Shift Categories: Prioritize & Organize with Custom Tags

🏷️ Shift Categories: Prioritize & Organize with Custom Tags
 

📘 Article Purpose

This guide explains how to use Shift Categories in Ontraccr’s Field Schedule to organize and prioritize shifts using custom color-coded labels.

🧩 What Are Shift Categories?

Shift Categories let you:

• Group unassigned shifts visually
• Tag shifts with internal labels like “High Priority” or “Do Not Reschedule”
• Help your dispatchers quickly understand the intent or rules for each shift

🧠 Categories are especially helpful in the Unassigned Shift Queue, where many pending items can be hard to distinguish without them.

🛠️ How to Create Custom Categories

Go to Settings > Customization > Schedule

Click Schedule Categories

Click Add

You’ll be prompted to:

• Enter a name (e.g., “Service Work”, “Urgent”, “Low Priority”)
• Select a color (via palette or hex code)

Click Save

🎨 Editing & Reordering Categories

Use the pencil icon to rename or change colors

Use drag-and-drop (inside Settings) to reorder categories

This affects how they appear in the unassigned shift panel—not on the schedule board itself

📦 Applying Categories to Shifts

You can apply a category when:

• Creating a shift (in the Shift Slider, under “Category”)
• Editing any existing shift
• Categorizing unassigned shifts for visual organization

📌 If no users are assigned, the shift will appear in the Unassigned Shift Queue, grouped under that category.

🔍 Example Categories

🧠 Use Cases

• Separate shifts by department (Service vs Construction)
• Flag shifts that shouldn’t be moved
• Prioritize what needs dispatching first

🧭 Visibility Across Views

Categories apply to:

• Unassigned Shift Queue (on the left sidebar)
• Any view (Day, Week, User, etc.)

This ensures a consistent visual cue no matter how you filter or organize your schedule.