What are digital vacation requests?
The classic vacation request is a form that the employee fills in by hand and submits to the HR department or directly to the employer. There the document is processed and the data is usually entered into an Excel spreadsheet or an analogue calendar.
The digital vacation request is different in that it is not submitted on paper but digitally through software. The request is also processed online in the relevant system. Exactly how this process works depends on the provider.
Why you should go for digital vacation requests
In terms of the basic process, there is hardly any difference between the analogue and the digital request. In both cases a form is filled in, passed on to the person responsible and processed there. But the two processes differ considerably in the actual steps involved. Here are five reasons why you should definitely go for the digital version:
1. Prone to errors
Filling in by hand, submitting, processing, entering - this process depends heavily on how careful the person handling it is. One transposed digit, filing it in the wrong folder, a misread date, and the request is set for September instead of July, or not for the right person at all. Mistakes like that can always happen and are easy to fix - if they are spotted early enough. If they are not, the consequences can cause a lot of stress and disruption. With the digital version, the details are fixed as soon as the employee sends off the request. The system stores all the important figures across every step of the process. That means far fewer mistakes.
2. Time savings
Processing by hand can become genuinely laborious: find the form, fill it in, hand it in at work, enter the data by hand and pass on the confirmation. Every one of these steps eats up valuable time. With digital requests, by contrast, the request is created in seconds and forwarded to the responsible department with one click. The message pops up there and can be dealt with in no time at all, stress-free, thanks to an integrated calendar and all the important personal details, such as the number of vacation days still available. The employer automatically receives confirmation that it has been processed by email. If everything runs smoothly and there are no overlaps, this process can take just a few minutes.
3. Mobility
Vacations are planned at home on the sofa, so why not submit the request straight from there as well? With digital vacation requests you can. The request can be created on a mobile phone or on a PC. In just a few clicks the vacation is requested and can be processed right away.
4. Keeping track at all times
In many businesses, vacation days are still written into a calendar in the break room. On top of that there may be an Excel spreadsheet with the vacation days taken and still outstanding. For businesses with few employees or with fixed vacation days because of a company shutdown, this approach can work well. But as soon as that is no longer the case, chaos quickly takes over. Digital vacation requests give you the option of seeing all requested and approved vacations at a glance.
5. Faster processing
The horror scenario: the vacation request is submitted and the slip of paper goes missing, is filed in the wrong place or thrown away by mistake. The result: the vacation has to be cancelled, cannot be taken with a partner or the family, or there is friction in the team over who submitted the request first and therefore has a claim on those dates. All in all: not a good outcome! If the request had been submitted online, it would not have gone missing but would have been processed within minutes. The flights could have been booked in time and the overlap spotted early.
The right tool for your business
The only question now is: which tool can I use to do this? There are many solutions on the market. Digital vacation requests are usually just one feature among many in these solutions. So the digital vacation request is only one step in digitalizing your business. Alongside it, you can also digitalize topics such as time tracking or your project documentation with the help of apps.
With clockin you get the complete package: built for digital time tracking, clockin lets you organise your business's entire absence management digitally. Vacation requests are submitted through the app and can be processed directly by the people responsible in the Office Center.
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