply for leave in case of emergency and his immediate superior gets to view his request.  His immediate supervisor can easily review it against accrued leaves or grant the leave even if there is no balance to the applicant’s account. If leave is granted and it is a paid or unpaid leave then the software carries out relevant processes which reflect in payroll calculation and accounting so there is no chance of an error. Leaves can be granted automatically on a defined period basis and their balance as well as usage can be tracked. Employers can define leave policies that apply to all employees in a uniform manner thereby ensuring transparency and satisfaction.

Facility to create multiple leave types

Apart from defining policies management can also incorporate various types of leaves in the leave management system. Management can clearly define earned leave, sick leave, casual leave, marriage leave, bereavement leave, maternity leave and others and define whether it should be paid or otherwise. It is possible to set limits for each type.

Policies

The leave management solution can be configured to set parameters to grant leave, define restrictions, define policies for weekend leaves and special religious festival leaves as well as year end processing of leaves. A company can define holidays and publish a list in advance and also add restricted holidays to the list. If it has branches in various locations then it is possible to create location based lists. Leave encashment can also be defined. Employees know where they stand.

Decentralization

HR solution with leave management system can decentralize the leave process. An employee’s application for leave need not always go all the way to the top. His immediate manager can be granted powers to sanction leave or reject it. Top management can focus on more strategic tasks.

Reports

In an enterprise with hundreds of employees it would become an error-ridden task to compile reports of leaves in a manual way. Leave automation reduces errors to zero. Reports are precise and accurate especially when it comes to year end processing.

Year end processing

Automated leave management software lets you configure year end processing to make it a fast and error-free process. One can automate carry forward of leave, encashment or even negative balance. Based on analysis of current year leave operations the company can modify any policy for the next year.

Better transparency

Automating Leave Management brings in greater transparency. Employees can log in and view a complete report of their leave. Employers can print reports immediately without waiting for HR personnel to compile reports. This way there is no friction between employers and employees and productivity increases.

Any enterprise that employs more than 10 people will find that implementing an automated HR process that includes leave management will reduce cost, reduce dependence on personnel and free them to do more important task and contribute to productivity at work.