What the cost figure means

The schedule can show what a week is likely to cost, so you know whether next week is over budget before you publish it. In this video you'll see where the rates come from, where the estimate appears, and, just as important, what that number is not. Rates come in with your roster. Open Staff, then Import, and paste the spreadsheet. Alongside the usual columns, name, employee ID, role, employment type and contracted hours, add an Hourly Rate column. Grace's rate isn't known yet, so hers is left blank. Press Check it. You see exactly what would be imported before anything is saved, including the new roles. Tick them, and import. Rates are kept apart from everything else. Only owners, admins and schedulers can see them. A nurse never sees anyone's rate, including on the schedule. Here's next week, planned. Beside the warnings is the estimated labor cost: the scheduled hours multiplied by each person's rate. It's there to tell you whether next week is over budget before you publish it. It says partial, because Grace has no rate on file, so her shifts aren't counted. Add her rate with another import, and the estimate becomes complete. The same estimate appears as you add a shift. Press Add a shift, and under the times you'll see the paid hours and an estimated cost, labeled a budgeting estimate, not a pay figure. Be clear about what this figure is. It's scheduled hours times the rates you entered, and nothing more. It doesn't know about overtime rules, shift differentials, taxes, or anything your payroll provider does. It isn't a pay statement, and nobody is paid from it. Treat it as a planning number. If you need your rates elsewhere, Exports has a Staff roster with rates file: the same roster plus hourly cost, again a budgeting estimate, never a wage figure, and not a file to leave in a shared folder. So the labor figure is simple: scheduled hours times the rates you entered with your roster, shown on the schedule and as you add shifts, and marked partial when someone has no rate. Use it to plan and to stay on budget. It's an estimate, never a wage.