Eploy Restricted Hours Visa Breach Prevention Features – Eploy

Eploy’s Restricted Hours Visa Breach Prevention features are a set of rules and settings that can prevent accidental breaches in employment of candidates who are restricted to the number of hours they are entitled to work in the UK.

For example, these features would apply to international students studying in the UK who hold a Tier 4 visa that restricted them to working a limited number of hours per week (typically 10 or 20) during term time.

The features are designed to prevent the following breaches regarding these candidates:

Employment of a candidate whose Visa has expired or is due to expire.
Booking a candidate to work regular weekly hours on one or more Placements where the total expected weekly hours exceeds the number of hours their visa permits.
Approving Timesheets for candidates that would take the hours they have worked during a single week above the total permitted by their visa.

The available features consist of the following:

A system rule that alerts users when a candidate’s visa had expired or is due to expire, and sets an inactive Candidate Employment Status when the expiry date is reached
A system setting that ensures that Placements created or modified for candidates with restricted hours visas have estimated weekly hours set against them, and that those hours, in conjunction with hours set on other Placements occurring during the same time period, do not not exceed the candidate’s visa weekly hours restriction
A system rule that checks existing Placements for candidates with restricted hours visas and alerts users if the estimated weekly hours, in conjunction with hours set on other Placements occurring during the same time period, exceed the candidate’s visa weekly hours restriction
A system rule that checks candidate-submitted Timesheets for candidates with restricted hours visas and alerts users if those hours, in conjunction with hours set on other Timesheets occurring during the same time period, exceed the candidate’s visa weekly hours restriction

Typical Setup

In order to effectively track international candidates who have working visas which restrict the number of hours per week they are permitted to work, the Eploy system and portals need to be configured to allow relevant data to be fed from various parties; the Candidate, the Hiring Manager and the Recruitment Team.

The diagram below represents the process that a typical Eploy setup will consist of, where a Candidate and Hiring Manager Portal are in place. Your setup may differ slightly from this if you don’t have both of these portals, or if you have limitations on some of them.

Explanation Of Restricted Hours Visa Breach Features

Visa Expiry Rule

This system rule continuously checks candidate records where the candidate has a visa and emails users* if the expiry date on their visa is nearing or has passed.

If the expiry date is nearing (see Visa Expiry Rule Settings for the Advance Warning Variable that controls how far in advance users should be warned), an alert is sent out daily.

If the expiry date has been reached/passed, a final alert is sent and the status of the Candidate is automatically changed to indicate that their visa has expired.

* Alert recipients are configured using the Visa Expiry Recipients variable in the Visa Expiry Settings

Placement Breach Prevention Setting

When this setting is activated, a number of conditions will be checked whenever a Placement is created or modified in the core Eploy system.

Firstly, the system will check if the candidate the placement is for holds a visa that restricts the number of weekly hours they are entitled to work. If this is not the case, there is no need for further action and the Placement can simply be saved.

If the candidate does have a restricted hours visa, the following conditions will also be checked:

Is the Candidate Status inactive? (For example, if the Candidate's visa has expired and their status has been set by the Visa Expiry Rule). If YES, the placement is prevented from saving and a message is displayed to the user.
Has ‘Time Worked’ been recorded against a relevant rate? If NO, the placement is prevented from saving and a message is displayed to the user.

Is one or more rate interval set to a value other than HOURLY? If YES, the Placement is prevented from saving and a message is displayed to the user.

Does the total ‘Time Worked’ on relevant rates for this Placement and other Placements for this candidate occurring during the same time period exceed the number of weekly hours the candidate is restricted to work (also taking into consideration the ‘hours worked elsewhere’ candidate field and the ‘placement restriction buffer’ variable)? If YES, the placement is prevented from saving and a message is displayed to the user.

The screenshot below shows an example of a message that will be displayed in this circumstance. The marked elements within the message show how you can breakdown the situation and understand why there is a breach. Please see the Placement Breach Prevention Settings section for more information on these elements.

If the user is restricted from saving the Placement record due to a breach, the only way to bypass this is by altering this placement or other concurrent placements to fit the accepted criteria, or to set the Placement Status to one of the exemplified statuses (defined in the Placement Breach Prevention Rule Settings).

Placement Breach Prevention Rule

This system rule can work alongside the Placement Breach Prevention Setting to continuously check existing Placements to ensure that they still do not take the candidate in breach of the weekly hours restriction their visa permits. It checks the same criteria as the setting, and takes the following action if any of the breaches listed in the section above occur on one or more concurrent Placements:

Emails user(s)* to notify them that a Placement breach has occurred.
Sets the status of the affected Placement(s) to the ‘Warning’ status to signify that they breach the candidate's weekly hours restriction.

In theory, if you have the Placement Breach Prevention Setting active, this rule should rarely be triggered, because Placements that cause a breach should be prevented from being created in the first place. However, a breach could possibly still happen for the following reasons:

A candidate's weekly ‘hours worked elsewhere’ field may change, causing one or more active or future Placements to breach.
Historic Placements that existed prior to activating the breach check may cause a breach.
If Placements can be created somewhere other than the Core Eploy system (e.g. the Hiring Manager Portal) they may have bypassed the check.

* Alert recipients are configured using the Placement Breach Recipients variable in the Placement Breach Prevention Settings

Timesheet Breach Prevention Rule

This system rule continuously checks timesheet records as they are submitted by candidates and and emails users* if one or more submitted timesheets breach the number of weekly hours permitted by their visa restrictions. It also sets a ‘warning’ status against the Timesheet to highlight that it is in breach. Timesheets with this warning status can be hidden from the Hiring Manager Portal, avoiding breached Timesheets from being authorised until the beach is rectified or exemplified by the recruitment team.

Firstly, the system will check if the candidate the timesheet is for holds a visa that restricts the number of weekly hours they are entitled to work. If this is not the case, there is no need for further action and no Timesheet alert is sent.

If the candidate does have a restricted hours visa, the following conditions will be checked:

Is the Candidate Status inactive? (For example, if the Candidate's visa has expired and their status has been set by the Visa Expiry Rule).
Is the Placement record set to a ‘Warning’ status? (i.e. has the Placement Breach Prevention Rule identified a breach and set the status accordingly?)
Does the total time submitted on relevant rates for this Timesheet and other Timesheets for this candidate occurring during the same time period exceed the number of weekly hours the candidate is restricted to work (also taking into consideration the ‘hours worked elsewhere’ candidate field and the ‘timesheet restriction buffer’ variable)?

* Alert recipients are configured using the Timesheet Breach Recipients variable in the Timesheet Breach Prevention Settings

Settings

The Restricted Hours Visa Breach Prevention features rely on a number of settings that will be discussed and agreed with the customer during implementation. These settings allow customers to choose how they prefer the features to work, e.g. who should be emailed when breaches occur, Statuses that will be relevant to each of the system rules and fields that will be used to identify candidates with restricted hours visas, visa expiry dates, weekly hour restrictions etc.

The settings fall under 3 categories; those that affect the Visa Expiry Rules, those that affect the Placement Breach Prevention Settings/Rules and those that affect the Timesheet Breach Prevention Rules.

Visa Expiry Settings

Setting Type	Setting Name	Setting Description
Field	Candidate Visa Flag	The field or custom question response on the Candidate record that signifies that the candidate has a restricted hours visa and that therefore the Breach Prevention features are applicable. E.g. you may have a question “Do you have a working visa that restricts the number of weekly hours you are entitled to work in the UK?” where a response of YES would indicate that Breach Prevention applies. Typically this field/question would be included on the Candidate registration form on the Candidate portal and would then be verified during right to work verification checks.
Field	Candidate Visa Expiry Date	The field or custom question on the Candidate record that represents the expiry date of the candidate's current visa. This is used by the Visa Expiry Rule to determine whether the candidate's visa has expired or is due to expire. Typically this field/question would be included on the Candidate registration form on the Candidate portal and would then be verified during right to work verification checks.
Variable	Advance Warning Variable	A predefined variable setting the number of days of advance warning to be given to signify that a candidate's visa is due to expire. E.g. if the variable is set to 28, users will begin to receive daily notifications that the candidate's visa if she to expire from 28 days prior to the expiry date of their visa. This value will be discussed and agreed during implementation.
Variable	Visa Expiry Notification Email Recipient(s)	A list of email addresses and/or references to email fields within the system to send notifications of candidates whose visas have expired or are due to expire. Eploy can include static email addresses, emails addresses allocated to specific users or contacts within Eploy, or a logic that determines which users/contacts should ’subscribe’ (e.g. users who have the ‘Receive Notification Of Candidate Inserts’ flag set ON within their user record).
Status	Visa Expired Candidate Employment Status	A Candidate Employment Status option that the Visa Expiry Rule will automatically set for candidates whose visas have expired (e.g. “Visa Expired”). This status should always be set to terminate the candidate record (configured in Admin > Drop Down Lists: Employment Status). This status will be discussed and agreed during implementation.

Placement Breach Prevention Settings

Setting Type	Setting Name	Setting Description
Field	Candidate Visa Flag	The field or custom question response on the Candidate record that signifies that the candidate has a restricted hours visa and that therefore the Breach Prevention features are applicable. E.g. you may have a question “Do you have a working visa that restricts the number of weekly hours you are entitled to work in the UK?” where a response of YES would indicate that Breach Prevention applies. Typically this field/question would be included on the Candidate registration form on the Candidate portal and would then be verified during right to work verification checks.
Field	Candidate Restricted Weekly Hours	The field or custom question on the Candidate record that represents the number of weekly hours their visa restricts them to work in the UK. This is used by the Placement Breach Prevention Setting/Rule to determine whether the total planned weekly hours on one or more concurrent placements breach this limit. Typically this field/question would be included on the Candidate registration form on the Candidate portal and would then be verified during right to work verification checks.
Variable	Placement Warning Buffer	A predefined variable used to modify when the Placement Breach Setting/Rule should flag that a breach has occurred, allowing the threshold to be lowered. For example, if this variable is set to 2 and a candidate's allowed weekly hours is 20, saving of a Placement record will be prevented or an alert will be triggered when the total planned weekly hours on concurrent placements would be in excess of 18. If the variable is set to 0, then the threshold is unaffected and will be as per the Candidate Restricted Weekly Hours field. This value will be discussed and agreed during implementation.
Field	Hours Committed Elsewhere	The field or custom question on the Candidate record that represents the number of weekly hours the candidate is committed to outside of records that are stored in Eploy. As any hours the candidate works elsewhere will count toward their weekly allowance, it is important that their work commitments outside of the university/organisation that tracks the candidate's hours in Eploy are known. The Placement Breach Setting/Rule will factor this value into the calculation to determine whether a breach has occurred. E.g. if the candidate's weekly allowance is 20 hours and the Hours Committed Elsewhere is set to 6, saving of a Placement record will be prevented or an alert will be triggered when the total planned weekly hours on concurrent placements would be in excess of 14. Typically this field/question would be included on the Candidate registration form on the Candidate portal and would then be verified during right to work verification checks.
Variable	Placement Breach Notification Email Recipient(s)	A list of email addresses and/or references to email fields within the system to send notifications of concurrent placements that breach the candidate's visa restrictions. Eploy can include static email addresses, emails addresses allocated to specific users or contacts within Eploy, or a logic that determines which users/contacts should ’subscribe’ (e.g. users who have the ‘Receive Notification Of Candidate Inserts’ flag set ON within their user record).
Status	Placement Breach Warning	A Placement Status option that the Placement Breach Rule will automatically set for one or more concurrent placements that have breached the number of weekly hours permitted by a candidate's visa (configured in Admin > Drop Down Lists: Placement Status). This status will be discussed and agreed during implementation.
Status(es)	Placement Exempt	One or more Placement Status options that can be used to signify that the placement is exempt from visa restrictions. These can be used to bypass the Placement Breach Prevention feature, allowing the user to save a Placement record and to avoid the Placement Breach Prevention Rule triggering an alert, even though (collectively with other concurrent Placements) it might exceed the number of weekly hours permitted by a candidate's visa. These statuses are typically used when circumstances dictate that a Placement does not fall under the usual visa restrictions, e.g. if the work occurs outside of term time. Multiple Placement Exempt statuses can be configured (in Admin > Drop Down Lists: Placement Status) for use under varying circumstances. These statuses will be discussed and agreed during implementation.
Status	Placement Breach Rectified	A Placement Status option that the Placement Breach Rule will automatically set for one or more concurrent placements that previously breached the number of weekly hours permitted by a candidate's visa, but had since been corrected (configured in Admin > Drop Down Lists: Placement Status). This status will be discussed and agreed during implementation.
Variable	Excluded Rates	One or more Rate Types whose weekly hours are NOT factored into the calculation when determining where one or more concurrent placements breach the hours permitted by a candidate's visa. This is typically for rates that are set to represent additional pay that is accumulated alongside a standard rate (e.g. Holiday Pay), where the ‘Time Worked’ recorded will be duplicated against another Rate Type and therefore should not be considered in the visa breach functionality.

Timesheet Breach Prevention Settings

Setting Type	Setting Name	Setting Description
Field	Candidate Visa Flag	The field or custom question response on the Candidate record that signifies that the candidate has a restricted hours visa and that therefore the Breach Prevention features are applicable. E.g. you may have a question “Do you have a working visa that restricts the number of weekly hours you are entitled to work in the UK?” where a response of YES would indicate that Breach Prevention applies. Typically this field/question would be included on the Candidate registration form on the Candidate portal and would then be verified during right to work verification checks.
Field	Candidate Restricted Weekly Hours	The field or custom question on the Candidate record that represents the number of weekly hours their visa restricts them to work in the UK. This is used by the Timesheet Breach Prevention Rule to determine whether the total planned weekly hours on one or more concurrent timesheets breach this limit. Typically this field/question would be included on the Candidate registration form on the Candidate portal and would then be verified during right to work verification checks.
Variable	Timesheet Warning Buffer	A predefined variable used to modify when the Timesheet Breach Rule should flag that a breach has occurred, allowing the threshold to be lowered. For example, if this variable is set to 2 and a candidate's allowed weekly hours is 20, an alert will be triggered if a candidate submits Timesheet record where the total planned weekly hours on it and other concurrent timesheets would be in excess of 18. If the variable is set to 0, then the threshold is unaffected and will be as per the Candidate Restricted Weekly Hours field. This value will be discussed and agreed during implementation.
Field	Hours Committed Elsewhere	The field or custom question on the Candidate record that represents the number of weekly hours the candidate is committed to outside of records that are stored in Eploy. As any hours the candidate works elsewhere will count toward their weekly allowance, it is important that their work commitments outside of the university/organisation that tracks the candidate's hours in Eploy are known. The Timesheet Breach Rule will factor this value into the calculation to determine whether a breach has occurred. E.g. if the candidate's weekly allowance is 20 hours and the Hours Committed Elsewhere is set to 6, the candidate submitting a Timesheet record will trigger an alert when the total planned weekly hours on concurrent timesheets would be in excess of 14. Typically this field/question would be included on the Candidate registration form on the Candidate portal and would then be verified during right to work verification checks.
Variable	Timesheet Breach Notification Email Recipient(s)	A list of email addresses and/or references to email fields within the system to send notifications of concurrent timesheets that breach the candidate's visa restrictions. Eploy can include static email addresses, emails addresses allocated to specific users or contacts within Eploy, or a logic that determines which users/contacts should ’subscribe’ (e.g. users who have the ‘Receive Notification Of Candidate Inserts’ flag set ON within their user record).
Status	Timesheet Breach Warning	A Timesheet Status option that the Timesheet Breach Rule will automatically set for one or more concurrent timesheets that have breached the number of weekly hours permitted by a candidate's visa (configured in Admin > Drop Down Lists: Timesheet Status). This status will be discussed and agreed during implementation.
Status(es)	Timesheet Exempt	One or more Timesheet Status options that can be used to signify that the timesheet is exempt from visa restrictions. These can be used to avoid the Timesheet Breach Prevention Rule triggering an alert, even though (collectively with other concurrent Timesheets) it might exceed the number of weekly hours permitted by a candidate's visa. These statuses are typically used when circumstances dictate that a Timesheet does not fall under the usual visa restrictions, e.g. if the work occurs outside of term time. Multiple Timesheet Exempt statuses can be configured (in Admin > Drop Down Lists: Timesheet Status) for use under varying circumstances. These statuses will be discussed and agreed during implementation.
Status	Timesheet Breach Rectified	A Timesheet Status option that the Timesheet Breach Rule will automatically set for one or more concurrent timesheets that previously breached the number of weekly hours permitted by a candidate's visa, but had since been corrected (configured in Admin > Drop Down Lists: Timesheet Status). This status will be discussed and agreed during implementation.
Variable	Excluded Rates	One or more Rate Types whose weekly hours are NOT factored into the calculation when determining where one or more concurrent timesheets breach the hours permitted by a candidate's visa. This is typically for rates that are set to represent additional pay that is accumulated alongside a standard rate (e.g. Holiday Pay), where the ‘Time Worked’ recorded will be duplicated against another Rate Type and therefore should not be considered in the visa breach functionality.