How do I limit the number of employees who can be off at the same time?

2 min read By TimeOff Support

Use the Restrict leave overlap policy to control how many employees from a team or group can be away at the same time.

You can set either a maximum number of employees who may be absent or a minimum number who must remain available.

Set up a leave overlap restriction

Go to:

Settings → Employee policies → Restrict leave overlap

Create a new restriction group and give it a clear name, such as Customer Support or Warehouse Team.

Choose one of the following rules:

At most X employees absent — for example, no more than two employees can be away at once.
At least X employees present — for example, at least five employees must remain available.

Then choose what happens when the limit is reached:

Block the booking — the employee cannot submit the leave.
Allow the booking and record a warning — the booking continues, but a warning is recorded for the approver.

The group can include:

You can also exclude individual employees where required.

Yes. You can optionally set a Restricted period so the rule only applies between specific dates.

You can also use Limit to leave types if the restriction should apply only to particular types of leave, such as annual leave.

Leave these options blank if the restriction should apply at all times and to all leave types.

When finished, select Save changes.

Yes. Leave that is still awaiting approval counts towards the limit.

This means further requests can be blocked even before existing requests have been approved when the policy is set to Block the booking.

When the policy is set to Block the booking, it does not apply when an administrator adds leave on behalf of another employee.

This allows administrators to handle exceptional cases when necessary.

For a complete explanation of restricted periods, warning mode, employee groups and other options, see Restrict leave overlap.