Shift Masking

If a Working Normal Shift schedule record is covered (or partially covered) by a Schedule Exception, the portion of the shift that is covered is considered masked. For example, if an employee is scheduled to work 7:00 am to 4:00 pm but takes a half-day of vacation, half of the shift is "masked" by the vacation exception. This masking is indicated on the Schedule Page daily views by showing the shift records in a light gray font when they are masked by other exceptions. Basically, a masked shift record is ignored by ARCOS, and not displayed.

Shift records which fall on a Holiday have always been treated as masked, meaning ARCOS ignores them and does not display them.

Other functions that Shift Masking affects:

1. Overrides: Consider an employee who has a scheduled shift, but is also on an exception, such as Vacation. A callout is performed, and Vacation is checked as an override. In the past, the employee would NOT be called, because ARCOS still considered them not available due to their shift. With the new shift masking, their Vacation record masks the shift record, so ARCOS considers them Available for the callout.

2. Cumulative Hours Worked Calculation: Many companies have an indicator on the Working page that turns an employee's row yellow or red based on how many hours they have worked. In the past, shift hours which were masked by an exception were actually counted into the Cum Hours calculation. Also, many companies have Rest Rules which perform a similar Cumulative Work calculation in order to determine if an employee should be placed on Rest. "Masked" shift records are no longer included in these calculations.

3. Schedule Record Detail Popup: If a shift is masked, even partially, there is an indicator in the Schedule Record detail popup that says, "Masked by exception?" YES.

4. Auto Release: When an employee is working a callout which is leading up to the start of their scheduled shift, ARCOS  auto-releases them from the callout at the start of that shift. With this change, a "masked" shift can no longer cause the employee to be auto-released. This is equivalent to the behavior on a holiday. An employee's shift on a holiday is ignored, and the employee is not auto-released.

5. Grace Period (doesn't apply to all companies): Grace Period is the time period before or after a shift in which the employee is excused from callouts. A masked shift record is no longer considered for this rule.

6. Ignored Exception Types: (doesn't apply to all companies) Certain schedule exception types are always ignored by ARCOS, in terms of an employee's availability to be called on a callout. These ignored exceptions DO still cause shift masking. Therefore, if a person is on a shift, and on an ignored exception type, they are considered available for a callout.

7. Unavailable Status Via Inbound: (doesn't apply to all companies) When an employee makes himself Unavailable via the ARCOS inbound system, his schedule is updated to put him on Unavailable status until the start of his next shift. With this change, a masked shift is NOT considered when searching for the start of his next shift.

8. Holdover Via Schedule Exception Page: Holdover (aka Extended Day, Continuation of Day, etc.) schedule records can be created by some companies by using the Schedule Exception page. If the exception that you try to create is going to overlap a shift record already in place, your Holdover record will end at the start of that shift. A "masked" shift record is  no longer considered when searching for the upcoming shift.

9. Exceptions at the End of a Shift: If an employee has an exception covering the end of his shift, on the working page, instead of a checkbox to hold him over, an "M" displays, meaning the end of the record is masked and therefore the employee cannot be held over.

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*Note: Not all companies have all of the items described in the Online Help.

*Please note, the ARCOS online documentation is a living document that is always under review. If you see information that is inconsistent with the behavior in the application, or you do not see a page covering an ARCOS feature you would like to know more about, please contact the ARCOS Support Center.