Import Hours Worked
How do I import hours worked for my employees?
Purpose: To show you how to import hours worked for your employees into BambooHR.
If you use BambooHR® Time Tracking, hours worked will automatically sync with your time off policy based on hours worked. You do not need to use the hours importer.
The Import Hours feature is available to the Account Owner, Full Admin users, and Payroll Admin users.
Import Hours
Navigate Settings and select Account on the left side. Click Import Hours. To start a new import, click New Hour Import.
1. Upload File
First, download the template file to ensure all information is organized correctly before importing. Once you have completed setting up the template file, be sure to save it as a CSV to import. Then, click Choose File to upload. After its upload, click Next Step to move on to match the fields.
The template file requires the following fields:
- Employee #: The employee number must match with an existing employee record.
- Hours Worked Date: When importing dates, you should always use mm/dd/yyyy format in your spreadsheet. If you have a different date format in your BambooHR account, the date will automatically switch to match your default date format.
- Rate Type (REG or OT): This determines if the hours worked are regular hours or overtime hours. The entries in this column must match exactly, i.e., REG and OT, and they must be in all caps.
- Hours Worked: Enter hours worked. Special characters, negative amounts, more than five numbers, and more than four decimal places are not accepted.
If you need to import Double Time or Holiday hours via the importer, you can use the following selections in your spreadsheet:
Double Time
- Pay Code: Double Time
- Rate Type: OT
Holiday
- Pay Code: Holiday
- Rate Type: REG
If you are using Payroll and your Double Time or Holiday hours receive a special rate of pay (1.5x or 2x the regular rate, etc.) you will need to manually add the difference in the rate of pay as a lump sum using an Extra Pay item when running payroll. Holiday hours when running payroll are paid at the employee's regular rate of pay. This is the same for all time off hours.
Optional fields
The following fields are optional in the template file. It is important to note that if you use the BambooHR® Payroll, none of these optional fields will sync over to Payroll. With the Payroll add-on, the best practice is to remove these fields from the template file before importing.
- Pay Code: Must be Holiday or Double Time
- Pay Rate: Maximum of five numbers, no more than four decimal points
2. Match Fields
If you have downloaded the template file to organize your data, the fields will automatically match up with the fields in BambooHR. Otherwise, you will need to match the column name in the Import File Column with the correct BambooHR Field. The Sample Data column gives you an example of which data in your spreadsheet maps to each field in BambooHR.
If you are not importing into an optional field and you have included it in your spreadsheet, click the X next to the field name to exclude it from the import. Once you have matched the fields, click Next Step to review your import data.
3. Review
1. The top section will show a red highlight in any fields of data that have errors. Click into the field to select a correct value or enter an accepted value. Once the row of data no longer has any errors, the page will move down to the bottom section automatically.
2. If you decide that you do not want to import a specific line of data, select the X on the left. This will remove only that line of data, and you can proceed with the rest of the import.
3. Fields highlighted in red show any data that needs attention. The importer will automatically fix some errors but some may need to be manually fixed before upload.
Once you have reviewed your data, select Import Hours to complete the import.
Employee #
No corrections applied
Hours Worked Date
If date can be detected it will change to MM/DD/YYYY format
Pay Rate
Rounded to four decimal places
Remove currency symbols
Rate Type (REG or OT)
REG - if the value starts with “reg” (case-insensitive), convert it to REG.
Examples that would be corrected:
reg
Reg
regular
regulatory
reg12345
Examples that would NOT be corrected:
RG
rge
REF
refular
[empty]
OT - if the value starts with “ot” (case-insensitive) OR “over” (case-insensitive), convert it to OT.
Examples that would be corrected:
ot
Ot
other
Overtime
Over-time
Over Time
Examples that would NOT be corrected:
o
TO
Obertime
time over
[empty]
Hours Worked
Rounded to four decimal places
Pay Code
If the value is a case-insensitive match, correct it to a case-sensitive match.
Examples that would be corrected: (Corrected to Holiday or Double Time)
holiday
holiDay
hOlIdAy
Double time
double Time
DouBle Time
Examples that would NOT be corrected:
Hooliday
Doube Time
Extra Hours
[empty]
A Project Name and Task Name field will be added to the importing experience.
The downloadable template will include these two fields for you to fill out. You must match the Project/Tasks names to exactly how they are set up in BambooHR through Project Tracking settings. The process for importing will remain the same as outlined in this guide.
Once you import your employees' hours into BambooHR, hours worked within the pay period will automatically pull into your scheduled payroll when you click Start Payroll on the Payroll tab. Please keep in mind that imported hours will not sync with off-cycle payrolls.
Hours added in BambooHR will automatically pull into Payroll.
No hours will sync for salary-exempt employees. You can add any additional holiday hours as extra pay while running payroll one by one per employee.
If you import over hours that have already been imported for a specific date, sometimes the hours will stack rather than override the current hours in payroll, even if you delete the import and start over. For this reason, if you have imported inaccurate hours, we suggest creating a new template with the difference in hours and reimporting the new template.
Navigate to view the history of imports. Then, select the date of the import you'd like to view.
You can then view the import results of that specific hours import. If you want to see more detailed employee information regarding previous imports and filter them by date range, check out the Approved Hours report.
Need to delete a previous import?
Select Delete Import in the top-right to remove the entire import. If you need to remove specific lines of data, select the lines you want to delete, and then choose Delete Rows. If you use BambooHR Payroll, please see this section above before deleting the import.