Staff can ask to swap a shift with a colleague, drop a shift for someone else to pick up, or request cover. Once any colleague step is done, the request lands with a manager to approve. There are two places to review them.
Per-area queue
In a area's Rota builder, a Requests to review panel appears whenever something is awaiting your approval (it stays hidden when there's nothing to do). Each entry shows a Swap, Cover or Drop badge, the shift date and time, and who's involved.
Org-wide queue
For everything in one place, open Shift requests from the Requests link in the Rota overview header. Requests are grouped by the area they belong to. Use the filter chips — Awaiting approval, Awaiting colleague or All recent — to narrow the list.
Approving or denying
Press Approve to action the request. For a swap or cover this reassigns the shift to the new person; for a drop it opens the shift up.
Press Deny to turn it down. The requester (and the other person, on a swap or cover) is notified.
Use Add reply to include a short optional message to staff with your decision.
When approving is blocked
Approving runs the same safety checks as the rota builder. If the new person isn't qualified for that area, is excluded, or would be double-booked, the request can't be approved and you'll see a message such as *Can't approve — this would create a conflict or competency gap*. Resolve the underlying issue, or deny the request.
- 1Open the **Requests to review** panel in the area's **Rota** builder, or go to **Shift requests** from the **Rota overview** header
- 2Keep the filter on **Awaiting approval**
- 3Check the request type (**Swap**, **Cover** or **Drop**), the shift, and the people involved
- 4Optionally use **Add reply** to leave a note
- 5Press **Approve** to action it, or **Deny** to turn it down
- The per-area **Requests to review** panel only shows when action is needed, so an empty builder means nothing's waiting.
- A conflict or competency message on approval means the swap would break a rule — fix it or deny the request.
- The **Rota overview** shows a per-area request count so you can see at a glance where approvals are stacking up.