Managing leave and absence
There are various reasons why someone might take leave, with most being planned in advance in line with the relevant employment policies, procedures and guidance, as follows;
- Annual leave, bank holidays and concessionary days
- TOIL
- Additional planned unpaid leave
- Family leave
- Study leave
- Reserve forces and cadet adult instructors leave for service
- Special and other leave
However, there are times when an employee may be absent and need leave to support them with unplanned circumstances, as follows;
- Sickness absence
- Missing staff
- Bereavement, dependant care, and domestic emergency leave
As a line manager, it is your responsibility to support your employees and manage leave and absence in accordance with the University’s policies, procedures and guidance. This includes:
- Approving or rejecting leave requests in PeopleXD - employees submit leave requests via PeopleXD. You are responsible for reviewing and approving/rejecting requests promptly.
- Maintaining timely and accurate records - this ensures correct pay, entitlement deductions, and provides visibility of leave taken.
- Monitoring leave and absence patterns - you should use PeopleXD data to identify patterns (e.g. frequent short-term sickness or employees not taking enough annual leave). This helps you plan workloads, support wellbeing, and meet legal obligations under the Working Time Regulations.
- Encouraging employees to take annual leave regularly - proactively check that employees use their entitlement throughout the year to maintain wellbeing, prevent burnout, and sustain productivity.
- Providing support when absence occurs - have early and supportive conversations with employees, use relevant University policies and procedures (e.g. Sickness Absence Management), and involve the People Directorate or Occupational Health when needed.
People XD is the University’s people information and payroll system for all employees and line managers. It is where payslips are accessed, personal information is maintained, and recruitment is undertaken, as well as being where all employee leave and absence is managed.
In many cases, there are legislative obligations that require that these records are accurately maintained, and there is often an impact on the employee’s pay. For these reasons, and to ensure compliance with GDPR and data protection requirements, all leave records must be kept and maintained in People XD.
The University’s policies, procedures and guidance are there to support you in your role. They set out the different types of leave available, explain employee entitlements, and outline the steps you need to follow when approving, recording, or managing leave and absence.
For queries or support with the application of any of these policies, contact the PD Operations team.
The ‘Manager Dashboard’ in PeopleXD allows managers to view and manage their team’s leave and absence. To support line managers in using PeopleXD, a suite of user guides and demonstrations are available, including guides to support with leave and absence management.
For queries or support with the People XD platform please visit the FAQs page in the first instance. For systems support please follow the instructions for logging an incident with the HRIS team. Logging an incident should also be used to request for a substitution to be set up when a line manager is due to be on leave themselves, enabling the continued smooth running of the system in their absence.