Scheduling of Academic Leave

No. A staff member will need to have an annual leave balance of 20 or more days of annual leave in SSO to be included, and not on;

1. a senior staff contract
2. SSP, Parental Leave or on a period of Leave without Pay at the time the leave balance is assessed.

A fixed-term staff member will need to have a contract which includes January 2025.

Annual leave does not apply to casual staff so this scheduling process will also not apply to casual staff.

Academic staff who have a forecast annual leave balance of 20 or more days as at 25 November 2024 will receive an email in September 2024 informing them of their leave forecast balance and asking them to book 20 days annual leave in Staff Services Online (SSO) by 25 October 2024.

The forecasted leave balance will take into account any annual leave already booked and approved in SSO up until 29 November 2024.

If by 25 October the Academic staff member has not booked and had approved 20 days leave (between the last pay period in November 2024 through to the last pay period in November 2025) an automated process will schedule leave to be taken from the start of the Christmas close down in 2024. If the annual leave you have already booked in SSO does not total 20 days, the balance will be automatically scheduled.

If you are a part-time staff member or on a reduced fraction, then the amount of leave that you will be asked to book and take will be pro-rated. The amount of leave that you are required to take will be made clear in the email you will receive in September.

You have until 25 October 2024 to make alternative arrangements with your Supervisor and to book annual leave for the 20 days in SSO. The leave booked must be scheduled to be taken before the end of November 2025.

If you have 20 days annual leave booked and approved in SSO, which you are taking before the end of November 2025, then you will not have any further annual leave automatically scheduled for you in SSO.

On returning from leave you can speak to your supervisor and agree alternative dates to take your annual leave.
You can then submit a cancellation request to your supervisor for the scheduled leave booked in January and then, once the cancellation is approved, submit a new leave absence request for the alternative dates that you plan to take your annual leave instead.

Providing you have alternative leave arrangements for 2025 booked in Staff Services Online (SSO) prior to 25 October 2024, you will not be required to take leave in January.

If you realise that you need to be at work and cannot take annual leave during the time that has been booked in SSO, there is an “opt out” provision if you make alternative arrangements to take annual leave with your Supervisor.

After you speak to your Supervisor and they have agreed to alternative dates for you to take your annual leave, you will need to go into SSO and request to cancel the leave. You will need to list the agreed alternative annual leave dates in the free text box of the cancellation request.

As soon as the cancellation has been approved in the system by your Supervisor you will need to submit a new annual leave request for the alternative agreed dates for your Supervisor to approve this online as per the usual process for requesting leave

Long Service Leave booked and approved in SSO in the 20 day period from the Christmas closedown will be overridden by the automatically scheduled annual leave. The Long Service Leave will be re-credited when this happens. You will be asked to go back into SSO and rebook your Long Service Leave for different dates.

Yes. If you have an annual leave balance of 20 or more days as at 25 November 2024 you will receive an email in September 2024 informing you of what your leave balance and prompting you to book the balance of the required 20 days annual leave in SSO before 25 October 2024 if you do not want any days automatically scheduled.

If you do not book further leave through SSO, before 25 October 2024, then the number of days to bring your total number of leave days booked to 20 will be automatically scheduled. E.g. if you have 14 days leave booked in SSO then 6 days will scheduled automatically from the Christmas Closedown.

If you fall sick or are injured when you are on scheduled annual leave, you may submit a personal leave request for the relevant date(s) through SSO. This sick leave, once approved, will override any booked annual leave on this date, and your annual leave will be re-credited. You will then be required to submit a new annual leave booking for the day(s) that have been re-credited, at an agreed time with your Supervisor.

You will already have agreed with your supervisor to take your purchased leave over the 12 months following your successful application. If you are advised in this process that you have a balance of 20 days still in SSO, check that you have entered the purchased leave dates that you have already agreed with your supervisor in SSO.

If you have already agreed with your supervisor to take your annual leave before you retire and you are advised in this process that you still have a balance of 20 days annual leave, check that you have entered the dates that you have already agreed with your supervisor in SSO and if not, book the agreed dates before the 25 October.

If you have already agreed with your supervisor to take your annual leave as part of an approved application for SSP and you are advised in this process that you still have a balance of 20 days annual leave, check that you have entered the dates that you have already agreed with your supervisor in SSO and if not, book the agreed dates before 25 October.

7.35 hours equates to 1 day of annual leave for full time staff.  The hours for part time staff or staff on flexible work arrangements is determined by their individual work schedule.

20 days annual leave (full time) equates to 147 hours that need to be book through SSO.

Yes. The two Christmas closedown dates should be submitted as part of the 20 days.  If not submitted through SSO, they will automatically be included in the Christmas Closedown process.  This is process takes place in November for all staff who have not submitted leave for the two days.

In order for you to determine if you have booked enough leave to avoid the automatic scheduling process, work though the following steps:

• View Absence Requests in SSO to view how many days you have booked between 30 November 2024 and 28 November 2025. You will need to change the From and Through Dates and refresh the page to view all requests.  To see the total hours for each leave request clicking on the Absence Name hyperlink. Note, 1 full time day is equal to 7.35 hours.

• The balance of leave booked (point 1 above) needs to be deducted from the 147 (or part time equivalent) hours you are required to take between 30 November 2024 and 28 November 2025. If the balance is greater than zero you will need to submit a leave request for those hours. If the balance is below zero then you have submitted sufficient leave to avoid the automatic scheduling process.