Zoho People Shift and Leave Management
Attendance is only right or wrong against a shift, and a salary is only right or wrong against a leave balance.
Shifts and leave are where Zoho People earns its keep, and where most setups quietly go wrong. A night-shift worker marked late every morning, a leave balance that disagrees with what the manager approved, a compensatory off nobody remembers to expire: each one becomes a salary dispute at month-end. We set shifts and leave up from how your business actually runs, then test them against a real month.
Last reviewed — prices, plan details and other figures on this page were checked then.
Shifts set up per team, not per company
Shift rosters need the Zoho People Professional plan. The decisions below are the ones we settle with you before configuring anything.
Shift patterns
Start and end times, breaks and the hours that count as a full day, set for each shift. Retail, factory and office teams usually need different ones.
Rotating rosters
Weekly or monthly rotations between day and night shifts, published to staff in advance, so attendance is measured against the shift each person was actually on.
Grace periods and late marks
How many minutes late is still on time, how many late marks make a half-day, and whether early leaving counts the same way. Written down once, applied the same for everyone.
Weekly offs
Fixed Sundays for the office, rotating offs for stores open seven days. Getting this wrong marks people absent on their day off.
Overtime
Which shifts earn overtime, after how many hours, and whether it is paid or banked as compensatory off. The answer decides what Zoho Payroll has to pay.
Shifts per location
Each branch keeps its own shifts and holidays, while HR sees every site in one place and branch managers approve only their own team.
Leave rules that match what managers already approve
Leave is included from the Zoho People Free plan. The hard part is writing down the rules your managers have been applying, including the exceptions.
Leave types
Casual, sick, earned or privilege leave, maternity and paternity, and loss of pay, each with its own eligibility, notice period and approval chain.
Accrual
Leave credited upfront at the start of the year, or earned month by month. New joiners and probation periods are prorated by rule, not by hand.
Carry-forward and encashment
How much unused leave rolls into next year, the cap, and what is paid out instead. Encashed days are passed to payroll rather than calculated in a spreadsheet.
Weekends and holidays inside leave
Whether a Friday-to-Monday leave counts as two days or four. Zoho People can count or exclude the days in between; we set it to match your policy.
Holiday calendars
National, state and festival holidays per location, so a branch in another state gets its own list instead of head office's.
Approvals
Who approves which leave, what happens when they are on leave themselves, and when HR is copied. Requests stop living in WhatsApp threads.
Compensatory off that expires on its own
Staff who work on a holiday or weekly off earn a compensatory day. The policy usually says it must be used within a set period. In practice nobody tracks the expiry, balances pile up, and the business ends up owing days it never meant to.
For SWA Diamonds, a multi-store jewellery retailer with 215+ employees, we wrote a custom Deluge function in Zoho People that expires unused compensatory leave automatically when its validity runs out. HR no longer has to correct balances by hand, and staff see the expiry date when they earn the day.
The same approach works for any rule Zoho People does not apply out of the box, such as leave that lapses if not taken in a given quarter. Our Zoho developers write and maintain these functions.
Five mistakes that show up on the first payslip
Opening leave balances loaded without a cut-off date, so leave already taken this month is counted twice.
One company-wide shift for everyone, so night and weekend staff are marked late or absent.
Holiday calendars copied from head office to every branch, including branches in another state.
Loss-of-pay leave left as a normal leave type, so payroll never sees the unpaid days.
Policy changes made mid-year without a date, so past balances recalculate and nobody can explain the new numbers.
Shift and leave setups we have delivered
- SWA DiamondsZoho People & Zoho PayrollMulti-store jewellery retailer, 215+ employees. Biometric attendance across stores, mobile check-in with GPS for field staff, department-wise shifts, loss-of-pay calculated from attendance, state-wise statutory compliance, and a custom Deluge function that expires unused compensatory leave automatically.
- Diya and Thomas CompanyZoho People & Zoho PayrollManual attendance, leave and salary calculation replaced with one system: employee records migrated into Zoho People, shift schedules and leave policies configured, salary structures built in Zoho Payroll, and a self-service portal for leave, attendance and payslips.
- Ayn Musk Furniture LLC (BOSQ)Zoho PeopleFurniture manufacturing and trading business moving HR off spreadsheets: centralised employee records, automated attendance, shift schedules and holiday calendars, leave approvals, and HR reporting that no longer has to be compiled by hand.
Zoho People Shift and Leave Management — common questions
Which Zoho People plan includes shift management?
Shift rosters come with attendance on the Professional plan, ₹96 per user per month billed annually in India (October 2026, excluding GST). Leave management, holiday calendars and approvals are available from the Free plan.
Can different branches have different holidays?
Yes. Each location can have its own holiday calendar and its own shifts, so a branch in another state gets that state's holidays. HR still sees all locations together.
Can Zoho People handle rotating day and night shifts?
Yes. Rotating rosters can be set weekly or monthly, and attendance is then measured against the shift each person was assigned that day rather than standard office hours.
Can compensatory off expire automatically?
Compensatory off can be granted with a validity period. Where a policy needs more than the built-in options, we add a custom Deluge function, as we did for SWA Diamonds, so unused days expire on schedule without HR correcting balances by hand.
How does leave reach payroll?
Unpaid leave and absences are passed from Zoho People to Zoho Payroll as loss-of-pay days for each pay period. Our Zoho People and Payroll integration page explains the cut-off dates and what has to be agreed between HR and accounts.
Related pages
- Zoho PeopleWhat Zoho People covers, the plans, and how we implement it.
- Biometric attendance integrationGetting punches from the devices at each site into Zoho People.
- Zoho People and Payroll integrationHow leave and attendance become loss-of-pay in the pay run.
- Zoho People implementationThe full rollout, from policy review to the parallel month.
- Zoho PayrollSalaries, PF, ESI, professional tax and TDS.
- Zoho Partner in KeralaOur statewide practice across all 14 Kerala districts.
Talk to us about shifts and leave
Send us your leave policy and a description of your shifts, even if the policy is out of date. We will tell you what Zoho People can apply out of the box and what needs custom work.
- Your written policy compared with what managers actually approve
- Shifts set up per team and per location
- Opening balances loaded against an agreed cut-off date
- Custom Deluge rules where the standard options fall short
We implement Zoho People and Zoho Payroll for businesses across India and the GCC, and for Kerala and its fourteen districts from our base in Malappuram.