A staff rota is the week's answer to one question: who is here, when, and for how long. Every small employer with people on shifts writes one, and most write it the same way, by starting from who is available and filling the grid until it looks full. That is how a shift rota ends up with the easy shifts covered three deep and Thursday evening empty, and how the owner learns what the week cost only when payroll runs. This page is about writing the rota the other way round, from the shifts the business needs to the people who fill them, and about the three numbers a weekly rota should show before it is published.
Start from the shifts, not from who is free
Decide the days you open, the shifts in a day and the people each shift needs, and that is the rota's skeleton before a single name goes on it. Seven days with two shifts a day and three people a shift is 42 shifts to fill and, at eight hours each, 336 rota hours. A rota schedule built this way tells you immediately whether the team is big enough: 336 hours over twelve people is 28 a head. A rota built from availability tells you nothing until a shift is empty on the day.
The three numbers to read before you publish
Hours per person, so you can see who is heading past the 48 hour weekly average GOV.UK sets and who is short of their contract. Cost of the week at each person's rate, so the owner is not surprised by payroll. And the gap between contracted hours and rota hours, because a business that has promised twelve people 30 hours each has promised 360 hours, and a rota that uses 336 is paying for 24 hours nobody works. The free work rota template on this site returns all three from the inputs above.
The rota plan for the week, and what happens when it changes
A rota plan is only true until the first swap. Someone agrees to cover a late by text, a supervisor nods, and the sheet still shows the original name, which is the version payroll is run from. The fix is not a better spreadsheet, it is a record where the change is made on the rota by a named person and the published version updates. That is the paid part of this site; the free part is the arithmetic that tells you the week is covered and what it costs.
Questions people ask about staff rota
What is the difference between a staff rota and a shift rota?
Nothing in practice. A shift rota labels its cells early, late and night; a staff rota may use times. Both are the same grid with the same totals behind it, and both go wrong in the same place, which is the swap that never reaches the sheet.
How far ahead should a rota be published?
As far as your contracts and your trade allow, and consistently. The law does not fix one notice period for every workplace; your contracts and any agreed policy do, and a rota that is published on a regular day each week is easier to defend and easier to staff than one that appears when it is ready.
Can the free tool on this site write the rota for me?
It works out the week: the shifts to fill, the hours, the cost and the gap against contracts. Putting names on the shifts, publishing it to the team and keeping every swap is Weekrota Pro, at a flat £6.50 a month for the whole team.