Define working hours and availability for your team

Stop guessing who can work this week. Set each person’s hours and availability once, then build every schedule from one place — across all your locations.

When your team’s regular days, school nights, and “I can’t come in” times live in Easyteam, you spend less time chasing texts and more time running the store. You, your managers, and the AI Scheduler all plan from the same picture, so coverage stays solid and the weekly build goes faster.

Everyone is available at all times until you add working hours or availability. Your current schedules won’t change until you set this up.

On this page

• Which one should you use?
• Set working hours for your team
• Add availability for school, appointments, and one-off changes
• Get the most out of working hours and availability
• See it on the schedule
• Let managers or staff update availability
• Troubleshoot working hours and availability

Which one should you use?

Working hours are the regular week — the days and times a person can be scheduled at all. Availability covers everything else: something that ends, repeats every other week, or needs a visible reason on the schedule.

Working hours come first. Availability works inside them.

Set working hours for your team

Working hours are the days and times each person can be scheduled — and Easyteam holds you to them. Set them once on the staff member’s profile, and nobody gets put on a shift outside those hours, whether you build the week by hand or use the AI Scheduler.

That is the fastest way to capture store rules like “Maria never works Sundays” or “the closing team is never scheduled before 2 PM,” and keep those rules consistent across every location you manage.

Steps:

1. Go to Staff and open the staff member.
2. In the Working hours card, click Manage working hours.
3. Optional: If someone else already works the same days, click Copy from another staff to bring in their hours, then adjust.
4. For each day of the week, turn the day on or off. For days that are on, set the start and end time. Days that are off show Not available for scheduling.
5. Click Save.

If the location already has operating hours, Easyteam fills those in as a starting point. Otherwise the person starts as available all day (Available for scheduling at all hours.).

On the Staff table, a Working hours column shows the same summary. You can show or hide it from the View menu.

Copy working hours from another staff member

If several people at the same store work the same days, copy hours instead of setting them one by one.

Steps:

1. Open Manage working hours for the staff member you are updating.
2. Click Copy from another staff.
3. Search for a staff member who already has working hours, review the preview, and apply it.
4. Click Save.

What this does on the schedule

• Days or times outside working hours appear grey, and the + button does not show — so you are not tempted to add a shift there.
• Easyteam will not save a shift outside those hours.
• The AI Scheduler will not schedule someone outside their working hours.
• If you later tighten someone’s hours and draft shifts already exist, those drafts stay put. Easyteam warns you that some of them may no longer fit.

Add availability for school, appointments, and one-off changes

Use availability when someone’s usual hours stay the same, but they have a preference or a hard no for a specific date or a repeating pattern — class on Tuesday nights through May, every other Saturday, or a family event next week.

Blocks show as labeled tiles on the schedule, so any manager can see the reason while they build the week. That is especially helpful when you run more than one store and are not always the person creating the schedule.

Availability is not the same as time off, and it is not the Prefer / Available / Unavailable responses staff use on open shifts.

Preferred vs Required

When you mark someone Unavailable, choose how strict it is:

• Preferred — Easyteam warns you, but you can still schedule them if you need the coverage.
• Required — Easyteam will not let you (or the AI Scheduler) put them on a shift during that time.

Available blocks are always Preferred. There is no “Required available.”

A full-day Required unavailability also hides the + button, so nobody accidentally adds a shift that day.

Create an availability or unavailability block

You can create blocks from the schedule on web or mobile: hover + on a row or cell, use + Add on mobile, or edit an existing availability tile.

Steps:

1. Go to Schedules.
2. Hover an empty cell and click +, or use + Add on mobile, then open the Availability tab.
3. Choose Unavailable or Available (default is Unavailable).
4. Select the Staff member. Admins and managers can choose anyone; staff members can only create blocks for themselves.
5. For Unavailable, set Type to Preferred or Required (admins and managers).
6. Choose the Date. Leave All day on, or turn it off to set a start and end time.
7. Optional: Turn on Repeat and choose whether it ends Never or On a date.
8. Optional: Add Notes so any manager can see why the person is unavailable.
9. Click Save.

![Managers can choose the Preferred or Required type on blocks]](https://storage.crisp.chat/users/helpdesk/website/-/9/3/1/4/931439f481791800/image_xgcfht.png)

Edit, repeat, or delete

Blocks can repeat every 1, 2, or 4 weeks, based on the weekday you chose. There is no daily or monthly option.

When you edit a repeating block, choose This date only or All occurrences from selected date.

When you delete a repeating block, choose This occurrence only or All occurrences.

Get the most out of working hours and availability

• Add a short note on availability so any manager — including at another location — understands why while they build the week.
• Use Required when the person truly cannot work. Use Preferred when you would rather not schedule them, but might still need them on a busy Saturday.
• Let staff keep their own school and appointment times up to date so you are not the bottleneck. See Let managers or staff update availability.
• Don’t fill the grid with repeating tiles for a permanent weekly pattern like “never works Sundays.” Use working hours instead so the schedule stays easy to read.

💡 Scheduling best-practice: Set a house rule so the schedule builds itself. Agree on: how much unavailability is reasonable, when it has to be in, and what a block should say. Something like "up to two unavailable days a week, one weekend day kept available, in by Wednesday, always with a short note." Then Friday's schedule takes just a couple of minutes instead of an afternoon, and just a few seconds with AI Scheduler - the grid already tells you Dana has class Tuesday nights through May, Marcus is at his second job every other Saturday.

See it on the schedule

Working hours and availability look different on the grid, so you can read the week at a glance:

• Outside working hours — grey cell, no +
• Availability blocks — labeled tiles: Available (preferred), Unavailable (preferred), or Unavailable (required), with All day or a time range. Hover to see the note when you are allowed to see it.

If a block overlaps a shift or approved time off on the same day, it collapses so the cell stays readable. On mobile, tap the collapsed indicator to peek at the block.

Admins and managers can click + on an Available tile to open Add Shift with the times already filled in. That creates a draft shift.

Availability blocks are not included on the printed schedule. For more information, refer to Print and share schedules.

To show or hide blocks, open the schedule View menu, find the Schedule section, and use the Availability checkbox (on by default).

The AI Scheduler follows the working hours and availability you set here. For more information, refer to Use AI scheduling to optimize shifts.

For day-to-day shift creation and publishing, refer to Create and manage employee schedules.

Let managers or staff update availability

You can keep availability as an admin-only task, or let managers and staff update it themselves. Letting the team maintain their own school nights and appointments cuts back-and-forth and keeps every location looking at the same, up-to-date schedule.

Steps:

1. From Easyteam, go to Settings.
2. Open Scheduling.
3. Under Availability, turn on or off:
4. • Allow managers to create and edit availability blocks
   • Allow staff members to create and edit availability blocks

What to expect:

• Admins can always create and edit availability for anyone, and can choose Preferred or Required.
• Managers can create and edit when the manager setting is on, including for other people, and can choose Preferred or Required.
• Staff can create and edit only when the staff setting is on, only for themselves, and only as Preferred. They can only edit blocks they created.
• Everyone can still see availability on the schedule, even if they cannot edit it.
• Working hours stay an admin task on the Staff page. These settings do not change that.

Troubleshoot working hours and availability

I can’t add a shift, or the + button is missing

The day is outside the staff member’s working hours, or there is a full-day Required unavailability on that date. Check the Working hours card on the Staff page and any Required tiles on that day. If someone is not schedulable at all, all seven of their working days may be turned off.

I can’t save an availability block on a certain day

The date or time is outside that person’s working hours, or they already have an availability entry on that date (only one per person per day). Widen their working hours on the Staff page, or pick a day and time that is already allowed. An Available block cannot open a day that is turned off — to free up a Saturday, turn Saturday on in working hours.

A manager or staff member can’t create or edit availability

Turn on the matching setting under Settings → Scheduling → Availability. Admins always have access.

The AI still scheduled someone during an availability block

The block was Preferred, not Required. Preferred is a soft preference that Easyteam warns about but allows. Use Required when the time must never be scheduled.

Staff can’t edit an availability block I created for them

Staff can only edit blocks they created themselves. Blocks created by an admin or manager are read-only to them.

The schedule is full of repeating availability tiles

A repeating block that never ends was used for a permanent weekly pattern. Edit it or use working hours for that so the grid stays clear.

View all Schedules articles

Updated on: 13/08/2026