How to roster a small team when someone resigns

Written by Roster Flow. Published 14 September 2026.

In a large business a resignation is a vacancy. In a small one it is a hole in next week’s roster, and often in skills nobody wrote down: the only barista who can set up the machine on a Sunday, the person who places the supplier order, the one casual who always says yes to a late close.

This article is about the rostering side of a resignation. Notice, final pay and any leave owed have their own rules, and the Fair Work Ombudsman’s resignation and notice and final pay pages are the places to check them.

Start with the dates

Confirm the last working day in writing as soon as the resignation arrives, and put it in the roster calendar. Every other decision in this article runs back from that date.

An award can set the minimum notice an employee gives. Under the Restaurant Industry Award, an employee must give the employer notice of termination of at least the period in Table 9, according to their period of continuous service (clause 35.1(b)):

The Hospitality Industry (General) Award (clause 41.1), the General Retail Industry Award (clause 37.1) and the Fast Food Industry Award (clause 31.1) set out the same periods. Each clause applies to all employees except those identified in sections 123(1) and 123(3) of the Fair Work Act. Who those employees are, what happens when notice is short, and whether a notice period is worked or ended early are questions for the Fair Work Ombudsman, and its Notice and Redundancy Calculator covers other awards.

Map everything the person covers

Before touching the roster, list what the person actually does. The shifts are the easy part. The skills and the jobs that never appear on a roster are what catch small teams out.

A skills matrix turns the second row into a table you can check every time someone leaves, not just this time.

Roster the notice period

• Plan the handover shifts. Pair the person leaving with whoever takes over each skill for at least one shift, and put those pairings on the roster so they happen.
• Write the unwritten jobs down. Ask them to note supplier contacts, machine settings and where things are kept. Shift handover notes suggests a short format.
• Settle any leave first. If they ask for leave during the notice period, check the Fair Work Ombudsman’s resignation page before you build the roster around it.
• Know the last shift. Decide exactly which shift is their last, and who takes back keys, codes and logins at the end of it.
• Keep things steady. The last weeks go best when their shifts stay as agreed and the handover is added, not squeezed in.

Share out the hours carefully

The quickest fix is to give the hours to the people who are left. It is also where the mistakes happen: overtime nobody planned, part-time employees rostered outside their availability, and the same two people covering everything until they resign too.

1. Ask who wants the hoursStart with anyone who has already asked for more. Handling staff who want more hours covers checking and recording those requests.
2. Check each person’s limitsFor casuals, the daily and weekly limits in your award. For part-time employees, their written availability and guaranteed hours. For full-time employees, where overtime starts.
3. Cost the optionsCompare a new starter’s ordinary hours with overtime for the people already there. The roster cost calculator helps, and preventing accidental overtime sets out the triggers in four awards.
4. Say what is temporaryTell people which extra hours are cover until the replacement starts and which are theirs to keep, and put it in writing.

The award rules apply to the hours you move. Under the Restaurant and Hospitality awards, a part-time employee must not be rostered to work any hours outside their availability (clause 10.7(a)), any change to their guaranteed hours needs their written consent (clause 10.5), and time worked in excess of their rostered hours is paid at the overtime rate (clause 10.13(b)). A full-time or part-time employee’s roster can be changed by mutual agreement or with 7 days’ notice (clauses 15.3(d) and 15.5(d)), and a proposed change to an employee’s regular roster or ordinary hours of work needs consultation first (clauses 33 and 39). Other awards differ, so check yours with the Fair Work Ombudsman’s Find my award tool.

Decide whether to replace like for like

A resignation is a chance to ask whether the old shape of the job still fits. Before advertising, look at the last 8 weeks and answer four questions.

• Were their hours the ones the business needs now, or the ones that suited them?
• Would two casuals cover the gap better than one part-time employee, or the reverse?
• Is there a skill, such as opening or ordering, that should never again sit with one person?
• Does someone already on the team want the role, with a new starter taking their old shifts?

If you split your roster into steady core hours and a flexible layer, as in giving staff predictable hours without losing flexibility, the answer is usually clearer: core hours go to someone on a fixed pattern, flex hours to casuals.

Bring the replacement in before the gap opens

Recruiting and first shifts take longer than a notice period feels. Count back from the last day: when does the job ad need to go out for a new starter to work at least one shift alongside the person leaving? Even one overlapping shift saves a week of questions.

Keep the first two weeks light. A new starter does not replace an experienced person on day one, so put someone who knows the job on every shift they work. A new employee’s first roster covers the paperwork and the first week, and training new starters without blowing the wage budget covers the cost of training shifts.

A worked example: a cafe loses its opener

This is an example, not a real business. A cafe covered by the Restaurant Industry Award trades from 7:00 to 15:00, Tuesday to Sunday, and is closed on Mondays. Every opening shift runs from 6:30 to 14:00 with a 30 minute unpaid meal break at 10:00, so it is 7 paid hours. Morgan, a part-time barista with 2 years of service, opens Tuesday to Friday on 28 guaranteed hours and places the Thursday supplier order.

On Tuesday 1 December, Morgan resigns. With more than 1 year but not more than 3 years of continuous service, Table 9 sets 2 weeks’ notice, and Morgan’s last shift is agreed as Tuesday 15 December. Ari, a part-time barista, opens on Saturday and Sunday on 14 guaranteed hours, is available Tuesday to Sunday from 6:30 to 15:00, and asked for more hours last month.

The owner talks with Ari about taking the Tuesday to Thursday openings, including what it means for Ari’s week, and Ari agrees in writing to 35 guaranteed hours from Tuesday 22 December (clauses 33 and 10.5). The new pattern is 5 × 7 = 35 hours, inside Ari’s availability (clause 10.7(a)), with Monday and Friday off, meeting the 2 days off each week in clause 10.7(c). For the week of 16 December, Ari agrees to open on the Wednesday and Thursday as additional hours, and Jordan opens on Friday 18 December.

The handover is on the roster: Ari agrees to open alongside Morgan on the two Thursdays, as additional hours, to learn the machine set-up and the supplier order, and Jordan, hired the week Morgan resigned, works Morgan’s last Friday alongside them. Morgan’s 28 hours are covered by 21 extra hours for Ari and 7 for Jordan, and weekday sick calls, which Morgan used to pick up, now go first to the cafe’s other casual.

Look after the people who stay

• Tell the team who covers what, once the person leaving is comfortable with the news being shared. Communicating roster changes covers reaching everyone affected.
• Watch the extra load. Check the next four rosters for anyone whose hours or run of days has crept up while the gap was open.
• Share the shifts nobody wants. A departure often leaves late closes or weekends to the same few people. Fair weekend and closing-shift rotations shows how to rebalance them.
• Ask why they left. If the answer is the roster, such as too few hours, too many weekends or late changes, fix that before the next resignation.

Roster Flow keeps the changeover in one place: 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.

A checklist for when someone resigns

• The last working day is confirmed in writing and on the roster calendar
• Their shifts, skills, regular jobs and cover duties are listed
• Handover shifts are on the roster, and the unwritten jobs are written down
• Leave, notice and final pay questions are checked with the Fair Work Ombudsman’s pages
• Extra hours for others fit their availability, agreed hours and overtime limits
• Changes to anyone’s regular roster are consulted on and agreed or given notice
• The replacement works at least one shift before the person leaves, if possible
• The next four rosters are checked for anyone carrying too much

Sources

• 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]
• Fair Work Ombudsman: resignation
• Fair Work Ombudsman: notice and final pay
• Fair Work Ombudsman: Notice and Redundancy Calculator
• Fair Work Ombudsman: find my award

Back to the blog