HR settings

Every setting the HR module reads, on one page behind the hr.settings key. The rail groups them — Workforce (job roles, contract templates, starter forms, team tiers, worker groups), Policy (leave, time and pay, expenses, approvals, notice, disciplinary), Compliance, Joining, Time → Money and the Worker Portal — and the Switchboard lists them all with their defaults and a door to the tab that owns each. Four tabs matter before the first worker is on site: Sites (where labour is invoiced to), Check-in & Sites (how a worker proves they were there), Timesheets & Invoicing (how attendance becomes a timesheet) and Xero Coding (where the cost lands in Xero).

You enter

Sites: each site labour is invoiced to — name, address, schedule, whether it is active for HR, and its link to a Xero tracking option; or import the project codes already in Xero.
Check-in & Sites: per site the map pin, radius, check-in method, kiosk, site hours and break; for the group the face-check, location, NFC, paid-time, automatic check-out, reminder, manager-override and gate-tablet rules.
Timesheets & Invoicing: whether each project bills separately or a worker's projects roll into one timesheet per cycle, the billing cycle, an optional date to switch over on, submission timings, worker self-service and auto-submit.
Xero Coding: the GL account and tax type a subcontractor invoice is coded to when it is pushed, and which Xero contact each worker's bills belong to in each company.

Saral fills in

The Switchboard: every HR setting, its topic, the section that edits it, its default, whether it is changed, and whether an essential is still unset.
The code default wherever you leave a setting blank — the module ships with industry-standard values and says so under each editor, so a new account is never blank.
A Xero-backed site's Live / Closed status, read from its tracking option in Reference data (one owner), and the worker-to-contact links the auto-linker suggests from a worker's other links.
Settings owned elsewhere are shown read-only with a door to their editor — the Check-in tab's Set Elsewhere card is the worked example.

It produces

The rules every HR screen reads: which sites appear on the Site Register and in assignments, how a check-in becomes paid hours, how attendance is cut into timesheets and invoices, and the coding each invoice carries to Xero.
A readiness picture on the Switchboard — how many essentials are set — that the first-time setup wizard (HR → Set up HR) walks through step by step over the same stores.

What this page is for

A new account should not be blank and an old one should not be a mystery. The rail puts every HR setting in a named group; the Switchboard shows them all together so nothing is missed, and the first-time setup (HR → Set up HR) is a second door onto the same stores, mounted step by step. Each value lives in one place and is read by every HR screen that needs it. Every rule setting ships with a standard figure as its default and says so under the editor; a blank value inherits it, a changed one is marked on the Switchboard. Only someone with the hr.settings key opens the page; a few tabs need more — the Sites register needs proj.manage to write, DBS and Sponsorship need the vetting keys to read.

What to set first: sites, then check-in

Everything in HR hangs off a site: attendance is recorded against one, a timesheet is cut per site or per cycle, an invoice line is coded to its Xero project. So Sites comes first — create them, or import the tracking options the group already uses in Xero so each site arrives with its Xero link. Then Check-in & Sites: give each live site a map pin and a radius, choose how workers check in there (phone location, the site code, a card, a gate tablet) and set its hours and break, because paid time runs from site start to site finish. The group rules below the site list decide what a doubtful check-in does — a weak or faked location, a missed check-out — and the standard is always to wait for a manager, never to refuse anyone.

Then how attendance becomes money

Timesheets & Invoicing decides how the register is cut: Separate (one timesheet per project) or Consolidated (one per billing cycle, across a worker's projects), with a switch-over date so a change lands cleanly at a period boundary. The timings decide when a draft is chased, when it is submitted by itself, when the office is pinged about a pending one, and how long a worker waits before claiming a day the register has not yet backed. Worker self-service lets a worker submit their own timesheet; the two-person rule on payment batches keeps the person who approves from being the person who pays. Supplier invoices, beside it, is the same decision for professionals and agencies — their timesheet period, deemed approval and where their invoices go.

And where it lands in Xero

Xero Coding is the last link: the GL account and tax type a pushed subcontractor invoice carries, and the Xero contact each worker's bills belong to in each company of the group. A worker with no contact link cannot be pushed, which is why the auto-linker sits on this tab and suggests a match from the worker's other links. Saral produces and approves the CIS invoice and pushes it as a bill; the CIS return and the statements are done in Xero, and payroll runs in your payroll app — nothing on this page changes that.

What else is on the rail

Workforce: job roles, contract templates, starter forms and terms, team tiers and worker groups. Policy: leave and absence, time and pay (including the standard day hours a day rate is converted with, and the overtime rule layers with their tester), expenses, approvals and controls (the separation-of-duties switches, all off by default), notice periods, disciplinary and grievance. Compliance: the accreditations and policies autopilots, the employee handbook, data retention, DBS checks and sponsorship. Joining: onboarding, compliance and documents (the reminder points before a document expires), kit and equipment, training, the public worker pool form and the rates for hiring. Worker Portal: the walkthrough, the worker-record gate, notifications and messages. Each is a board of cards; a setting that only changes one screen stays on that screen.

The words of every email

Worker Portal → Email templates lists each email Saral sends a worker — the starter form invite and its reminder, the right-to-work re-check and expiry notices, the contract to sign, invoice approved and payment sent, leave approved and declined — with today's wording as the standard. Open one to change its subject, body and button for the whole account or for one company (a blank field inherits), in any of the portal's ten languages; a worker's preferred language, set on their record or by them on My settings, picks the variant written in it and falls back to English. The preview is rendered by the same function the send path uses, over sample facts; Send test to me mails it to your own address; every save is versioned and Reset returns to the standard. A tokenised email keeps its link: the body must carry the button, and the save refuses one that does not. Who the email is from is never here — the company profile and sending domains decide that.

Where the settings live

Here — this page is the owner of every HR setting, one tab per subject, and nothing on the main Settings page duplicates it. Facts other pages own are shown read-only with a door: a Xero-backed site's Live / Closed is its tracking option under Settings → Reference data, the group's companies and their Xero connections are under Settings → Companies & entities, and the bank-file formats a payment batch is written in are under Settings → Bank files & paying accounts. A Switchboard row that opens a tab here is the quickest way back to any of them.

Next screen: /hr/add-worker

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