Most small teams already keep the rota in a spreadsheet. This add-on handles the
parts a spreadsheet handles badly: building the month grid, finding the mistakes in
it, and turning the result into something you can hand to a person.


Who it is for

Built for the person who writes the rota by hand: a restaurant or cafe
manager, a care home or clinic scheduler, a retail shop owner, a warehouse
supervisor. Anyone with hourly employees, a monthly roster and no HR system or shift management software.

Whether you call it a rota, a roster, a work schedule, shift planning or a shift planner, the job
is the same: who is on, which day, for how long. ShiftSheet does employee
scheduling for one team in one spreadsheet. It builds the free schedule template -
staff, shift codes and a month grid - you fill it in, and the hours and overtime
are totalled for you, with a printable timesheet for anyone on it. Call it a rota maker, a roster maker or a schedule maker: it lays out the month and checks it, but it does not fill in who works when - that part stays yours. Looking for an hours calculator or an overtime calculator? It works the hours out from the shift codes on your rota - planned hours, not a time clock, so there is no clock-in or clock-out to record.


How it works

First time in a new spreadsheet: open Extensions > ShiftSheet > Start here.

You set up your people and your shift codes once. M is 07:00-15:00 with a 30 minute
break. N is 23:00-07:00 and runs past midnight. Whatever codes you already use, you
can keep using them.

Then you generate a month and type shift codes into the grid. One row per person,
one column per day.

If you would rather see it working before typing anything, one button fills the
grid with an example month. It has a few mistakes in it on purpose, so the next
step has something to find.


Check the schedule

Seven checks run across the whole month:

- a shift code that is not in your list
- two codes in one cell whose hours run into each other
- a shift that starts before the previous one has finished
- a name on the schedule that is not on your Staff sheet
- less rest between two shifts than you allow
- more hours in a week than you allow
- too many days worked in a row

Each problem is written to an Issues sheet with the person, the date, and what is
wrong. The check reads your grid and never writes to it.


Total the hours

Hours per person for the month, with overtime worked out week by week,
because that is how overtime is actually owed. Adding up a whole month and
subtracting a monthly threshold underpays anyone who had one heavy week and one
quiet one.

Overnight shifts are counted correctly. A shift that ends before it starts is
treated as crossing midnight, not as negative hours.


Print a timesheet

One sheet per person: the dates, the shifts, the hours, and a signature line at the
bottom. Print it, sign it, file it.


Your grid is safe

Generating a new month does not overwrite a schedule that already has shifts in it.
The old grid is renamed and kept in the same spreadsheet. Nothing here deletes work
you have already done, and the validation checks never touch the schedule at all.


Free and paid

Free covers a team of any size and includes the schedule grid, all seven checks, the
hour and overtime-hour totals and single-person timesheets. Those do not expire.

Free also lets you try the money side. For 30 days from the first time you run
Totals, the Rate and Cost columns show real figures from the pay rates on your
Staff sheet. And your first "Timesheet for everyone" is free. After that, both
belong to the paid version.

The paid version is a one-time purchase of US$39. It is not a subscription and does
not renew. It keeps pay rates and labour cost on, with overtime paid at the multiplier you set,
and prints every timesheet in one go. After paying you receive a licence code by email. Enter it with
Extensions > ShiftSheet > Enter licence code. There is no second file and nothing to
move across. The code is tied to your Google account; anyone else who runs ShiftSheet
in the same file enters the same code once.

Refunds within 14 days, no questions asked.


What it cannot see

Three permissions, as Google lists them on the install screen:

- View and manage spreadsheets that this application has been installed in
- See your primary Google Account email address
- See your personal info, including any you have made publicly available

Only the first reaches a spreadsheet. It cannot read your other spreadsheets, your Google Drive™, your Gmail™ or your Google Calendar™ - a limit Google enforces, not us. The other two
come from the listing, not the add-on; nothing in its code reads your email or your
profile.


Nothing leaves the spreadsheet

The add-on makes no network requests. There is no server of ours to call and no
account to create. The licence code for the paid version is checked inside the
add-on, against a list in its own code; it is not sent anywhere. Your schedule, your
staff names, their hours and their pay stay in the file you opened.

What it remembers between sessions - your rules, the current month, which sheets it
created, a counter for the review prompt, whether a licence code was entered, when
your 30 days of Rate and Cost started, whether your one free "Timesheet for everyone"
has been used, and whether two one-time notes (the Start here guide and a tip about
"Timesheet for everyone") have been shown - is stored by Google with the file or your
account, and is not sent anywhere.

Our privacy policy: https://shiftsheet.me/privacy.html


Not payroll advice

The hour limits, rest gaps and overtime thresholds are the numbers you enter. The
add-on does not know the employment law of your country and does not claim to
enforce it. The labor cost figure is arithmetic on the rates you type in. It is not
a payslip and does not calculate tax.


Support

support@shiftsheet.me

Google Sheets™, Google Drive™, Gmail™ and Google Calendar™ are trademarks of Google LLC. ShiftSheet is an independent product
and is not affiliated with or endorsed by Google LLC.