Email Alerts for Time Off

What are the available email alerts for time off?

Purpose: To show you how to create each of the different email alerts for time off information in BambooHR. Time off email alerts are a great way to notify the appropriate co-workers when employees will be out of the office, have pending requests, or have made changes to requests.


Email Alerts

You can create time off email alerts to help you notify others when time off events are happening. To create a new email alert, go to Email Alerts in Settings and click +Add Alert. Select which time off email alert you would like to add.


Set alert information

  1. Send this alert to: Determine who will receive the email alert. The Admin Users option sends the alert to all users listed as Full Admins in Access Levels. The Manager option sends the alert to the manager of the employee who triggered the alert. The Others option allows you to enter a specific employee, department, location, job title, division, or email address. This will send the alert to all individuals listed in the Others option.  
  2. When should this alert be sent?: Determine when you would like this email notification to be sent to the recipients.
  3. Alert Customizations (Optional): Enter a custom email subject heading and message to include in the email alert. Please keep in mind that this setting applies to all recipients of the alert. They will receive the same custom message.
  4. This alert will include: Click Edit to determine which employees will affect the alert.

Once you have saved the email alert, it will automatically send when triggered. Find examples of each time off email alert below.

The Pending Time Off Requests and the Time Off Reminder alerts will automatically default to Full Admin Users under the Send this alert to... setting. You may change this setting, but please note that the Manager setting is based off of who the employee "Reports To" rather than the Manager Access Levels set up in BambooHR.  


Pending Time Off Requests

The Pending Time Off Request alert notifies you when an employee submits a time off request, and it is not approved or denied within a specific time frame. This alert bases on the submission date and sends basing on the time frame specified in the alert.

The automatic default settings for this alert include a Weekly alert to be sent at 3:00 a.m. (American/Denver), with requests submitted 2 days ago.  You do have the option to adjust these default settings if you wish. The options for those include:

  • Schedule: Determine how often you would like this alert to send (Daily, Weekly, Monthly, or Quarterly).
  • Time: Select what time it should send on those specific days. In the screenshot above, the alert will send at 3:00 a.m. (America/Denver time). 
  • Include time off requests submitted more than: Decide which requests should be related to the alert by selecting to include requests within a specific amount of days prior.

If you have set up this alert today for requests submitted more than 0 days ago, it will not send if the scheduled time has passed. In the example above, the alert schedules to send at 3:00 a.m. (America/Denver time). If I update this alert after 3:00 a.m. and set it to include requests submitted more than 0 days ago, it will not catch the requests for today because the scheduled time has already passed. 

If an employee submits a time off request and then transfers to a new manager, the request will remain with their previous manager. A Full Admin user can approve the pending request, or the employee can cancel the request and resubmit it for their new manager to approve.

Note: If your time off requests require multiple people to approve, this email alert will send to all recipients until all approvers have approved or denied the time off request.

Time Off Approved

The Time Off Approved alert notifies you when a user approves a time off request. This is an event-based alert, which means the alert is triggered once a request is approved. 

Time Off Balance

The Time Off Balance Alert notifies the selected employees of their current time off balances according to a specific schedule. This alert helps employees to stay aware of how much time off they have available.

The Time Off Balance alert includes the following:

  1. Send this alert to: Since this email alert notifies employees of their time off balances, you have the option to send it to all employees. If you want to filter which employees should receive the alert, click Edit.
  2. When do you want to be alerted?
    • Frequency: Select how often you would like your employees to receive an email alert regarding their balances (Weekly, Bi-weekly, Semi-monthly, Monthly, Quarterly, or Semi-annually). We recommend setting this alert to send with your pay schedule.
    • Time: Select what time you would like the alert to send on those specific days. In the screenshot above, the alert will send at 6:00 a.m. (America/Denver time). 
    • Day of the Week: Select your pay date. This will change depending on the frequency you set. In the example above, I selected "Monthly" so I only need to select one pay date each month. 
    • Start sending alerts: Select when you would like to start sending the alert.
  3. View and Adjust Alert Dates: When you click this button, all of the projected future dates for the current year (based on your frequency) will appear. An editing pencil icon will be available when hovering over each date. Clicking on that icon will allow you to change a specific date if needed. This option helps you ensure the email alert will send when needed. Please note this email alert will only send out for the current year. If you would like the alert to continue into the new calendar year, you will need to edit the alert and change the start date at the beginning of each year. 
  4. Include Time Off Balances: Select which time off categories you would like to include in the time off balances alert.

You can set up multiple versions of this email alert. If some of your employees are on a bi-weekly pay frequency and others are on a semi-annual pay frequency, you can create two versions of the alert and use this setting to decide which group receives which alert.

Time Off Denied

The Time Off Denied alert notifies you when a time off request is denied. This is an event-based alert, which means the alert is triggered once a request is denied.

Time Off Reminder

The Time Off Reminder alert sends a notification based on the start date of an employee's approved time off request. For example, you can have the alert triggered a specific number of days before or after a time off start date.

In addition to the setup information above, the Time Off Reminder alert includes the following:

When should this alert be sent?

  • Reminder: Determine how many days before or after a time off request you would like the alert to send. Add other reminders by clicking +Add Reminder and check the box for Send me an alert on the time off start date
  • Send Alerts at: Select what time you would like the alert to send on those specific days. In the screenshot above, the alert will send at 3:00 a.m. (America/Denver time).

The email alert will list the following information about the time off request:

  • Employee's name
  • Approved Time Off Date(s)
  • Time Off Amount
  • Time Off Category

The manager will receive a consolidated email notification if there is more than one person scheduled to be out of the office during the time frame specified in the Time Off Reminder alert.

Time Off Request Changed

The Time Off Request Changed alert notifies the recipient when an employee changes the dates* of a time off request. This is an event-based alert, which means the alert is triggered once a request has changed.

*If an employee cancels a time off request instead, this alert will not send. Only the person set as the approver on the request will receive an email notification about the canceled request. 

Time Off Requested Event

The Time Off Requested Event alert notifies you when an employee submits a time off request. This is an event-based alert, which means the alert is triggered once a time off request is submitted.

When an email alert is triggered and if its recipient is an employee, they will receive the alert as long as they have an active status in BambooHR. The recipient does not need to be enabled with access to receive an email alert. An employee with an inactive status will not receive an email alert.