How to manage annual leave when building a roster

Written by Roster Flow. Published 18 July 2026.

Most leave problems on a roster are timing problems. A request is approved in a conversation at the counter, nobody writes it down, and three weeks later the roster goes out with that person on Saturday. Or two people who do the same job are both away in the same week, and nobody notices until the Monday. The fix is not complicated: one place where leave is recorded, and a roster built around approved leave rather than patched afterwards.

This article is about annual leave and the weekly roster. The wider system for availability, time off and every kind of leave is in the availability and leave guide.

Who gets annual leave, and how much

Annual leave comes from the National Employment Standards. Every employee except a casual gets paid annual leave, and full-time and part-time employees get 4 weeks a year based on their ordinary hours. For a part-time employee on 20 hours a week, that is 80 hours over a year. Awards and agreements cannot give less, but they can give more.

Leave builds up gradually from the first day of employment, including during a probation period, and unused leave carries over from year to year. Some shiftworkers get an extra week. Under the Restaurant Industry Award, for example, that applies to a 7 day shiftworker regularly rostered on Sundays and public holidays in a business where shifts are rostered 24 hours a day, 7 days a week (clause 25.2).

Casuals do not get paid annual leave, but they still go on holidays. Treat a casual’s time away as unavailability for those dates, and record it in the same place as everyone else’s leave so the roster shows it.

Put approved leave on the roster before anything else

Approved leave is the one part of the week that is already decided, so it goes in first. Build each roster in this order:

1. Mark approved leaveBlock out every approved leave day in the roster period, including part days, before a single shift is placed.
2. Mark unavailabilityAdd casuals’ time away and anyone’s regular unavailability, so all the gaps are visible together.
3. Place fixed shiftsPut in the full-time and part-time employees who are working, on their agreed hours.
4. List the holesWrite down every shift left uncovered by leave, with the role and skills each one needs.
5. Fill and cost themCover each hole from the options below, then check the week’s hours and cost before you publish.

If leave is approved after a roster is published, change the published roster straight away and tell anyone whose shifts moved.

Set a simple way to ask for leave

An employee needs to request annual leave before taking it, and the Fair Work Ombudsman notes that the process is often set out in an award, agreement, company policy or employment contract. For most small businesses a short written policy is enough. Decide these points and tell the team:

• One channel. Requests come in writing through one place, such as a leave request form or an app, never as a message in a group chat.
• How far ahead. Ask for a set amount of notice, for example 4 weeks for a week or more away. This is your policy, not a legal minimum, so keep it reasonable and apply it to everyone.
• A reply date. Answer every request within a few days, and before the roster for that period is built.
• Late requests. Requests for a week already published are still considered, but may need a swap before they can go ahead.
• Peak periods. Say early how popular weeks, such as Christmas and the school holidays, will be shared.

Leave does not have to come in whole weeks. There is no minimum or maximum amount that must be taken at one time, so with agreement an employee can take a part day, a single day or several weeks. A leave request for one Friday deserves the same answer and the same record as a request for a month.

Deciding whether to approve a request

Under the National Employment Standards, an employer can only refuse an annual leave request if the refusal is reasonable. That leaves room to say no to a week the business genuinely cannot cover, but not to refuse leave by habit. Work through the same questions every time:

If you refuse, give the business reason in writing and offer other dates you can approve. If you approve, confirm the dates in writing and put them on the roster that day. Either way, keep the request, the answer and the reason.

Covering the shifts

Once leave is approved, list the shifts it leaves open and cover them in this order:

• Staff who want more hours. Casuals who have said they want extra shifts, checked against their availability.
• Part-time employees, by agreement. Offer extra hours inside their availability, and check first how your award treats a part-time employee’s additional hours. Rostering part-time and casual employees together covers what to look for.
• Cross-trained staff. Someone who can do the job, moved from a shift that is easier to fill.
• A lighter shift. A quiet stretch that can run one person short while someone is away.

Offer open shifts to everyone who could take them at once, rather than asking one person at a time. How to fill open shifts sets out a way to do it without messaging the whole team.

Leave costs more than the hours on the roster

Annual leave is paid at the employee’s base pay rate for the hours of leave taken, without overtime, penalty rates, allowances or bonuses. If the shifts are covered, the business pays for the same hours twice: once as leave and once as work.

Many awards add annual leave loading, and the rule differs between them. The Restaurant Industry Award and the Hospitality Industry (General) Award set a loading of 17.5% (clauses 25.3 and 30.3). The General Retail Industry Award pays the greater of 17.5% or the penalty rates the employee would have earned in their ordinary hours (clause 28.3), and the Fast Food Industry Award pays the greater of 17.5% or the weekend penalty amounts for the ordinary hours they would have worked (clause 22.2). Confirm your award with the Fair Work Ombudsman’s Find my award tool, and see current rates on pages such as the Restaurant Industry Award pay rates.

When you cost a week with someone away, add their leave hours and any loading to the roster cost calculator estimate for the shifts.

A worked example: a cafe in January

A cafe open 7 days has two part-time baristas, Priya on 24 hours a week over four mornings and Luca on 20 hours, plus a kitchen team and casuals. In October the owner receives three requests for January 2027.

In each of Priya’s two weeks, her four mornings need covering. Luca agrees to take two of them, 12 hours inside his availability, and a casual takes the other two, another 12 hours. The roster shows 24 hours of barista work on those mornings each week, but the cafe pays for 48: Priya’s 24 hours of leave, plus loading if the award provides it, and 24 hours of cover.

Luca’s leave was moved rather than refused, he was told why, and the new dates were confirmed in writing and put straight on the February rosters.

Christmas closures and shutdowns

Many small businesses close for a week or two over Christmas and New Year. Whether you can direct staff to take annual leave during a closure depends on the award or agreement. For employees with no award or agreement, the Fair Work Ombudsman says an employer can require them to take paid annual leave during a temporary shutdown if the requirement is reasonable.

The Restaurant, Hospitality and General Retail awards share the same shutdown clause (clauses 25.4, 30.4 and 28.4). The employer must give affected employees 28 days’ written notice of the shutdown, or a shorter period agreed with the majority of them. The direction to take leave must be in writing and reasonable, and it can only cover leave the employee has already accrued. For any part of the closure a direction does not cover, the employer and employee can agree in writing to unpaid leave, or agree to leave in advance. Anyone hired after the notice goes out must be given it as soon as reasonably practicable. The Fast Food Industry Award has no shutdown clause, so check any agreement that applies before planning a directed closure.

In practice, set the closure dates early, send the written notice well before the 28 days, and check each person’s balance, because nobody can be directed to take paid leave they have not accrued. Put the closure on the roster as soon as it is decided, and check which public holidays fall inside it in your state.

Large leave balances

A balance that keeps growing is a roster risk, because one day the person asks for two months at once. The Restaurant, Hospitality, General Retail and Fast Food awards treat more than 8 weeks of accrued leave as an excessive leave accrual (clauses 25.5, 30.6, 28.5 and 22.5). The first three set 10 weeks for a shiftworker as they define it.

Under those clauses, the employer and employee first genuinely try to agree how to reduce the balance. If they cannot, the employer can direct the employee in writing to take leave, but the direction:

• must not leave the employee with less than 6 weeks of accrued leave
• must not require a period of leave shorter than one week
• must not start the leave less than 8 weeks, or more than 12 months, after the direction is given
• must not be inconsistent with leave already agreed between you

The employee has a matching right. After more than 6 months with an excessive accrual and no agreement, they can give written notice asking for leave, up to 4 weeks in any 12 months (5 for a shiftworker under the Restaurant, Hospitality and General Retail awards), and the employer must grant it. The easier path is to check balances every quarter and plan leave with anyone heading past 6 weeks.

When plans change

Sometimes approved leave has to move. Some awards and agreements have rules about cancelling or changing approved leave, so check yours first. Where there are none, the Fair Work Ombudsman says the employer and employee should discuss it and try to agree, taking into account things like whether the employee has booked flights or paid deposits, how close the leave is, and whether the business can adjust rosters instead.

Keep the records

Employers must keep a record of any leave taken and of how much leave each employee has, as part of the time and wages records kept for 7 years. If you agree to leave in advance under an award such as the Restaurant Industry Award, the agreement must be in writing, state the amount of leave and the start date, and be signed by you and the employee (and a parent or guardian if they are under 18), with a copy kept as an employee record (clause 25.8).

Roster Flow is built for this part of the week: availability and leave from staff phones, the roster published to everybody at once, clock ins that become timesheets, and approved hours sent to Xero, MYOB or a CSV file. See how leave requests work.

An annual leave checklist for every roster

• Every approved leave period is recorded in one place, with the date it was approved
• Leave and casual unavailability go on the roster before any shift
• Requests are answered in writing, with a reason and other dates if refused
• No two people with the same key skill are away in the same week without a cover plan
• Open shifts are offered to everyone who can take them
• Leave hours and loading are counted in the week’s wage cost
• Shutdown dates are set early, with 28 days’ written notice where the award requires it
• Anyone with more than 6 weeks of leave has a plan to take some before the balance passes 8

Sources

• Fair Work Ombudsman: annual leave
• Fair Work Ombudsman: taking annual leave
• Fair Work Ombudsman: payment for annual leave
• Fair Work Ombudsman: cancelling annual leave
• Fair Work Ombudsman: direction to take annual leave during a shutdown
• Fair Work Ombudsman: direction to take excess annual leave
• Fair Work Ombudsman: record-keeping
• Fair Work Ombudsman: find my award
• Fair Work Commission: Restaurant Industry Award 2020 [MA000119]
• Fair Work Commission: Hospitality Industry (General) Award 2020 [MA000009]
• Fair Work Commission: General Retail Industry Award 2020 [MA000004]
• Fair Work Commission: Fast Food Industry Award 2020 [MA000003]

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