Set your disciplinary policy

What this achieves

The disciplinary policy is the rulebook every case in a scope runs under, covering which consequences may be used, how much a deduction can take, and what a refusal or a dispute does. Setting it is what bounds every case raised afterwards.

Required role: Administrator.

Before you start

Settle the decisions first. This screen is quick to fill in and the answers are not — what a refusal does, and what a month’s deductions are capped at, are questions for your own advisers rather than for the person at the keyboard.

Steps

Go to Settings → Disciplinary.
Open the Policy tab.
Choose the Scope — Tenant-wide default, or a legal entity.
Under Allowed consequence types, enable only the types this scope may use.
Under Process & jurisdiction, set the switches and the refusal policy.
Under Deduction caps, set Maximum per offense and Maximum per month.
Select Save policy.

Allowed consequence types

Only the enabled types may be used in ladders for this scope. A type you leave off is not offered in the ladder builder at all, so it cannot be added by mistake.

Option	Description
Warning	A recorded warning at verbal, written, or final level.
Monetary deduction	An amount, or a number of workdays, taken from pay.
Unpaid suspension	A number of days without pay.
Probation	A period of probation, in days.
Bonus ineligibility	A number of months during which the employee does not qualify for a reward.
Training requirement	Training to complete, within a number of days.
Custom	A consequence you name yourself.

Example: an entity that has decided it will never deduct pay leaves Monetary deduction off, and no ladder in that entity can then take money.

Process and jurisdiction

Option	Description
Allow stage override	When on, the mechanically computed stage can be replaced, and a justification is required. Off means the stage is strictly whatever the ladder produces.
If the employee refuses to acknowledge	Action stands (proceeds anyway) or Block (consequence is held).
A dispute holds the consequence	When on, a disputed monetary consequence is held pending review.
Acknowledgment required	When on, the employee must acknowledge before consequences apply.
Approval required	When on, raised cases route through the approval workflow before they take effect.
Letter language	Overrides the language of served letters. Default (by jurisdiction) follows the legal entity’s jurisdiction.

Example: HC Corp UK Ltd setting the refusal policy to Block (consequence is held) means Tom Hargreaves refusing to acknowledge stops the deduction and leaves the case for a person to resolve, rather than the money moving anyway.

Turning Acknowledgment required or Approval required off removes a step from every case in the scope. Neither is a convenience setting.

Deduction caps

Each cap has a Mode of Amount or Workdays. In Amount mode you set an Amount and a Currency; in Workdays mode you set a number of Workdays. A cap left unset shows as No cap.

Option	Description
Maximum per offense	The most any single case can take.
Maximum per month	The most all cases together can take from one employee in a calendar month.

Example: with a per-month cap set at HC Corp UK Ltd, a second case against the same employee in one month is reduced to what is left under the cap. The case records the reduced amount, a note explaining the reduction, and the remainder that was deferred.

Set both. A per-offense cap on its own does not stop three cases in one month adding up to more than you intended.

What happens next

The policy applies to cases raised from now on. Its allow-list immediately governs the ladder builder for this scope, so open the violation catalog next and check that no ladder relies on a type you have now turned off. Cases already resolved keep the consequences they resolved with.