{"id":113,"date":"2025-09-08T09:01:37","date_gmt":"2025-09-08T16:01:37","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/hr.uw.edu\/time-absence\/?page_id=113"},"modified":"2026-06-27T10:20:35","modified_gmt":"2026-06-27T17:20:35","slug":"time-off-usage-hierarchy","status":"publish","type":"page","link":"https:\/\/hr.uw.edu\/time-absence\/managing-time-and-absence\/time-off-usage-hierarchy\/","title":{"rendered":"Time off usage hierarchy"},"content":{"rendered":"

Workday has a set of validations used to enforce a hierarchy for time off usage, following UW time off policies.\u00a0Time Off usage validations do not apply to employees on an approved Sick\/Injured or Becoming a Parent Leave of Absence; these employees may use their Time Offs in any order.<\/p>\n

For Professional Staff<\/h4>\n

A professional staff employee\u2019s time off balance, based on already approved time off requests, is assessed in this order:<\/p>\n

    \n
  1. Must exhaust all Holiday Credit Time Off before using Compensatory, Discretionary and Vacation Time Off \u2013 to improve user experience this is not enforced in Workday; however, employees should still be aware that exhausting this Time Off first is UW policy<\/li>\n
  2. Must exhaust all Compensatory Time Off before using Discretionary and Vacation Time Off<\/li>\n
  3. Must exhaust all Discretionary Time Off before using Vacation Time Off<\/li>\n
  4. Must exhaust all Holiday Credit, Compensatory, Discretionary and Vacation Time Off before using Unpaid Time Off<\/li>\n<\/ol>\n

    For Classified Staff<\/h4>\n

    A classified staff employee\u2019s time off balance, based on already approved time off requests, is assessed in this order:<\/p>\n

      \n
    1. Must exhaust all Compensatory Time Off before using Vacation Time Off<\/li>\n
    2. Must exhaust all Holiday Credit, Compensatory and Vacation Time Off before using Unpaid Time Off<\/li>\n<\/ol>\n

      Common Errors<\/h4>\n

      When time offs are not used in the order expected, Workday will return a validation message preventing the request from being submitted. If the Time & Absence Initiate completes the process on behalf of a worker, Workday will return a warning message when applicable. The Time & Absence Initiate can transact around the warning message and submit the time off request.<\/p>\n

      Message text<\/h5>\n

      Error \u2013 Quantity per Day<\/em><\/strong>
      \nYou have an available Holiday Credit, Discretionary, or Compensatory Time balance that must be used first. Please revise your request. The Daily Quantity cannot be more than 0 hours.<\/em><\/p>\n

      As the hierarchy rules assess approved<\/em> time off requests, additional consideration is needed in scenarios where an employee is requesting time offs that impact multiple hierarchy rules under a single request.<\/p>\n

      Example 1<\/strong>
      \nAs of January 1, a full-time Professional Staff employee has an available balance of 8 hours of Discretionary Time Off and 32 hours of Vacation Time Off.<\/p>\n

      The worker will receive the validation error referenced above if a single time off request is initiated using both time off types, even if the hierarchy\/order of time off usage is followed. E.g. Monday \u2013 8 hours of Discretionary Time Off and Tuesday-Thursday 32 hours of Vacation Time Off.<\/p>\n

      Example 2<\/strong>
      \nAs of January 1, a full-time contract classified employee has an available balance of 16 hours Vacation Time Off and has received approval to take 8 hours of Unpaid Time Off for an upcoming absence. The worker will receive the validation error referenced above if a single time off request is initiated for the remaining Vacation Time Off and the Unpaid Time Off even if the hierarchy\/order of time off usage is followed. E.g. Wednesday-Thursday \u2013 16 hours of Vacation Time Off and Friday \u2013 8 hours of Unpaid Time Off.<\/p>\n

      In these scenarios, the worker has 2 options:<\/p>\n

        \n
      1. Submit separate time off requests by time off type, in order of the hierarchy rules: Submit the time off request for the first time off type and wait for approval. Submit the time off request for the next time off type and wait for approval.<\/li>\n
      2. Contact the Time & Absence Initiate who can transact around the hierarchy messages and submit a single time off request on behalf of the employee.<\/li>\n<\/ol>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

        The order in which a professional staff employee\u2019s time off balance is assessed.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":49,"featured_media":0,"parent":107,"menu_order":30,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","template":"","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"_lmt_disableupdate":"no","_lmt_disable":"no","slim_seo":{"title":"Time off usage hierarchy - Time and Absence","description":"The order in which a professional staff employee\u2019s time off balance is assessed."},"footnotes":""},"class_list":["post-113","page","type-page","status-publish","hentry"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/hr.uw.edu\/time-absence\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages\/113","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/hr.uw.edu\/time-absence\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/hr.uw.edu\/time-absence\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/page"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/hr.uw.edu\/time-absence\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/49"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/hr.uw.edu\/time-absence\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=113"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/hr.uw.edu\/time-absence\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages\/113\/revisions"}],"up":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/hr.uw.edu\/time-absence\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages\/107"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/hr.uw.edu\/time-absence\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=113"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}