Available shifts

Create open shifts for employees to apply to and make unassigned shifts available

Christina avatar
Written by Christina
Updated over a week ago

This article was last updated November 30, 2023.

There are multiple ways to make a shift available in Sling.


โ€‹โ€‹Please note: Only shifts for the current and future dates can be made available.

Creating an available shift (web)

In the day or week view, you can hover your mouse over a date in the available shifts row and click on the plus sign (+) that appears.

A new window will pop up where you can enter the shift details.

NEW! Now it is also possible to create a recurring available shift. Simply select to make the recurrence details visible so that you can select how you want the shift to repeat.

Premium accounts will also see a field to designate how many slots need to be filled, as well as the option to apply Shift templates instead (to the right of "Custom"). Business accounts can also assign Tags to the shift. To see the details for tags, tasks, or shift notes, click their corresponding icons in the upper right of the shift modal:

Once you have all your details entered, you'll want to choose which publishing option you want to apply. Leaving the switch on "No" will add the shift to the calendar, but it will be invisible to employees. Switching it to "Yes" will publish the individual shift when you click Save and will alert any employee assigned to the same position and location as the shift.

If you need to make any changes to the shift, you can click it to do so. An unpublished shift will automatically provide the option for you to edit it. A published shift will simply require you to select the option to edit the shift.


Making unassigned shifts available

Move all unassigned shifts

If you have existing shifts in the Unassigned row and want to make them available, it's very easy to move them.

Go to the week or month view of the Schedule and click the Auto button toward the center-top of the page. Select Make all unassigned shifts available and you will see all the unassigned shifts moved to available shifts.

Move one shift at a time

Individual shifts can be moved by drag and drop. This applies to unassigned shifts as well as assigned shifts, so if an employee notifies you that they are not able to work a shift already assigned to them, you can move it easily and find coverage. Notice that you will need to re-publish the shift when moving it using drag and drop.

You can also click the shift to open its details and then click the options button (3 dots) to make a single shift available. This method keeps an already published shift published as available.

Lastly, you can select multiple shifts that you wish to make available, and then use the Auto button. In this case, Sling will only make available the shifts that you've selected, and will leave the others in the Unassigned section.

Notice that the shifts remain unpublished until you decide to publish them and make them visible to your employees!


Creating a new available shift (mobile app)

Go to the Shifts tab and then tap the options button (3 dots) at the top right of the screen. Choose Create shift.

On the next screen, enter all the shift details and make sure to switch the toggle shown to make it available.

Tap Save (top right) to add the shift to the schedule. You'll be prompted to choose whether it's added as unpublished (save as draft) or published.

Make an existing shift available

If you need to make an existing shift available from the app, go to the Full Schedule tab and tap the shift to open the details.

Then, tap the options button at the top right of the screen and choose Make shift available.

At the moment, there isn't an option to make all unassigned shifts available from the app, so if you need to do this, please log in using a browser on a desktop device.


Helpful links

Need some more information about how available shifts are visible? Go here.

Want to review the difference between Unassigned, Available, or Scheduled shifts? Check out this page.

More details on the difference between unassigned and available shifts here.

Learn how to build your schedule using unassigned shifts in this article.

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