Need to offer overtime to a group (or all) of your agents? Need to find the best time to schedule a meeting? Automated Schedule Adjustment plans allow you to complete these and a whole range of common scheduling and administrative tasks with just a few clicks. 

With version 26.01, a limited number of ASAP options may be applied in a working schedule:

• Modify current schedules: Optimize off-phone events, delete schedule events, edit schedule events.
• Increase available staff: Recover off-phone events.
• Decrease available staff: Plan a meeting.

Note: ASAPs in a working schedule— 

• are not included in the ASAP calendar, 
• do not include participant acceptance or notifications, and 
• do not include the option to copy the plan (even if copying the working schedule).

View the webinar presented November 20, 2025

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ASAP (Automated Schedule Adjustment Plan)

The ASAP feature automates a range of common schedule and intraday management administrative tasks using a variety of plan types. It is designed to work with notification channels, which for some plans allows agents to accept or decline offers for work adjustments such as overtime or voluntary time off (VTO). Agents are notified via selected channels including email, SMS, pop-up desktop notifications, and the Community Everywhere mobile application.

Using an ASAP allows you to make hundreds of schedule changes and notify agents in a few clicks. Once you master a single plan type, you will find it very easy to use the others.

ASAP Types

There are eight primary ASAPs that fall into three categories. Each plan is designed to execute a specific schedule modification and support a variety of options. Each distinct plan type is described below with step-by-step instruction as this document continues.

Modify Current Schedules

Modify plans allow you to automate routine bulk scheduling tasks such as deleting events, or changing the event type or day, with a goal of reducing manual effort by schedulers, supervisors, and administrators. Once executed, affected agents will be notified of the changes via the selected notification channel(s).

Optimize Off-phone Events – optimize breaks and lunches, meetings and/or trainings, intraday. For example: If several people call out sick, or you are seeing an increase in shrinkage, you can re-optimize breaks and lunches for some or all agents (or just the breaks or the lunches).

Delete Scheduled Events – This plan allows you to select one or more events and a time range and it will mass delete qualifying events from the schedules of agents who you select. It will not ask permission from the agent first. Coaching canceled? No problem!

Edit Scheduled Events – This strategy allows you to edit date, time, and event codes or any combination of the three. Need to move coaching to tomorrow at the same time? Just coded 50 trainings with coaching instead of supervisor review and need to change them? Edit Scheduled Events makes it easy.

Increase Available Staff

Increase available staff plans allow you to offer extra hours to agents and allows them to respond rapidly, quickly increasing agent contact work time. These plans provide an option for “agent acceptance,” allowing you to enable participant counts – strategies that limit the number of respondents (e.g., only 5 people can accept the offer of overtime).

Recover Off-Phone Events – Replace (or modify) events with contact work.

Extend Scheduled Shifts – Use to add time to the start or end of an existing shift. Not an event, but a schedule extension. Consider adding an overtime event if you need to track overtime. An agent must have a schedule in place on the selected day for this plan.

Create Overtime Shifts – Use to offer overtime to agents (mandatory or optional). This plan type can be offered to agents without a current schedule in place.

Decrease Available Staff

These plans will reduce contact work time by redirecting agents to other activities, or reducing shift duration (with voluntary time off). These plans provide an option for “agent acceptance,” allowing you to enable participant counts – strategies that limit the number of respondents (e.g., only 5 people can accept the offer to leave early).

Plan a Meeting – Use this plan to let the system find the most appropriate time to schedule a meeting, or to tell you which agents can attend a meeting at a specified time. Note: If the meeting is mandatory (it has to happen on a given day) there may be no perfect time in the schedule, but CommunityWFM will present you with the best options.

Create VTO Events – Use to offer voluntary time off when call volume is low.

Navigating to the ASAP Interface

Access the ASAP module from three places for eligible users (typically scheduler and above). Restricted users will not see the module.

1. Schedule menu > ASAP calendar
2. Published Schedule Report
3. Daily Adherence Report

1. From the ASAP calendar (Schedule > ASAP calendar)

Click on any day in the calendar to start an ASAP, then select from the drop-down menus to choose the category (modify current schedule, increase staff, decrease staff), and specific ASAP plans will be available from the plan type drop-down.

2. From a Published Schedule Report (Report > Published schedule > Schedule details > Enterprise model).

At the top of the page: select a date, then from the drop-down menu select the ASAP category, then the ASAP plan type, finally click the green plus (+) to launch the ASAP planning window.

3. From a Daily schedule adherence report (Report > Schedule adherence > Daily schedule adherence > Enterprise model).

At the top of the page: select a date, then from the drop-down menu select the ASAP category, then the ASAP plan type, finally click the green plus (+) to launch the ASAP planning window.

Creating ASAPs

After selecting a plan type, you are ready to set up the parameters for the instance of the plan you wish to execute.

Green, yellow, and red button borders indicate completed items that you can edit (green), pending items (yellow), and items that you cannot configure until a prerequisite step is completed or the step is complete and you cannot edit it (red).

ASAPs are automatically added to the ASAP calendar after configuration. The calendar view allows for drag-and-drop copying of an existing ASAP to a new day.

Creating all plans follows the same basic process:

1. Design the plan

a. Configure the basic properties (date, time, restrictions, etc.)

b. Select eligible event types (breaks, lunches, meetings, etc.)

c. Choose people (who will be eligible – by activity or supervisor)

2. Manage participant feedback (for some plans)

a. Open for feedback

b. Monitor feedback

c. View the response report (if agent acceptance is included)

d. Close feedback

3. Verify and execute the plan

a. View current schedules

b. Execute the plan

c. View results

The following sections describe configuration options for each plan in detail as well as how to use the calendar and other ASAP features.

Modify Current Schedule

Optimize Off-phone Events

Use Optimize Off-phone Events to adjust the placement of scheduled events to account for intraday staffing variations. Optimize Off-phone Events is most commonly used to adjust breaks and lunches, but can work for a variety of other event types. Optimize Off-phone Events will analyze current staffing levels and try to place events in a more optimal time slot than their current placement.

Navigate to ASAP Optimize Off-phone Events using one of the three methods described.

Basic properties

1. Click Get Started in the middle of the page or Basic properties (note that all other buttons are red and greyed out, indicating that they cannot be configured until step 1 is complete).
2. Plan name: Enter a plan name.
   
3. Applies to Activity: Use to include schedules that have a specific activity assigned. For example, only include agents who have a specific activity assigned in their profile.
   
    
4. Schedule date: The date auto-populates with the day in the schedule you were on when you launched the ASAP (but you can change the date here if you need to).
   
5. Identify the window of time for the plan to look at to optimize breaks and/or lunches. Edit both Modify events that start on or after and Modify events that end on or before. For example: if we put 1 pm and 6 pm, the plan will optimize any events that start at or after 1 pm and before or at 6 pm.
    
6. The slider Restrict change in start time to a maximum (in minutes) tells the system how far it can move the break left or right. The minimum is 15 minutes. If you have an event at 1:30 pm and you set the slider to 15 mins, that optimized break could begin at 1:15 pm or 1:45 pm. If you set the slider to two hours, that optimized 1:30 pm break could be moved to 11:30 am or 3:30 pm. Consider keeping the range to 15–30 minutes. The number in parentheses to the right of the slider indicates the selected number of minutes.
   
7. Minimum event start time buffer will prevent the break from being placed right next to another event. If you leave as None, it could put the break right up against a published event such as a meeting or coaching. If you set it to 15 minutes, it will place it at least 15 minutes before or after any other event on the schedule.
    
8. Restrict to people compatible with the selected agent template allows customization of the plan. If the plan will apply to everyone leave this as -- No Selection--.
9. Overlapping interval behavior settings allows you to include or exclude events that start and/or end outside the selected time window. For example: Our event starts at 1:00 PM. A lunch starts at 12:45 pm and ends at 1:15 pm. If we include the overlapping activity, the plan will optimize the lunch. If we exclude overlapping activity, the plan will exclude lunch optimization because it does not start at or after 1 pm. You can overlap for start time and end time of the plan independently.
   
10. Click Save plan properties to complete the configuration of the basic properties.
    
    Select Eligible event types
11. Click Select eligible event types or Select event types to tell the plan what types of events to optimize. 
    
12. In the pop-up, Select All or select individual events then click Save.
    
    The chart will show you the total number of hours available for optimization. You can add additional event types or move on to selecting people.
    
     
13. Click Choose people on the events worksheet or on the left side menu then click Choose plan participants. In this example, the selection window will only display agents who have a break or lunch that falls between 1 pm and 4 pm.
    
14. Select one of the Choose buttons to select the candidates from Activity or Supervisor. Decide whether you want to filter for everyone in the enterprise model (or just an activity), or you can select a specific supervisor’s team.
    Indicate whether to automatically update net line statistics. If you want to update your variance and expected service metrics at the top of your schedules, check the box to automatically update net line statistics.
    
     
15. Once you determine the filter, you can choose to optimize all agents or just include a few. Click Select all or Select none and then refine your selection with Remove or Include next to each agent. For example: if there is someone with a medical condition that requires them to have breaks at a specific time, you would exclude them from the plan.
    
     
16. Make your selections then click Finish.
    
    New graphs display eligible hours, eligible participants, and remaining eligible people. To increase the optimization, add additional people by clicking Choose people or adding additional events by clicking Select event types.
    To view the graph legends, hover over the bars.
    
17. Prior to executing you can View current schedules to preview the effect of the ASAP.
    
18. Click Execute the plan. When you execute the plan, it will analyze your coverage numbers and optimize the agents’ schedules for your selected events (e.g., breaks and/or lunches).
    
19. Confirm that you want to execute the ASAP.
    

Note: Once executed, you cannot undo the action. For example, if you optimize breaks and lunches, you cannot revert the breaks and lunches to their original time by deleting the ASAP.

Delete Scheduled Events

This is the most basic ASAP. This plan will find and delete all qualified events from selected agent’s schedules. Think of it as a “search and destroy” ASAP.

Navigate to ASAP Delete Scheduled Events using one of the three methods described.

1. Click Get Started or Basic properties (you can’t click on any other step until you have completed this).
   
2. Plan name: Give the plan a name.
3. Applies to Activity: Use to include schedules that have a specific activity assigned.
   
4. Schedule date: The date auto-populates with the day in the schedule you were on when you launched the ASAP (but you can change the date here if you need to).
5. Eligible shift boundary: Identify the window of time for the plan to look at to remove events. Edit both Eligible shift boundary earliest and Eligible shift boundary latest. For example: if we put 2 pm and 6 pm, the plan will delete any selected events that start at or after 2 pm and end before or at 6 pm.
6. Click Save plan properties to complete the configuration of the basic properties.
7. Upon saving, the Select event types window opens. Click Select event types then Select event types again.
   
   
8. All event types in your schedule will appear in the pop-up. Select the events you want to delete then click Save.
   
9. The chart will show you the total number of hours selected for deletion and the number of eligible participants.
   
10. Click Choose people then Choose plan participants. The system knows to present only the people who have specified events that fall between 2 pm and 6 pm.
    
11. Choose the candidates for the plan. Decide whether you want to filter for everyone in the enterprise model (or just an activity), or you can select a specific supervisor’s team.
    If you want to update your variance and expected service metrics at the top of your schedules, check the box to automatically update net line statistics.
    
12. Once you determine the filter, you can choose to include all agents or just include a few. Click Select all or Select none and then refine your selection with Remove or Include next to each agent. For example: if your plan is removing breaks, and there is someone with a medical condition that requires them to have a break, you would exclude them from the plan. Make your selections then click Finish.
    Prior to executing you can View current schedules to preview the effect of the ASAP.
    
    The list of all agents and their schedules gives you the opportunity to see how executing the ASAP will affect the schedules.
    Icons next to the agent names indicate if the agent is included/accepted (green check), response pending (question mark), declined (red X), excluded (red circle), or eligible but not included (yellow triangle).
    
    
    
    The pink shaded area in the schedule indicates the ASAP timeframe.
    
13. Click Execute the plan. When you execute the plan, it will search for and delete all selected events within the specified time.
    
    
    When deleting events, the system will automatically delete the selected events from the agents’ schedules. Agents will not have a choice when you delete a scheduled event.
    Confirm that you want to execute the plan.
    

Note: Once executed, you cannot undo the action. For example, if you delete breaks and lunches, you cannot restore the breaks and lunches by deleting the ASAP.

Edit Scheduled Events

This ASAP allows you to edit qualified events by changing the date, time (fixed or relative), event type, or a combination of any or all items. For example: Move all coaching events for Spanish speaking agents that occur today between 1:00 pm and 4:00 pm to tomorrow between 12:00 pm and 3:00 pm.

Navigate to ASAP Edit Scheduled Events using one of the three methods described.

1. Click Get Started or Basic properties (you can’t click on any other step until you have completed this).
   
2. Plan name: Give the plan a name.
3. Applies to Activity: Use to include schedules that have a specific activity assigned.
   
4. Schedule date: The date auto-populates with the day in the schedule you were on when you launched the ASAP (but you can change the date here if you need to).
   
5. Modify events that start on or after / end on or before: Identify the window of time for the plan to look at for the scheduled events. For example: if we put 1 pm and 6 pm, the plan will find any events that start at or after 1 pm and end before or at 6 pm.
   
6. Edit start time: You have the option of changing the time to a fixed time (e.g., change the event start from 1:00 pm to 3:00 pm) or change it to a relative time (change the event to one hour earlier, regardless of the original time).
   If changing to a fixed time, enter the new time.
   
   If changing to a relative time, use the slider to adjust the amount of time the plan should shift the event. The number in parenthesis to the right is the number of minutes the plan will shift the event (in this example, later by 60 minutes).
   
7. Edit schedule date: You can keep the event on the same day or move it to a new day. To change to a new date, click on the calendar and select the day.
   
8. Edit event type: Do not modify the event type will leave the event type as is. Change to the selected event type gives you the option of changing it to a new event type.
   
9. Click Save plan properties to complete the configuration of the basic properties.
10. Upon saving, the Select event types window opens. Click Select eligible event types or Select event types.
    
11. Click Select event types to open the list of events.
    
12. All event types in your schedule will appear in the pop-up. Select the events you want to edit or move then click Save.
    
    The graphs will refresh with the number of eligible participants and eligible hours.
    
13. Click Choose people then on the Plan participants screen select Choose plan participants. The system knows to present only the people who have specified events that fall within the selected times.
    
14. Choose the candidates. Decide whether you want to filter for everyone in the enterprise model (or just an activity), or you can select a specific supervisor’s team.
    
15. Once you determine the filter, you can choose to edit the event for all agents or just include a few. Click All or None and then refine your selection with Remove or Include next to each agent. In most cases you would include everyone such as when you are rescheduling or canceling a meeting.
    If you want to update your variance and expected service metrics at the top of your schedules, check the box to automatically update net line statistics.
    Click Finish after selecting all of your agents.
    
    New graphs display eligible hours, selected participants, and remaining eligible people. To increase the optimization, add additional people by clicking Choose people or adding additional events by clicking Select event types.
    
    To view the graph legends, hover over the bars.
    
    Prior to executing you can View current schedules to preview the effect of the ASAP.
    
    
    The list of all agents and their schedules gives you the opportunity to see how executing the ASAP will affect the schedules.
    Icons next to the agent names indicate if the agent is included/accepted (green check), response pending (question mark), declined (red X), excluded (red circle), or eligible but not included (yellow triangle).
    
    
    
    
    The pink shaded area in the schedule indicates the ASAP timeframe.
    
16. Click Execute the plan in either location. When you execute the plan, it searches for and edits all selected events within the specified times.
    
17. Confirm that you want to execute the plan.
    
    Note: Once executed, you cannot undo the action. For example, if you move meetings to a future date, you cannot restore the meetings to the original date by deleting the ASAP.

18. Select View results to see a table of the changes created by the ASAP.
    

    

Increase Available Staff

Recover Off-Phone Events

Identify qualified events and agents and replace, delete, or modify events with contact work. This plan includes the option for agent acceptance and allows you to customize the number of agents who can accept the plan. For example: Allow Spanish agents who opt-in to replace lunch events that occur between 1:00 pm and 6:00 pm with email work, but no more than 10 agents can accept.

Navigate to ASAP Recover Off-Phone Events using one of the three methods described.

1. Click Get Started or Basic properties (you can’t click on any other step until you have completed this).
   
2. Plan name: Give the plan a name.
3. Applies to Activity: Use to include schedules that have a specific activity assigned.
4. Schedule date: The date auto-populates with the day in the schedule you were on when you launched the ASAP (but you can change the date here if you need to).
   
5. Eligible shift boundary earliest / latest: Identify the window of time for the plan to look at to recover events. Edit both Eligible shift boundary earliest and Eligible shift boundary latest. For example: if we put 1 pm and 6 pm, the plan will look within shifts that start at or after 1 pm and end at or before 6 pm.
   
6. Restrict to people compatible with the selected agent template allows customization of the plan. If the plan will apply to everyone leave this as -- No Selection--.
7. Eligible event type filter: Select whether to filter the plan to show only events previously designated as available for callback. When creating events there is an option to designate the event as allowing agents to be called back into the queue.
   
8. How do you want to perform the event recovery? Select whether to delete/modify the original event, or replace the event with a new type.
   
   OR
   
9. Overlapping interval behavior settings: Select the settings for events that overlap the start time, overlap the end time, or span the entire duration of the plan. For example, if an agent has lunch scheduled from 1:00 pm to 2:00 pm and the plan starts at 1:30, do you include the lunch in the plan? Selecting End Early will end the lunch at 1:30 and recover the rest of the time in the plan. Include Entire Event will act as if the entire event is within the start/end window of the plan and will recover the time for the entire event. Ignore will not include the event in the plan.
   
   Participant acceptance settings
10. Do plan participants have to accept the plan?
    If No, participants are automatically included in the plan, it will execute the change without agent approval. Think of it as a “voluntold” rather than “volunteer.”
    If Yes, participants must accept the plan prior to execution, agents must accept the change before it can be executed.
    
    If Yes, you will see additional options to indicate whether to execute the change immediately (this allows you to automate the execution of the plan), and whether there should be a minimum and/or maximum total number of participants for this plan. Note: If checking the box to immediately execute the schedule change, you cannot specify a minimum number of participants (but you can still have a maximum).
    
    
     
11. Click Save plan properties to complete the configuration of the basic properties.
12. Upon saving, the Select event types window opens. Click Select eligible event types or Select event types.
    
13. In the pop-up, select the eligible event types to tell the plan what types of events to recover then click Save.
    
14. Click Choose people then on the Plan participants screen select Choose plan participants. The system knows to present only people who have specified events that fall between the selected times.
    
15. Choose the candidates. Decide whether you want to filter for everyone in the enterprise model (or just an activity), or you can select a specific supervisor’s team.
    
16. Once you determine the filter, you can choose to include all agents or just include a few. Click Select all or Select none and then refine your selection with Remove or Include next to each agent. For example: if your plan is calling people back from breaks, and there is someone with a medical condition that requires them to have breaks, you would exclude them from the plan. Those not selected have a red border. If you require agent acceptance before executing the plan, agents will have a yellow border. Make your selections then click Finish.
    
    After selecting the agents, you must decide whether the ASAP will be distributed to everyone at once, or if some agents receive the notification first based on your previously defined ranking profile (seniority, performance ranking, etc.). Select Preview to see the ranking profile.
    
    You can choose how long each agent will have before the ASAP is presented to the next agent when you use a ranking profile. If you have lots of eligible agents, consider keeping the notification delay to a very short time or agents might be receiving notifications two days later! The delay slider is in seconds (not minutes).
    
     
17. Click Open for feedback to distribute the ASAP to the agents.
    
    
18. You can follow the rates of acceptance on the Monitor feedback dashboard or select View the response report to view individual agent responses.
    If you indicated a maximum number of agents who can accept the plan, the plan will stop approving new agents as soon as that number is reached. Any additional agents who try to accept the plan will receive a message that the maximum has been reached and it is no longer available, e.g., Thank you for accepting the proposed schedule adjustment program on 11 Aug 2021. However, the maximum number of respondents has been reached, so you will not be included in this plan's execution.
    If you did not select a maximum number, or decide to close the plan early, select Close for feedback.
     
19. When you are ready to Close for feedback, indicate what the ASAP should do for any pending feedback (the agent has not replied), then click Close for Feedback.
    Do not modify the feedback selection will not make any changes to the agent’s schedule. Automatically accept the plan for pending participants will accept the plan. Note: if you select this option, it will override any quotas. E.g., if you set a maximum of 3 participants, 3 accepted, and there are 4 pending, it will include all who accepted plus the 4 pending.
    Automatically decline the plan for pending participants will decline the plan.
    
20. Execute the plan after you have received all feedback.
    
    Note: If you selected the option to execute the plan upon acceptance, you will not need to do this step.
    Note: Once executed, you cannot undo the action by deleting the ASAP.

Extend Scheduled Shifts

Add or offer targeted extra hours to the start or end of the agent’s schedule for those who already have shifts available. For example: Extend overtime until 4:00 pm for any agent whose shift ends between 3:00 and 4:00 pm. Extend shifts allows the option for agent acceptance and maximum participants. Agents without a schedule for that day will not be eligible.

Navigate to ASAP Extend Scheduled Shifts using one of the three methods described.

1. Click Get Started or Basic properties (you can’t click on any other step until you have completed this).
   
2. Plan name: Give the plan a name. (Consider not including “overtime” in the plan name if there are agents who won’t accrue overtime pay if they accept the plan).
3. Applies to Activity: Use to include schedules that have a specific activity assigned.
4. Schedule date: The date auto-populates with the day in the schedule you were on when you launched the ASAP (but you can change the date here if you need to).
5. Eligible shift boundary earliest / latest: Identify the window of time for the plan to look at to extend the shifts. Edit both Eligible shift boundary earliest and Eligible shift boundary latest. For example: if we put 1 pm and 6 pm, the plan will look for shifts that start at or after 1 pm and end at or before 6 pm.
   
6. Restrict to people compatible with the selected agent template allows customization of the plan. If the plan will apply to everyone leave this as -- No Selection--.
7. How do you want to extend the shift? Select whether to extend shifts by modifying the original event (with this option you lose visibility of adding overtime hours), or creating new events of a selected type (then select the event type). This option will show the shift as, for example, an 8-hour shift with 2 hours of overtime, rather than extending it to be a 10-hour shift.
   
8. Select the Late departure behavior and Early arrival behavior. As a general rule do not include both; create a new plan if you need to extend the beginning and end of a shift. This will determine whether agents will work a specified amount of time before or after the shift (e.g., 2 hours — all shifts ending at 6:00 pm will now end at 8:00 pm; all shifts ending at 5:00 pm will now end at 7:00 pm), or if there will be a fixed time for all agents (all shifts extend to 8:00 pm).
   Late departure behavior
   
9. Specify a relative departure time (in minutes): use the slider to select how long the agent will stay relative to the end of their shift. For example, if a shift ends at 1:00 pm and we select 120 minutes, the agent now leaves at 3:00 pm.
   
10. Specify a fixed late departure time for eligible participants: enter the time to extend the shift to that time for all participants. For example, if you set it to 8:00 pm the agent whose shift ended at 1:00 pm now stays until 8:00 pm.
    
    Early arrival behavior
    
11. Specify a relative early arrival time (in minutes): use the slider to select how early the agent will arrive relative to the beginning of their shift. For example, if a shift begins at 1:00 pm and we select 120 minutes, the agent now arrives at 11:00 am.
    
12. Specify a fixed early arrival time for eligible participants: enter the time to extend the shift to that time for all participants. For example, if you set it to 8:00 am the agent whose shift begins at 1:00 pm now arrives at 8:00 am.
    
    Participant acceptance settings
13. Do plan participants have to accept the plan?
    
    If No, participants are automatically included in the plan, it will execute the change without agent approval. Think of it as a “voluntold” rather than “volunteer.”
    If Yes, participants must accept the plan prior to execution, agents must accept the change before it can be executed.
    If Yes, you will see additional options to indicate whether to execute the change immediately (this allows you to automate the execution of the plan), and whether there should be a minimum and/or maximum total number of participants for this plan. Note: If checking the box to immediately execute the schedule change, you cannot specify a minimum number of participants (but you can still have a maximum).
    
14. Click Save plan properties to complete the configuration of the basic properties.
15. Upon saving, the Select event types window opens. Click Select eligible event types or Select event types.
    
16. Click Select event types.
    
    
     
17. In the pop-up, select the event types you want to include (e.g., will you include someone who is already working an overtime shift?) then click Save.
    
18. Click Choose people then Choose plan participants. The system knows to present only the people who are scheduled during the specified shift.
    
19. Choose the candidates. Decide whether you want to filter for everyone in the enterprise model (or just an activity), or you can select a specific supervisor’s team.
    
20. Once you determine the filter, you can choose to include all agents or just include a few. Click Select all or Select none and then refine your selection with Remove or Include next to each agent. For example: if there is someone with a medical issue who cannot work overtime or come in early, you would exclude them from the plan. Those not select have a red border. If you require agent acceptance before executing the plan, agents will have a yellow border. Make your selections then click Finish.
    
21. After selecting the agents, you must decide whether the ASAP will be distributed to everyone at once, or will some agents receive the notification first based on your previously defined ranking profile (seniority or performance ranking, etc.). You can preview ranking here.
    You can choose how long each agent will have before the ASAP is presented to the next agent when you use a ranking profile. If you have lots of eligible agents, consider keeping the notification delay to a very short time or agents might be receiving notifications two days later! The delay slider is in seconds (not minutes).
    
22. Click Open for feedback to distribute the ASAP to the agents.
    
    You can follow the rates of acceptance on the Monitor feedback dashboard or select View the response report to view individual agent responses.
    
    If you indicated a maximum number of agents who can accept the plan, the plan will stop approving new agents as soon as that number is reached. Any additional agents who try to accept the plan will receive a message that the maximum has been reached and it is no longer available, e.g., Thank you for accepting the proposed schedule adjustment program on 11 Aug 2024. However, the maximum number of respondents has been reached, so you will not be included in this plan's execution. 
    If you did not select a maximum number, or decide to close the plan to close the plan early, select Close feedback.
23. When you are ready to Close feedback, indicate what the ASAP should do for any pending feedback (the agent has not replied), then click Close for Feedback.
    Do not modify the feedback selection will not make any changes to the agent’s schedule. Automatically accept the plan for pending participants will accept the plan. Note: if you select this option, it will override any quotas. E.g., if you set a maximum of 3 participants, 3 accepted, and there are 4 pending, it will include all who accepted plus the 4 pending.
    Automatically decline the plan for pending participants will decline the plan.
    
24. Execute the plan after you have received all feedback. Note: If you selected the option to execute the plan upon acceptance, you will not need to do this step.
    
    Note: Once executed, you cannot undo the action. For example, if you added 30 minutes to agents’ end times, you cannot remove that time by deleting the ASAP.

Create Overtime Shifts

Create overtime shifts is similar to extend scheduled shifts but allows inclusion of agents who are not working or do not have a schedule during the ASAP time offering and creates an entirely new work assignment. Create overtime shifts also allows for agents’ acceptance and minimum/maximum participants. For example: Offer a four-hour shift to agents with Spanish skill who are not working today, but no more than 5 total agents can accept. If you are offering overtime for multiple shifts, you must create multiple ASAPs.

Navigate to ASAP Create Overtime Shifts using one of the three methods described.

1. Click Get Started or Basic properties (you can’t click on any other step until you have completed this).
   
2. Give the plan a name. (Consider not including “overtime” in the plan name if there are agents who won’t accrue overtime pay if they accept the plan).
   
3. Applies to Activity: Use to include schedules that have a specific activity assigned.
4. Schedule date: The date auto-populates with the day in the schedule you were on when you launched the ASAP (but you can change the date here if you need to).
5. Eligible shift boundary earliest / latest: Identify the window of time for the plan to create the overtime shifts. Edit both Start time and End time.
   
    
6. Restrict to agents compatible with the selected agent template allows customization of the plan. If the plan will apply to everyone leave this as -- No Selection--.
7. Allow agents with schedules on this date to participate in this plan? Do you want to allow agents who are already working to add additional time? If you are adding a 12-hour shift, you might choose to exclude those who are already scheduled to work for 8 hours.
   
8. Event type: Select how the plan should identify this event.
   
9. Overtime off-phone options—Break sets: If required, indicate if the plan should include breaks within the overtime event. Select a break set type from the drop-down. The plan will automatically optimize any included breaks when the plan is executed.
   
   Participant acceptance settings
   
10. Do plan participants have to accept the plan?
    If No, participants are automatically included in the plan, it will execute the change without agent approval. Think of it as a “voluntold” rather than “volunteer.”
    If Yes, participants must accept the plan prior to execution, agents must accept the change before it can be executed.
    If Yes, you will see additional options to indicate whether to execute the change immediately (this allows you to automate the execution of the plan), and whether there should be a minimum and/or maximum total number of participants for this plan. Note: If checking the box to immediately execute the schedule change, you cannot specify a minimum number of participants (but you can still have a maximum).
11. Click Save to complete the configuration of the basic properties.
12. Click Choose people from either location then Choose plan participants. The system knows to present only the people who are not scheduled on the day or during the specified time.
    
13. Choose the candidates. Decide whether you want to filter for everyone in the enterprise model (or just an activity), or you can select a specific supervisor’s team.
    
14. Once you determine the filter, you can choose to include all agents or just include a few. Click Select all or Select none and then refine your selection with Remove or Include next to each agent. For example: if there is someone with a medical issue who cannot work overtime or come in early, you would exclude them from the plan. Make your selections then click Finish.
    
15. Open for Feedback: After selecting the agents, you must decide whether the plan will be distributed to everyone at once, or will some agents receive the notification first based on your previously defined ranking profile (seniority or performance ranking).
    
    You can choose how long each agent will have before the plan is presented to the next agent.
    If you have lots of eligible agents, consider keeping the notification delay to a very short time or agents might be receiving notification 2 days later! The delay slider is in seconds (not minutes).
    
16. You can follow the rates of acceptance on the dashboard, or select View the response report to view the response of an individual agent.
    
17. If you indicated a maximum number of agents who can accept the plan, the plan will stop approving new agents as soon as that number is reached. Any additional agents who try to accept the plan will receive a message that the maximum has been reached and it is no longer available, e.g., Thank you for accepting the proposed schedule adjustment program on 11 Aug 2021. However, the maximum number of respondents has been reached, so you will not be included in this plan's execution.
    If you did not select a maximum number, or are ready to close the plan, select Close feedback.
    
18. If you did not select a maximum number, indicate what the plan should do for pending feedback (the agent has not replied), then click Close feedback.
    Do not modify the feedback selection will not make any changes to the agent’s schedule. Automatically accept the plan for pending participants will accept the plan. Note: if you select this option, it will override any quotas. E.g., if you set a maximum of 3 participants, 3 accepted, and there are 4 pending, it will include all who accepted plus the 4 pending.
    Automatically decline the plan for pending participants will decline the plan.
    
19. Execute the plan after you have received all feedback. If you selected the option to execute the plan upon agent acceptance, you will not need to do this step.
    

Note: Once executed, you cannot undo the action. For example, if you create shifts for a dozen agents, you cannot remove them by deleting the ASAP.

Decrease Available Staff

Plan a Meeting

This is a two-way meeting planner for either finding the best time for a meeting for a group of specific agents, or finding agents to fill a specific meeting time.

1. Here are two examples:
   You have 10 agents and need to find a 30-minute meeting time when all can attend. This ASAP will allow you to select what work or events may be included in the search for a time, what time and date ranges to use, and will present you with options. Once executed, it will schedule the meeting and notify the agents.
2. HR is requesting that you send 10 agents to a meeting from 1:00 pm to 2:00 pm on Wednesday. This ASAP will allow you select which types of work agents may be pulled away from, and will show you who is available during that time. Once executed, it will schedule the meeting and notify the agents.

Navigate to ASAP Plan a Meeting using one of the three methods described.

1. Click Get Started or Basic properties (you can’t click on any other step until you have completed this).
   
2. Event type: Select the meeting/coaching event type and give your meeting a name.
3. Location: You can specify the meeting location (if known).
4. Duration: Enter the planned duration of the meeting/coaching event.
5. Applies to activity: Select the group who will participate in the meeting. You are able to choose the whole enterprise model, or you can include only one folder or activity from the enterprise model.
6. Click Save plan properties.
   
7. Select eligible event types then click Select event types.
   
8. Select all event types that the plan should look for in agents’ schedules. For example, should you include an agent who has a lunch or break during the meeting time?
   

9. Click Choose people to launch How do you want to plan your meeting? where you select whether to Start with People or Start with Time and Date. Choose people and have the plan find the best time, or choose the start date and time and let the plan find people who can attend.
   

   Start with People
    

   Skip ahead to Start with Time and Date.
    

10. Click Choose your meeting participants.
    
11. Click Choose meeting participants.
    
12. Decide whether you want to filter for everyone in the enterprise model (or just an activity), or you can select a specific supervisor’s team. Select an Activity or Supervisor group.
    
13. Once you determine the filter, you can choose to include all agents or just include a few. Click Select all or Select none and then refine your selection with Remove or Include next to each agent. Make your selections then click Finish.
    
    Note: The next screen will show Invalid date and Invalid times.
    **To proceed to the next step, click Choose people again to launch the planning page.**
    
14. Step 2: Select start date & time: Click Generate start times and the plan will find the best meeting date and time for this group.
    
15. First select acceptable dates from the list of eligible options. You can go forward or backward by one week to search for additional dates. After making your selections click Next.
    
16. If you want to designate a specific time range for the meeting, uncheck the box Consider any overlapping scheduled time… and click New to create a new time window.
    
17. 17. On the next screen, click Generate Start Times.
    
18. The plan will generate a list of possible dates and times, ranked by the best possible options at the top. The Participant Error column will display participant factors – can everyone attend the meeting or does it break any of the schedule rules? If zero, all people are available. The Schedule Error column shows the possible impact to your schedule. Don’t focus on the number – it’s just a factor within the system. For example, if the schedule error is 6, it does not mean you will be 6 people short at that time.
19. If you prefer to select a different date/time, make the selection in the far-right column by clicking the edit icon, then confirming that you want to change. Your selection will move to the top of the list and have a green check. Once you make a final selection click Finish.
    
20. Prior to executing you can View current schedules to preview the effect of the ASAP.
    
    The list of all agents and their schedules gives you the opportunity to see how executing the ASAP will affect the schedules.
    Icons next to the agent names indicate if the agent is included/accepted (green check), response pending (question mark), declined (red X), excluded (red circle), or eligible but not included (yellow triangle).
    
    The pink shaded area in the schedule indicates the ASAP timeframe.
    
     
21. Click Execute the plan then Execute the plan again.
    
22. Confirm that you want to execute the plan.
    
23. When you execute the plan, it will send a notification to the agents and place the meeting on their schedules.

Note: Once executed, you cannot undo the action. For example, if you delete the meeting ASAP, it does not remove the meeting from the agent schedules.

Start with Time and Date

Go back to Start with People.

10. Click Choose your meeting start date & time.
    
11. Select the date and time for your meeting then click Save this meeting time.
    
12. Select Choose people from either location to launch the Plan participants selection window.
    
13. Step 2: There are two options to select your candidates: Selecting Generate candidate list will display all agents who are available at that date and time, or Select candidates to choose from a list.
    Generate candidate list
    Select the candidates who should attend the meeting then click Finish.
    Select candidates
    Select the candidates who should attend the meeting then click Finish.
14. You can review the schedules, add additional people, or revise eligible events.
    
15. Confirm that you want to execute the plan to add the meeting to the agents’ schedules.
    

Note: Once executed, you cannot undo the action. For example, if you schedule a meeting, you cannot remove it by deleting the ASAP.

Create VTO Events

Creating voluntary time off events is the inverse of extending shifts. Create plans to reduce the duration of shifts, for example, by reducing all eligible agents by X minutes, or delaying start time for all eligible agents. VTO events allow for agent acceptance and minimum/maximum participants.

Navigate to ASAP Create VTO Events using one of the three methods described.

1. Click Get Started or Basic properties (you can’t click on any other step until you have completed this).
   
    
2. Plan name: Give your plan a name.
3. Applies to activity: Use to include schedules that have a specific activity assigned.
4. Schedule date: The date auto-populates with the day in the schedule you were on when you launched the ASAP (but you can change the date here if you need to).
5. Identify the window of time for the plan to offer the VTO. Edit both Start time and End time.
   
    
6. Restrict to agents compatible with the selected agent template allows customization of the plan. If the plan will apply to everyone leave this as -- No Selection--.
7. How do you want to shrink the shift? Should the plan create a new event to cover the VTO? Or shrink the shift by modifying the original event? If you shrink the shift by modifying the original event you will lose visibility of the VTO, which might be needed for reporting or for human resources accounting. If you create a new event, you can select the new event type.
   
8. Determine how the plan should present the VTO for agents leaving early, and for agents coming in late. Select the Early departure behavior and Late arrival behavior. As a general rule do not include both; create a new plan if you need to shorten the beginning and end of a shift. This will determine whether agents will leave work a specified amount of time before or after the shift (e.g., 2 hours — all shifts ending at 6:00 pm will now end at 4:00 pm; all shifts ending at 5:00 pm will now end at 3:00 pm), or if there will be a fixed time for all agents (all shifts end at to 4:00 pm).
   
   Early departure behavior options:
   
   Late arrival behavior options:
   
9. Do plan participants have to accept the plan?
   
   If No, participants are automatically included in the plan, it will execute the change without agent approval. Think of it as a “voluntold” rather than “volunteer.” 
   If Yes, participants must accept the plan prior to execution, agents must accept the change before it can be executed. 
   If Yes, you will see additional options to indicate whether to execute the change immediately (this allows you to automate the execution of the plan), and whether there should be a minimum and/or maximum total number of participants for this plan. Note: If checking the box to immediately execute the schedule change, you cannot specify a minimum number of participants (but you can still have a maximum).
   
10. Click Save plan properties to complete the configuration of the basic properties.
11. Click Select the eligible event types or Select event types then Select event types again to select which events on an agent’s schedule may be offered VTO.
    
12. Select eligible event types then click Save.
    
13. Click Choose people from either location.
    
14. Choose the candidates. Decide whether you want to filter for everyone in the enterprise model (or just an activity), or you can select a specific supervisor’s team.
    
15. Once you determine the filter, you can choose to include all agents or just include a few. Click Select all or Select none and then refine your selection with Remove or Include next to each agent. For example: if there is someone with transportation issues who cannot work overtime or come in early, you would exclude them from the plan. Make your selections then click Finish.
    
    If you selected …participants are automatically included in the plan, you can proceed with executing the plan. 
    If you selected to allow participant acceptance—
16. Open for Feedback: After selecting the agents, you must decide whether the plan will be distributed to everyone at once, or will some agents receive the notification first based on your previously defined ranking profile (seniority or performance ranking).
    
    You can also choose how long each agent will have before the plan is presented to the next agent. If you have lots of eligible agents, consider keeping the notification delay to a very short time or agents might be receiving notification 2 days later! The delay slider is in seconds (not minutes).
    
    You can follow the rates of acceptance on the dashboard via Monitor feedback, or select View the response report to view the response of an individual agent.
17. If you indicated a maximum number of agents who can accept the plan, the plan will stop approving new agents as soon as that number is reached. Any additional agents who try to accept the plan will receive a message that the maximum has been reached and it is no longer available, e.g., Thank you for accepting the proposed schedule adjustment program on 11 Aug 2021. However, the maximum number of respondents has been reached, so you will not be included in this plan's execution.
    If you did not select a maximum number, or are ready to close the plan, indicate what the plan should do for pending feedback (the agent has not replied), then click Close feedback. 
    
    Do not modify the feedback selection will not make any changes to the agent’s schedule. Automatically accept the plan for pending participants will accept the plan. Note: if you select this option, it will override any quotas. E.g., if you set a maximum of 3 participants, 3 accepted, and there are 4 pending, it will include all who accepted plus the 4 pending.
    Automatically decline the plan for pending participants will decline the plan.
    
    Execute the plan after you have received all feedback. If you selected the option to execute the plan upon agent acceptance, you will not need to do this step but you still can.
    

Note: Once executed, you cannot undo the action. For example, if you schedule agents to leave early, you cannot cancel it by deleting the ASAP.

Customize Notifications

A communication mechanism must be in place for ASAPs (memos or pop-ups) so an agent can see that there is a change in their schedule, or so they can participate in a plan (e.g., accept overtime or VTO). Agents receive notifications in the memo field of their home page (if the agent has enabled memos), or through pop-up notifications (if that service is enabled on your system). 
To determine if you have pop-ups enabled: Go to Setting > Application settings > Administrative settings > Notifications.

A green bar means that pop-ups are enabled.

For each ASAP there are standard messages for both memos and pop-ups for every possible contingency within each plan. The messages are very polite, and agents will get a message, for example, when the ASAP is offered, when it is accepted, when it is declined, or even when a plan with a limit is full and they were too late to be included.
You can customize the messages that agents will see in the memo field and in the pop-up. Edits made here apply only to this instance of the plan.

 
To view or edit the notifications for a single plan:

1. Go to the ASAP Extras area and select Customize notifications.
   
2. Click on the notification title to review the text for pop-up reminders and memos. 
   
3. To review the message as seen by the agent, select Preview message from the Available actions drop-down.
   
4. To edit the text, select Edit message from the Available actions drop-down. The edits apply only to messages in the plan you are editing.
   
   The #hashtag terms indicate that the plan is pulling in the data from the SQL server side of the system.
   
    
5. After editing, click Save.

Copy Plans

You can copy commonly used plans and apply them to different days with little effort. 

On the ASAP calendar, click and drag the plan to a new day. It will copy the ASAP with the basic parameters in place and a new name with “Copy of…” (moving will not change the original plan).

1. Navigate to the ASAP calendar:
2. Find the ASAP you wish to copy then click and drag to the new day.
   
3. Open the ASAP to make any needed edits to the plan then open for feedback or execute the plan. It is best practice to change the name of the copied plan. If you make multiple copies without changing the name you will have “copy of copy of copy of copy of copy of OT.”
   Alternatively, you can select Copy plan settings from the ASAP Extras area of any ASAP. You can choose whether to include eligible plan participants from the original ASAP.
   
   Click Save copy after making your selections and the copied ASAP will appear on the ASAP calendar.
   

Delete Plans

After executing a plan, there is no UNDO. If you delete the ASAP (Delete the plan), it does not undo the action; deleting the ASAP will not put anything back on the agents’ schedules.
On the ASAP calendar, open the plan then select Delete the plan from the ASAP Extras area.

Because there’s no going back, you need to check the box to confirm that you wish to delete the plan, then the Delete the plan button will become available. Refresh your browser if you still see the ASAP on the calendar.

After deleting you will see the following message:

Rescind Plan

For some plans you have the option of rescinding the offer if it is open for feedback and prior to plan execution.

• Create VTO Event
• Create Overtime Shifts
• Overtime Shift Extension
• Recover Off-phone Events

Note: If in the basic properties you selected to execute the plan upon acceptance, rescinding the plan will not delete any acceptances. You will have to manually delete them from the agent’s schedule.

When rescinding a plan, you can elect whether to modify agent’s current selections.

As with deleting plans, there is no going back. Click Rescind to remove the plan from receiving any additional feedback or responses. Rescinded plans remain on the ASAP calendar in purple.