A rota template is a grid with days across the top and people down the side, and every small employer in the UK has one somewhere, usually in a spreadsheet inherited from whoever ran the rota before. What sends people looking for a new rota template is rarely the grid. It is that the sheet does not add up: it shows who is on when, but not how many hours each person has, not what the week costs, and not whether the hours on the rota match the hours in people's contracts. This page is about what the template has to hold, which of the free templates people search for are the same sheet under a different name, and what the free work rota template on this site does today.
The grid, and the three totals it usually lacks
Days across, people down, a shift in each cell: that part is the same on a blank rota template, a monthly rota template and a printable staff rota template. The three columns almost every one of them lacks are the hours per person for the week, the cost of the week at each person's rate, and each person's contracted hours set beside the hours they have actually been given. Without the first you cannot see who is heading over the weekly limit; without the second the owner finds out what the week cost after it has been paid; without the third you pay for contracted hours nobody was on the rota for. The free sheet on this site returns all three from the days you open, the shifts in a day and the people each shift needs.
Weekly, monthly, shift and Christmas templates are one sheet
A weekly rota template and a monthly rota template differ only in how many columns you print. A shift rota template is the same grid with the cells labelled early, late and night instead of times. A Christmas rota template is a normal week with more people asking for the same days off and a different set of opening hours. Searching for each of them separately usually means the sheet in use cannot be changed without breaking, which is a sign it is holding formulas it should not be. Keep one template, change the inputs, and let the totals follow.
Free, printable and blank: what the free sheet on this site is
The work rota template on this site is free, needs no account and prints. It is not a downloadable spreadsheet: it is a worked sheet that takes your people, days open, shifts a day, hours a shift, people a shift, an average hourly rate and contracted hours, and returns the shifts to fill, the rota hours, the average per person, the cost of the week and the day, the gap against contracted hours and the headroom under the 48 hour limit. On the worked example that is 42 shifts, 336 hours, 28 hours a head and £4,270.56 for the week at £12.71 an hour. Keeping the sheet with names on it, week after week, is the paid record.
Questions people ask about rota template
What should a staff rota template include?
Days, people and shifts, and then the totals: hours per person for the week, the cost of the week at each person's rate, and contracted hours beside rota hours. The totals are what the grid is for; a template without them is a diary.
Is a spreadsheet rota template enough?
For a handful of people on a fixed pattern, yes. It stops being enough when swaps are agreed by text and never reach the sheet, when two people edit it, or when someone asks what the week cost and the answer takes twenty minutes. That is where a record with a history starts.
Does the free template on this site store my rota?
No. It works from the figures you enter and returns the totals on the page. Keeping the people, the weeks and every shift and swap is what Weekrota Pro does, for a flat £6.50 a month for the whole team.