This document will continue to evolve as existing sections change and new information is added. All updates appear in the following table:
| Date | Product | Feature | Notes |
|---|---|---|---|
| 25 MAR 2022 | Absence Management | Improved Absence Processing for Re-evaluating Absences | Updated document. Revised feature information. |
| 25 FEB 2022 | Absence Management | Retrieve Data to Reconcile Absences and Payroll Info | Updated document. Revised feature information. |
| 06 DEC 2021 | Created initial document. |
HCM Cloud applications have two types of patches you can receive that are documented in this What’s New:
- Release Updates (22A, 22B, 22C, and 22D)
- Optional Monthly Maintenance Packs to each update
It is important for you to know what Release Update your environment is on. You can find this in your Cloud Portal.
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HAVE AN IDEA?
We’re here and we’re listening. If you have a suggestion on how to make our products better, please let us know. To enter an idea go to the Ideas Lab on Oracle Customer Connect. In this document wherever you see the light bulb icon after the feature name it means we delivered one of your ideas.
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Suggested Reading for all HCM Products:
- Human Resources What’s New – In the Global Human Resources section you will find features on the base application in which other application are built upon.
NOTE: Not all Global Human Resource features are available for Talent and Compensation products.
- Oracle Human Capital Management Cloud Functional Known Issues and Maintenance Packs (Document ID 1554838.1). These documents identify bug fixes and possible known issues. You will also need to review these documents based in the release update version you are currently on or will be moving to.
- Oracle Help Center – Here you will find guides, videos and searchable help.
- Release Readiness – New Feature Summary, What’s New, Feature Listing Spreadsheet, Spotlights and Release Training
GIVE US FEEDBACK
We welcome your comments and suggestions to improve the content. Please send us your feedback at oracle_fusion_applications_help_ww_grp@oracle.com. Indicate you are inquiring or providing feedback regarding the HCM Cloud What’s New in the body or title of the email.
Column Definitions:
Report = New or modified, Oracle-delivered, ready to run reports.
UI or Process-Based: Small Scale = These UI or process-based features are typically comprised of minor field, validation, or program changes. Therefore, the potential impact to users is minimal.
UI or Process-Based: Larger Scale* = These UI or process-based features have more complex designs. Therefore, the potential impact to users is higher.
Features Delivered Disabled = Action is needed BEFORE these features can be used by END USERS. These features are delivered disabled and you choose if and when to enable them. For example, a) new or expanded BI subject areas need to first be incorporated into reports, b) Integration is required to utilize new web services, or c) features must be assigned to user roles before they can be accessed.
| Ready for Use by End Users Reports plus Small Scale UI or Process-Based new features will have minimal user impact after an update. Therefore, customer acceptance testing should focus on the Larger Scale UI or Process-Based* new features. |
Customer Must Take Action before Use by End Users Not disruptive as action is required to make these features ready to use. As you selectively choose to leverage, you set your test and roll out timing. |
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|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Feature |
Report |
UI or |
UI or |
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Oracle Absence Management is a configurable and flexible global solution that enables organizations to manage absences of their workforce. The framework provides ability to define both complex and diverse absence plans. It integrates with the Oracle Cloud Global Payroll and Time and Labor products and provides dedicated work areas for the roles of Administrator and Employees. Simplified user interface is provided for employees’ absence data entry.
Improved Absence Processing for Re-evaluating Absences
There is now a new parameter called Payroll Relationship Group for the Evaluate Absences process in the Schedule and Monitor Absence Processes page. You can select a specific payroll object group from the Payroll Relationship Group option when you submit the absence process. The application will then reprocess the absence entries of only those employees who belong to the payroll group you select.
Payroll Relationship Group option for the Evaluate Absences process
Additionally, you can now configure the Evaluate Absences process to look for changes in availability patterns using the existing Work Schedule Rule parameter. Use it to reprocess the absences of only those employees whose work schedule assignments have changed.
Work Schedule Rule option for the Evaluate Absences process
Exercise tighter control over defining employee groups for whom the absences have to be re-evaluated. Additionally, you now have the option to reprocess the absences of only those employees whose HR data has changes.
Steps to Enable
You don't need to do anything to enable this feature.
Tips And Considerations
- Updates to availability patterns include changes to availability pattern assignment and changes to shifts, breaks, and exceptions.
- The application doesn't consider the deletion of shifts, pattern assignments, breaks, and exceptions as a change in availability patterns.
- Changes to the setup components, such as availability type definition or break definitions aren’t tracked.
Plan Balances on Approval Notifications
A new parameter called Display balance in approval notification is now available in the absence type setup page. You can use it to configure absence types to display plan balance as of the absence end date in any generated notification.
Display balance in approval notification option in absence type setup page
Display plan balance on generated notifications to make approval process faster.
Steps to Enable
You don't need to do anything to enable this feature.
Tips And Considerations
- This option will have no effect if you haven’t configured approvals for the absence type.
- You can display plan balances only for accrual, compensatory, and donation plans.
- The plan balance is calculated when you trigger the notification. It isn’t dynamically updated unless the absence is resubmitted.
- The balance displayed in the responsive self-service page is the plan balance of the absence type.
Retrieve Data to Reconcile Absences and Payroll Info
You can now easily reconcile absence entries with absence payments by extracting a data file using the Absences and Payroll Info for Reconciliation extract. The data file includes absence hours reported in Oracle Global Absence Management and payroll info in Oracle Fusion Global Payroll Cloud Service.
The extract includes absence entries that belong to the current payroll period. Here’s the data that is extracted:
| Person and Assignment Details (first row) |
Absence Summary (Second row) |
| Business Unit Name |
Absence Plan |
| Person Number |
Absence Plan Units |
| Manager Name |
Absence Plan Units Difference |
| Assignment Number |
Absence Plan Units in Payroll |
| Legal Employer Name |
Absence Type |
| Employee Name |
Current Retro Indicator |
| Location Name |
Retro Absence Start Date |
| Business Title |
Units of Measure |
| Department Name |
Example of an extract for the Monthly Payroll Period of January 2021; Color formatting was added for illustrative purposes.
If the absence plan units difference column shows 0, it signifies that the data is reconciled. If the difference is negative, it means that some absence data wasn't transferred to Payroll. In the above example, James has 15 hours of absence hours and 4 days of absences recorded in absence management that didn’t move successfully to payroll. Similarly, Jennifer has 17 hours of vacation that didn’t move from absence management to payroll. She also entered an absence for a past payroll period (for 2020).
This enhancement improves productivity and accuracy by reconciling data between Absence Management and Payroll to ensure that people are correctly paid for their time off. It also reduces the time and administrative burden of having to manually create custom reports from scratch.
You can now easily reconcile absence entries with absence payments by extracting a data file.
Steps to Enable
You don't need to do anything to enable this feature.
Tips And Considerations
- Only the approved absences are considered for reconciliation.
- The unit of measure used for reporting is same as the unit of measure of the absence plan.
- The application considers only the primary assignments for reconciliation.
- The option for Retroactive changes to absence entries brings in any absences that have been modified within the current payroll period and have an absence start date that is earlier than the payroll period. This means that the application will fetch any old absence that is re-processed in the payroll period for which the extract is being run. This re-processing could happen due to a user modifying the absence entry, or when you submit the Evaluate Absences process for re-processing all absences.
Here's how you view the CSV file data in appropriate columns:
- Open the CSV file using Microsoft Excel.
- Click column A to highlight the entire first column.
- On the Data tab, select Text to Columns.
- Select the Delimited option.
- Click Next.
- Under Delimiters, select Comma.
- Click Next.
- Under Column data format, select the General option.
- Click Finish.
You can load the data in this extract output to Oracle Analytics Cloud Service for additional data visualization, ad-hoc analysis, and reporting capabilities.
IMPORTANT Actions and Considerations for Absences
REPLACED OR REMOVED FEATURES
From time to time, Oracle replaces existing Cloud service features with new features or removes existing features. When a feature is replaced the older version may be removed immediately or at a future time. As a best practice, you should use the newer version of a replaced feature as soon as the newer version is available.
| Product | Removed Feature | Target Removal | Replacement Feature | Replaced In | Additional Information |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Nothing at this time. |
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KNOWN ISSUES / MAINTENANCE PACK SPREADSHEETS
Oracle publishes a Known Issues document for every Update to make customers are aware of potential problems they could run into and the document provides workarounds if they are available.
Oracle also publishes Maintenance Pack and Statutory Maintenance Pack documentation of bugs that are fixed in the monthly or statutory patching.
To review these documents you must have access to My Oracle Support:
Oracle Human Capital Management Cloud Functional Known Issues and Maintenance Packs (Document ID 1554838.1)