Managing Designated Days and Company Holidays

Designated days are company-wide days off that appear on everyone's calendar. Use them for bank holidays, office closures, and mandatory leave periods.

What Are Designated Days?

Designated days are dates when:

• The office is closed
• No work is expected from employees
• The day doesn't count against individual annual leave balances

Common examples include bank holidays, Christmas shutdown periods, and company celebration days.

Accessing Designated Days

To manage designated days:

1. Click Designated Days from the Admin section of the navigation menu
2. You'll see a list of all designated days for the current year
3. You can add, edit, or remove days from here

Adding a Designated Day

To add a new designated day:

1. Go to Designated Days
2. Enter the date
3. Add a name or description (e.g., "Christmas Day", "Memorial Day")
4. Optionally tick Half Day if the office closes early rather than all day (see below)
5. Click Create Designated Day

Half-Day Designated Days

Some company closures are half days rather than full days — for example, Christmas Eve or New Year's Eve when the office closes at lunchtime. Team Toggle supports this:

• When adding a designated day, tick the Half Day checkbox
• Half-day designated days count as 0.5 days instead of 1 against leave allowances
• They appear on the calendar with a lighter colour and a half-day badge
• The designated days list shows a Half Day badge next to the date

Importing Public Holidays

Instead of adding public holidays manually, you can import them automatically for your country:

1. Go to Designated Days
2. In the Import Public Holidays panel, select your country from the dropdown
3. Choose the year you want to import
4. Click Import

The importer supports 35+ countries and handles floating holidays automatically (e.g., "third Monday of January" for Martin Luther King Day, "last Monday of May" for Memorial Day or Spring Bank Holiday). Dates that already exist in your list are skipped to avoid duplicates.

Company Closure Periods

Many organisations close for extended periods, such as between Christmas and New Year. To add a closure period:

1. Add each day of the closure as a separate designated day
2. Name them clearly (e.g., "Christmas Shutdown", "Office Closed")
3. Use the Half Day option for any days where the office closes early rather than all day

How Designated Days Affect Leave

When someone requests leave that includes a designated day:

• Automatic exclusion – The designated day is not counted against their leave balance
• Calendar display – The day still appears on the calendar but is marked differently
• Balance calculation – Only actual working days are deducted

Example

If someone books Monday to Friday and Wednesday is a designated day (bank holiday):

• They use 4 days of annual leave (Mon, Tue, Thu, Fri)
• Wednesday is automatically excluded
• They're still off all week, but only 4 days come from their allowance

Designated Days and Smart Suggestions

Team Toggle's Smart Suggestions feature uses designated days to calculate efficiency:

• Suggestions are optimised around bank holidays
• Taking leave adjacent to designated days maximises time off
• The more designated days you add, the better the suggestions

Make sure all your bank holidays are entered so team members get the most accurate recommendations.

Removing Designated Days

To remove a designated day:

1. Go to Designated Days
2. Find the day you want to remove
3. Click the delete icon
4. Confirm the deletion

To remove all designated days for a year at once, use the Delete All button at the bottom of the list. This is useful when re-importing holidays for a new year.

Designated Days and Policy Settings

Designated days only appear on the calendar and count against allowances for team members whose policy has Mandatory Days enabled:

• Go to Policies and edit the relevant policy
• In the Leave Entitlement section, tick Mandatory Days
• Save the policy

If different team members are on different policies, each policy's Mandatory Days setting is respected independently. This means you can have some groups who observe designated days and others who don't.

Planning Ahead

For the best experience:

• Import next year's holidays early – Use the auto-import feature by October or November so Smart Suggestions can factor them in
• Add company-specific days – After importing public holidays, add any additional office closures or half-day finishes
• Communicate changes – Let staff know about any unusual closure dates

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