Run monthly attendance

At month end, HR often spends days reconciling attendance, explaining discrepancies and fixing records by hand before payroll can start. Rifena designed the attendance cycle so data is watched and handled during the month; closing the period is a confirmation, not a repair job.

This workflow moves an attendance period from Attendance open to Attendance closed. The hand-off is complete only when attendance, leave, overtime, and holiday work have been reviewed and no required request is still pending.

Primary owner

HR or the attendance owner.

Contributors

employees, line managers, and payroll.

Role and access: the primary owner needs attendance review access for the intended employee scope; payroll-period closure is a separate permission.

Start with Open timekeeping. To close or reopen the period, use Open payroll-period settings. In Timekeeping, use Open timesheet, Open overtime, Open attendance summary, or Open timekeeping configuration for the task at hand.

Before you begin

The period must exist under Open payroll-period settings and show Attendance open. Work schedules, shifts, and clock policies should already apply to the employees in scope.

Recommended sequence for each period

Stage	Where to work	Result to confirm
Prepare	Operations → Timekeeping → Open schedules and shifts / Flexible	Employees have the intended work schedule
Monitor	Timekeeping → Today, then Timesheet → Viewing: Timesheet	Missing or unusual clock events are identified
Resolve	Timesheet → Viewing: Timesheets / Overtime and Settings → Holiday work	Corrections and decisions are complete
Reconcile	Timesheet → Viewing: Summary	Hours, overtime, and attendance totals are plausible
Close	System → Settings → Payroll periods	The period shows Attendance closed

View period-preparation screens2 images

Settings prepares policy and supporting data; it is not where individual timesheet rows are corrected.

Before the period starts, use Settings → Attendance policy to confirm the intended policy; employee and group scope still belongs under Clock assignments.

Do not edit a policy mid-period merely to unblock one event. First identify the effective policy, blocked channel, and supporting-data readiness. When a change is justified, keep the scope narrow and hand off its effective time explicitly.

1. Prepare work schedules

Open timekeeping and confirm the period, month, or date range before making changes.

1. Under Schedule, keep Shifts selected and assign the correct shift and work schedule to each employee or group for the intended dates.
2. Resolve employees without a shift, overlapping shifts, or mid-period schedule changes.
3. For remote work, travel, or another approved location, switch to Open flexible work arrangements and create the appropriate work arrangement before the work date.
4. Return to the schedule or timesheet and confirm the employee has the intended shift on the intended day.

This stage is complete when: no employee in scope is missing an expected work schedule.

2. Monitor attendance during the period

View the monitoring step1 image

Keep Viewing: Timesheets selected when tracing an exception to one employee and day.

Do not wait until period end to find exceptions. Daily, or at the organisation’s agreed operating cadence:

1. Open Today for clock-ins, clock-outs, and unusual events.
2. Open Timesheet with Viewing: Timesheets to find a missing checkout, a fully missing day, or hours that do not match the assigned shift.
3. Confirm the facts with the employee or manager before editing.
4. If a manual event is justified, use the action offered by the screen and record a specific reason.

Resolve exceptions while evidence is fresh

A missing checkout is usually easier to confirm on the day it occurs. Regular review shortens period-end work and reduces the chance of reopening attendance.

3. Correct a timesheet

After the correct time has been verified:

1. In Timesheets, select the employee and date.
2. Choose Adjust timesheet, Manual check-in, or Manual checkout for the visible issue.
3. Enter the confirmed time and a clear Correction reason. Avoid a generic note such as “fix attendance”.
4. Save, reopen the day, and confirm the clock-in, checkout, and total hours.

If the action is blocked or the record does not change, do not create repeated events. Record the employee, date, and visible message, then use Attendance support.

4. Resolve related requests

View the Overtime step1 image

Switch Viewing to Overtime for request decisions; there is no separate OT-policy destination.

Before closing the period:

• Under Timesheet, switch Viewing to Open overtime and decide every request in scope unless there is an agreed reason for it to remain pending before period end.
• Under Settings → Holiday work, review worked holidays and all pending records.
• Confirm every leave request in the period is approved or rejected.
• Resolve pending shift changes so actual work is recorded against the correct schedule.

This stage is complete when: no leave, overtime, or holiday-work request in scope is waiting for a decision.

5. Reconcile before closing

View the Summary reconciliation step1 image

Summary reveals period-level outliers; correct each issue on its owning view before returning here.

Under Timesheet, switch Viewing to Open attendance summary and review in this order:

1. Does the employee count and date range match the intended period?
2. Are total hours and overtime plausible for the organisation’s operation?
3. Are starters, leavers, and mid-period schedule changes represented correctly?
4. Does every missing, zero, or unusually high total have an explanation?
5. For a representative sample, trace the work schedule through to each day’s timesheet.

If anything is wrong, correct it on the owning screen and return to Viewing: Summary again. Do not close the period because the organisation-wide total merely looks reasonable.

6. Close attendance

1. Open System → Settings → Payroll periods.
2. Select the intended Attendance open period.
3. Choose Close attendance.
4. Read the checks in Close period attendance.
5. When every condition passes, choose Close attendance to confirm.
6. Confirm the period now shows Attendance closed.

Rifena blocks closure when the period has not ended or eligible timesheets, leave, overtime, or holiday-work records remain incomplete. The dialog identifies the group that needs attention. Resolve that group and close again.

Do not create payroll before “Attendance closed”

The payroll-run form only offers attendance-closed periods. Attendance closed is the formal hand-off from attendance to payroll.

7. Hand over to payroll

Give payroll at least:

• the closed period name;
• the date range;
• the closure time;
• any verified exceptions that still need attention during payroll review.

Payroll can continue with Run monthly payroll.

Reopen attendance only for a verified error

Reopen a period only after identifying incorrect source data and understanding the effect on payroll.

1. Open System → Settings → Payroll periods.
2. Select the Attendance closed period and choose Reopen attendance.
3. Read the warning and confirm only if this is the intended period.
4. Correct attendance, leave, overtime, holiday work, or related compliance data.
5. Reconcile Timesheet → Viewing: Summary, then choose Close attendance again.

Reopening can invalidate related payroll runs in Draft or Pending approval, which then need to be recreated after closure. Rifena blocks reopening when an affected payroll run is already Approved or Paid so confirmed history is not rewritten.

Do not work around a protected state

If an approved or paid payroll run prevents reopening, stop and use Attendance support. Agree an adjustment for a later period instead of changing confirmed history.

Period-end checklist

• Correct period and employee scope
• No unexplained missing attendance
• Every manual correction has a clear reason
• No pending leave, overtime, or holiday-work decision
• Starters, leavers, and schedule changes reviewed
• Summary reconciled against representative employees
• Period shows Attendance closed
• Payroll has received the hand-off

Related guides

• Run monthly payroll
• Leave and overtime
• Time and attendance policies
• State reference