Guidance for Staff and Supervisors While Continuing Work During COVID-19 Impacts

TO:        Campus Community

FR:         Cynthia Señeriz, Director, Human Resources

RE:         Guidance for Staff and Supervisors While Continuing Work During COVID-19 Impacts

The normal day-to-day business and workflows across the campus have shifted dramatically in the past week.  In light of the Governor’s Stay at Home Order issued on March 19^th, Human Resources offers the following guidance and suggestions for staff and supervisors to keep in mind in the coming weeks.

For Staff Who are Working Remotely:

• Stay in contact with your supervisor.  Schedule a daily check-in preferably via a video Zoom session, or at a minimum by phone to ask questions, communicate issues, establish daily priorities and share face-to-face time.
• Explore and use Google Chat to instant message if you are not already doing so.
• Continue to hold and attend regular meetings with your coworkers via Zoom.
• Access your office voicemail by dialing 805-893-8800. When prompted, dial your extension number followed by *key.  Enter your passcode when prompted. 
• Set up your office phone to send an email notification when you receive voicemail. Instructions available at http://www.commserv.ucsb.edu/mwi/
• Establish a schedule concerning start and stop times, and rest and meal breaks.  Non-exempt employees should enter their work hours in Kronos on a daily basis.  All deadlines for entering hours worked in Kronos must be adhered to ensure pay is processed accurately.
• Inform your supervisor if you encounter obstacles that prevent you from completing your normal work duties.

For Staff Who Perform Essential Functions and Continue to Report to Work On-site:

• Practice social distancing measures with colleagues. Avoid direct physical contact such as hand-shaking, and use telephones or video conferencing to reduce the need for close interactions.
• Wash your hands often.
• Stay home if you feel sick. Contact your supervisor.

For Staff Who are Unable to Report to Work Due to COVID-19 Impacts:

• Contact your supervisor. Request paid administrative leave and explain the reason for requesting the leave.

For Supervisors of Staff:

• Stay in contact with all of your staff members, whether they are performing essential functions on-site, working remotely, or receiving paid administrative leave and are unable to work.
• Ensure that staff members who are not able to report to work due to the impacts of COVID-19 receive the appropriate allotment of paid administrative leave, up to 128 hours based on 100% FTE.
  • Follow instructions for reporting paid administrative leave in Kronos for COVID-19 for your staff.   Communicate the approved hours of paid administrative leave with your department Timekeeper prior to the Kronos approval deadline.  (Instructions for calculating the appropriate allotment of paid administrative leave* are provided at the end of this document.)

• Ensure that non-academic student employees who are not able to report to work or have no scheduled hours due to the impacts of COVID-19, receive paid administrative leave, prorated based on their appointment percentage.  For examples of how to calculate the prorated paid administrative leave*, refer to the examples provided below.  The Office of Financial Aid and Scholarships will provide hiring departments special instructions about paying work-study students immediately following this memo.

• Ensure that work schedules are established for remote staff and those on-site with start and stop times, and rest and meal breaks.  Ensure staff are informed of deadlines for entering hours worked and leave taken in Kronos for each pay cycle.
• Review and approve employee timecards in Kronos.
• Establish a regular check-in process for both staff working remotely and staff working on-site to communicate issues, establish daily priorities and share face-to-face time.
• Ensure that staff working remotely are equipped with the appropriate equipment (i.e., PC/laptop, internet connection, webcam, phone, etc.) to carry out their job duties.  Establish procedures for access to files, documents, incoming mail and/or faxes that may be necessary to carry out their job duties.
• Set clear expectations and goals for all staff members, including achievable milestones that guide their work whether performed remotely or on-site.
• Provide constructive feedback when a goal or deliverable has been missed, do so promptly — timely feedback assists in correcting to keep the individual on course.

*Paid Administrative Leave:  How Paid Administrative Leave should be calculated

• Employees appointed at 100% are eligible for up to 128 hours. 
• For part-time employees with fixed schedules, the prorated entitlement is calculated based on their appointment percentage. 
• For employees working part-time variable schedules, employees will receive a prorated amount based on the average percentage of time worked between January 12 and March 7.  See examples below.

Employees who work variable, part-time schedules:  For part-time variable percentage appointees, the number of hours of actual time worked during the pay cycles displayed below is required to calculate their percentage of time worked.  This will be referred to as the Lookback calculation.

The Lookback calculation is only used for part-time variable appointments to determine average percent time and the maximum allotment of paid administrative leave.  The step-by-step calculation for part-time variable appointments is displayed below.

LH = Lookback Hours are all actual hours worked during the pay cycles identified above.

FH = Total Full-time Hours, the total number of hours for 4 bi-weekly periods = 320.

Step 1:  Add up LH (look back actual hours worked)

Step 2: Determine FH for the relevant pay period (e.g., 320 hours)

Step3: Divide LH by FH.  LH/FH = average % time for the 4 bi-weekly periods

Step 4: Multiply 128 by average % time from Step 3 = Maximum allotment of paid administrative leave

Example 1:

A student was scheduled for 12 hours a week in Spring quarter, but is unable to work in person nor remotely. This employee has a fixed part-time schedule.  12 hours/40 hours = .30 FTE.  The employee is eligible for 38.4 hours of paid administrative leave.  (.30 * 128 hours = 38.4) The department should submit the paid administrative leave in lieu of hours worked until the 38.4 hours are exhausted. 

Example 2:

No Spring schedule was set, but the student worked 10 hours/week for the 2-month period between January 12 and March 7.  Using the Lookback calculation, a total of 80 hours was worked between January 12 and March 7.  The Total Full-time Hours = 320.  Divide LH by FH to calculate the average percent time.  (80 hours/320 hours = .25.) Multiply 128 * .25 to calculate the maximum allotment of paid administrative leave.  The employee is eligible for 32 hours of paid administrative leave.  The department should submit the paid administrative leave in lieu of hours worked until the 32 hours are exhausted. 

Example 3:

A student was scheduled for 15 hours per week in Spring quarter but there is only 5 hours of work that can be completed remotely each week. This employee has a fixed part-time schedule.  15 hours/40 hours = .375 FTE.  The employee is eligible for 48 hours of paid administrative leave.  (.375 * 128 hours = 48) The employee would work 5 hours/week remotely, and the department should submit the paid administrative leave in lieu of the remaining scheduled hours until the 48 hours are exhausted. 

Additional Staff Resources to Reference:

COVID-19 Information for UC Employees

 https://qa.ucnet.universityofcalifornia.edu/news/2020/01/ucs-response-to-coronavirus.html

Executive Order of March 16th from UC President Napolitano  https://qa.ucnet.universityofcalifornia.edu/news/2020/01/executive-order-re-paid-administrative-leave-03-16-20.pdf

March 17 Memo Concerning Usage of Paid Administrative Leave

https://www.hr.ucsb.edu/memos/2020/executive-order-concerning-covid-19-and-usage-paid-administrative-leave

March 14 Memo Concerning COVID-19 Response and Campus Operations

https://www.hr.ucsb.edu/memos/2020/covid-19-response-and-campus-operations

Human Resources Telecommute & Remote Work

https://www.hr.ucsb.edu/employment/hiring/telecommute-remote-work

UCSB Information Technology Best Practices For Flexible Work Arrangements

https://www.it.ucsb.edu/best-practices-flexible-work-arrangements

QUESTIONS?

Employees are encouraged to communicate their questions directly to their supervisor.

Supervisor of staff employees should forward questions to Human Resources via ServiceNow using the following instructions: 

Human Resources Services / Login / Employee & Labor Relations  / Department Advisory Services