On Duty Request

A man was working, just not where a reader could see him. This screen gets the day approved as on duty, working from home, field work, training or a client visit, so it counts as attended instead of absent.

Where

Time Management › Transactions › On Duty Request

Who uses it

The employee, approved by his manager

When

Before the day where it can be planned, otherwise straight after

Needs first

Nothing beyond the employee and an approval route

What it is for

A reader can only record who walked past it. Everything else a company legitimately does with its people looks identical to absence: a sales officer at dealers all day, an engineer at a client plant, four men on a training course, a manager working from home with a fever.

This screen is the approved statement that the day was worked elsewhere. Once it is approved, the day reaches attendance as a day present rather than an absence, which is the whole purpose. The screen tells you whether that has happened yet, so you are never guessing.

It is the right answer for a field team, and a better one than geofencing. Geofencing Locations can only answer "was he standing at one of these places". It cannot answer "was he doing something useful", and a list of every dealer in Karachi is not a list anyone will maintain. An on duty day is approved by the man's manager, who does know.

The request carries a period and one line per day inside it, with times where the client wants the hours recorded. For a plain whole day, the date is all that is needed.

Note what it is not. It is not leave, so it costs no balance. It is not an attendance correction, which is an Employee Attendance Request for a day he was at the gate and the reader missed him. And it is not an excuse for a mark on a day he was present, which is an Exemption Request.

Every field, in plain words

Basic Data

Field	What it means	What to put in it	Notes
Transaction	The document number.	Fills itself. Leave it.
Transaction Date	The date the request is made.	12-Mar-2026	Required.
Employee	Who was or will be on duty elsewhere.	EMP-0318	Required. Pick from the list.
Name	Their name.	Saima Khalid	Fills itself. Leave it.
Request Type	What kind of away day it is.	FIELD	Required. The five values are below.
From Date	The first day the request covers.	16-Mar-2026	Required.
To Date	The last day it covers.	18-Mar-2026	Required.
Total Days	How many days the request covers.	Fills itself. Leave it.
Work Location	Where the work was actually done.	Al-Karam dealer network, Hyderabad	Write something real. It is what the approver reads, and what anybody auditing the request later has to go on.
Purpose	Why.	Quarterly dealer stock audit	Required.
Status	Where the request has got to.	Fills itself from the approval. Leave it.
Approved By	Who approved it.	Fills itself on approval. Leave it.
Approved Date	When it was approved.	Fills itself on approval. Leave it.
Reached Attendance	Whether the approved days have been written into attendance yet.	Fills itself. Leave it.	This is the field to look at when somebody says an approved on duty day still shows as absent.
Remarks	Anything else.	Travel approved by GM Sales

The Request Type values:

• OD On Duty - company work away from his normal place, where none of the others fits. The general purpose choice.
• WFH Work From Home - he worked, from home. Use it so the client can count how much of it is happening.
• FIELD Field Work - a sales or service day spent at customers. The usual choice for a field team.
• TRAIN Training - a course, internal or outside. It keeps training days separate from ordinary away days, which is what a client reviewing training spend wants.
• CLIENT Client Visit - a visit to a named customer. Use it where the client wants customer facing time counted separately from general field work.

Details

One line per day the request covers.

Field	What it means	What to put in it	Notes
Line #	The line number.	Fills itself. Leave it.
Date	The day being claimed.	16-Mar-2026	Required on every line. Each day inside the period needs its own line.
From Time	When the work started.	09:00	Leave both times empty for a plain whole day.
To Time	When it finished.	18:00
Hours	The hours worked that day.	9	Fill it where the client records hours for away days, for example to see whether a field day is a real day.
Posted	Whether this day has reached attendance.	Fills itself. Leave it.	A day not posted is a day still showing as whatever the reader said.
Remarks	A note on the day.	Four dealers in Latifabad

How to configure it

1. Agree with the client which of the five request types they actually want to tell apart. Most want field work, training and work from home separated and nothing more.
2. Set up the approval so the request reaches the person's manager.
3. The employee opens the screen, picks the Request Type, sets From Date and To Date, writes a real Work Location and a Purpose.
4. He adds a line per day. For a plain day the Date alone is enough. Where the client wants hours, he fills From Time and To Time.
5. He saves and sends it for approval.
6. The manager approves it. Check Reached Attendance afterwards, then look at the days on Employee Attandance and confirm they are no longer absences.
7. Do this before the Payroll Attendance sheet is made for the period.

Scenarios

"Our sales team is never at the office and every day shows absent"

This screen, Request Type FIELD, raised weekly rather than daily. Do not try to solve it with geofencing and a list of dealers, and do not let HR mark the days present by hand, which leaves no record of who authorised what.

"Four men are on a boiler safety course for three days"

One request each, Request Type TRAIN, From Date and To Date covering the course, three lines each. Three days that would otherwise be absences, now counted and visible as training.

"He worked from home because his child was ill"

Request Type WFH if he genuinely worked, leave if he did not. The honest distinction matters, because a work from home day costs no leave balance and a client who lets it stand in for sick leave loses the ability to see either.

"It is approved and the day still shows absent"

Look at Reached Attendance on the header and Posted on the line. If they say the day has not reached attendance, it has not, and the day is still whatever the reader made of it. If they say it has, pull the day again on Employee Attandance and look there.

"He was at the gate, the reader just did not read his finger"

That is not this screen. Raise an Employee Attendance Request, which corrects the punch. Using an on duty request for a missed punch makes the client's field work figures meaningless.

What it is connected to

• Employee Attandance is where an approved day lands, as a day present rather than an absence.
• Payroll Attendance counts what it finds when it is made, so an approval after the sheet exists needs the sheet remaking.
• An Employee Attendance Request is the right document for a day at the gate with a missed punch.
• An Exemption Request is the right document for a day he was present but carries a late, early or half day mark.
• Geofencing Locations is the alternative for people who work away from a reader but always at one of a few known places.
• It costs no leave balance, so the Leave Group has nothing to do with it.

If something looks wrong

• "It will not save" - Purpose is empty, or a line has no Date. Both are required.
• "It is approved but the day still shows absent" - Reached Attendance or the line's Posted says it has not been written yet. Until it is, the reader's verdict stands.
• "The payslip deducted the day anyway" - the Payroll Attendance sheet was made before the approval. Remake it.
• "There is nobody to approve it" - the employee's reporting line is not set on his organisation assignment, so the request has nowhere to go.
• "Half the team's field days are missing" - requests were raised for the period but never approved. An unapproved request changes nothing at all.