Employees need their days off for many reasons: vacations, medical visits, etc. You need to accommodate some instances where their personal lives will have to take priority over the work. 

A time off request form will allow employees to request time off from their work duties to attend to other personal matters or to just relax for a while and come back more focused and motivated to continue contributing to the business.

It is an inevitable part of the work cycle, and you need to be ready when that happens. In this guide, you will learn how a time-off request form is implemented and what its proceedings and formal documentation should be to record these instances of employee time-off requests. Also, we will provide you with templates to help you make your own.

Having the proper documentation regarding an employee's time off request is important. These forms will allow the employer to reschedule work hours if they are informed about certain time off requests in advance.

There are other important reasons to have a time off request form ready for your employees, such as:

• Company Compliance: Using a time off request form will allow employees to ensure they comply with their own paid time off policy. It’s also essential to manage employees properly. Even if you are in a state that doesn't obligate you to comply with a union contract regarding time off, they will require employers to apply their own policy correctly.

• Federal Compliance: Some states would have laws allowing employee leaves, including paid sick days. In those cases, the employer doesn't need to approve time, but they should document that they used the leave. These laws also may include penalties and potential fees for non-compliance.

If you are creating your own time off request form or using a template, some fields need to be included and filled regarding an employee time off request for proper record keeping. 

The most relevant information to be included is:

• Name or ID Number: You need this to identify who is submitting the request to maintain the employee's leave balance or for auditing purposes.

• Date of Request: When the employee requested time off. It will be useful to prioritize which requests to accept and if your policy requires you to submit requests in advance.

• Time Off Beginning Date and End Date: It is necessary to track how many days off the employee takes. It helps to keep tabs on how many days an employee has already taken off. 

• Number of Hours Requested: It is a good idea for the employee to write down the total number of working hours they'll be taking off. 

• Reason: You need to track why an employee has taken time off for reporting purposes and maintain an accurate leave balance based on your paid time off policy.

• Employee Signature and Supervisor Approval: This field is to make sure that all the parties are aware of such requests and agree to leaves that will require a supervisor's approval.

Here are some of the instances where an employee might require to have time off:

• Sickness: If an employee gets ill or fighting off a disease or prolonged illness. 
• Injury: If the employee sustains a major injury that will require rehabilitation or might result in immobility for it. 
• Bereavement: If the employee needs some time off to grieve the death of a loved one. 
• Maternity: Whenever one of your employees gets pregnant, they will need a maternity leave soon or some rest time recommended by the doctor.
• Vacation: An employee can request time off to go on a planned vacation (as long as some vacation days are left).
• Family Care: If an employee’s family member becomes sick or suffers an injury, they might request some time off.
• Military Duty: If military members get called to active duty, they will require some time off.
• FMLA: The Family and Medical Leave Act will allow employees to take job-protecting unpaid time off for specific medical reasons. This could be to handle chronic health issues of the employee or a family member for 12 weeks. They can apply for this after 12 months of employment.

You should consider several practices, so you don’t have any issues regarding time off request forms.

Make a Policy Whenever Many People Want to Take the Same Day Off

There are many questions that a company should consider when stating its time off policies. Does seniority influence priority? Is it "first come, first serve"? Does the reason influence the decision on who gets it and who doesn't?

A union contract may dictate how many days off you must approve, so you need to ensure that your policy matches the business' legal obligations.

Set Up the Rules Clearly

Place reasonable rules around asking for time off. Suppose you want people to request only up to two months in advance. In that case, you could limit your employee's ability to plan trips with family or friends or even get reasonable vacation prices. 

Separate Requests For Vacation Days Off From Medical Time Off

Some laws require you to provide time for employees to see doctors to receive therapy or treatments and also to provide time for sick days.

Most of the time, employees can only see the doctor at their office whenever the doctor gives them a particular appointment. These requests need priority as employees won't be able to reschedule their work time or their visits easily.

Keep It Private For the Employee

Digging for information about why employees require their time off will make them feel they need to always justify it. Time off is their time, whether they want to stay relaxed at home or visit a foreign country.

If there are conflicts because people want the same days off, you can prioritize based on the planned activity. Otherwise, if an employee wants time off and has the available vacation time (and the company can do well without them), you should give them days off. 

Don’t Revoke an Already Approved Time Off

You’ll be in trouble if you revoke an approved time off request, as they might already plan everything for those days. Don’t treat your employees poorly!

Now that you understand a time off request form and how a formal request should be composed, you are ready to write one of your own. But starting it from scratch can be a daunting task to carry over. 

That's why we will provide you with some great time off request templates to give you a head start. All you require is to have Microsoft Word already installed on your PC.

If you need a CD key for Word, you can purchase Microsoft Office 2021 Professional Plus Key Retail Global at the RoyalCDKeys store. You will get the latest version of Office, including the Microsoft Word program and Excel, Access, Outlook, PowerPoint, and many more.

Time Off Request Form Template

This template contains everything you need to make a proper time off request form. All the necessary information is already established and divided into categories. It also includes an additional field to write down some comments, if needed.

You can download it from TemplateLab.

Basic Time Off Request Form Template

This template goes as basic and simple as it can get. Everything is set up in one sheet with all the needed information to fill out a time off request form. 

You can download it from FitSmallBusiness.

Simple Time Off Request Form Template

This template is divided into four different sections. It begins with the employee information, followed by the reason for their time off, with many options. 

Then, you will have a blank section for the employee to write down their reason for taking off those days. And finally, the employee's signature and the supervisor's signature.

You can download it from LeaveBoard.

Volunteer Time Off Request Form Template

If you allow employees to have time off to do volunteer work, this template might help you. This is specific to this situation, as all the information established gears toward that goal. 

The employee fills this form with their information (name, ID, and department) and where they will volunteer. Then, there is a field that representatives of the volunteer service organization must fill to finally give it to your supervisor and see if it will approve it with its signature.

You can download it from TemplateLab.