Time banks and Planned absences

Absence planning is complicated. Time bank are complicated. This topic explains how they work together.

Time Banks: BALANCE vs AVAILABLE

To understand Umana time banks, let's compare them at your account at your chartered bank.

At your chartered bank you make deposits and take withdrawals, which you can see in your detailed transaction list. The sum of them is your current balance.

Umana is the same. You have deposits (such as annual entitlement) and withdrawals, and a balance which is the sum of them, plus your opening balance at the start of the period.

Since in Umana banks are by reference year, that opening balance is just the carry-over from the previous year.
Note to paymasters: Bank entitlement generated by a temporary (non-finalized) pay calculation does not affect the time bank balance. It only affects the balance once the pay run is finalized.

At your chartered bank you might also see an AVAILABLE balance, which is your balance, less any deposits on hold or by future planned payments, and augmented by your credit margin.

Umana is similar. You have a balance in your time bank, but the AVAILABLE time may be less if you have planned absences. In other words, Umana's planned absences are like a hold your chartered bank funds.
In Umana time banks, you may also have the equivalent of a credit margin. It is not shown in the Umana bank summary, but it is applied to when determining whether you can take an absence.

Another real-world metaphor is your credit limit on your VISA card: You might charge a purchase on the card, and go over your limit, because it takes time for charges (handled by the VISA clearing house) to work their way through to your bank. And the clearing house data is not up-to-date in real time.

Time passes

As time passes, and as transactions work though the system, the hold comes off your deposit and the funds become available. And once a future planned payment is made it appears in your transactions and reduces your balance, but is no longer a hold.

That's similar in Umana too. Once you take the absence you had planned, it is no longer planned, but becomes a transaction in your bank account.

Oops: What if the cheque doesn't clear, or if you cancel the future action? That situation has a parallel in Umana too, but it's not quite the same. Read on.

When a planned absence is no longer planned

Everyone changes their plans. Maybe we don't go on vacation but instead work that day, or take a sick day instead.

Umana needs to figure that out. Yet as normal people, employees are not prone to go back and update past plans based on today's reality.

So Umana applies this simple rule: Once you enter anything in your timesheet for a particular day, the timesheet becomes the official record for that day — all plans are off.

While entering time for a day, before you finish, you might see incomplete bank balances.

Here are some cases

If you take the absence — the same absence code as planned for that day — the absence is now deducted from your bank balance. The planned absence is ignored, removing it from the planned total for that bank (like removing the hold). The resulting available total should be the same.
If you enter a different kind of absence (maybe from another time bank) Umana treats that absence taken from that other bank, reducing the balance in that other bank. The original planned absence is ignored.
If you enter time worked Umana knows you are not taking the absence that day, and again Umana ignores the planned absence.

In other words, time entered in the timesheet (or gets to the payroll by some other process) is treated as what really happened, and the plan for the day is ignored.

Timing

Let's think about some "edge cases".

What should Umana do with an absence planned for last month?

That's too far back; you should have entered something in your timesheet by now for that date. If you didn't Umana still ignores the absence.
What about an absence planned for next year?

By next year we mean the following bank reference year. Planning an absence for next year shouldn't penalize you this year, because next year will have new entitlement and your bank will likely be refilled. So for calculating planned absences (i.e. reducing the available balance) absence planned for next year are ignored (till we get there).
What about an absence I took a few days ago, but I have not entered in my timesheet yet?

Umana doesn't have much choice. It is in the recent past (current week or so), so Umana assumes the plan is still good — until you fill in your timesheet and confirm or refute it.