On-Call Shift Check in

[menardJA]

Is there a way to make it so a resource has to check in for their shift before the On-Call takes effect? My organization has employees that work in an office in another country so they don't always have the ability to let us know expeditiously when they are going to be out sick or late to work aside from email which can be missed. Due to the fact that we have a 24/7 follow the sun support need we always need to have someone on-call and reachable which if an employee is sick on the overnight we may not know until the morning or something escalates to the secondary. I was asked to look into implementing a solution where the on-call shift would not take effect until the listed primary "checks-in" that they have started their shift for the day, I have done some googling and not found anything is there any way to implement this?

[Itallo Brandão · Accepted solution]

Hello!

Currently, On-Call Scheduling in ServiceNow does not have a native feature that requires a check-in before a shift becomes active. However, this functionality can be implemented through customizations in the on-call process.

Possible Solutions

1️⃣ Create a Check-In Button

• Add a UI Action on the on-call shift record, requiring the user to confirm availability.
• The shift will only activate if a check_in_done field is updated to true.

2️⃣ Use Flow Designer or a Business Rule

• Configure a Flow to check if the user has confirmed their availability at the start of the shift.
• If no check-in is recorded within a set time (e.g., 10 minutes after the shift starts), the system can automatically escalate to the backup or notify a manager.

3️⃣ Leverage Availabilities in On-Call Scheduling

• Set up the on-call rotation to assign tasks only to users marked as available.
• This would require employees to update their availability status before their shift starts.

4️⃣ Send Notifications to Enforce Check-In

• Before the shift starts, send an alert (via email, Teams, Slack, SMS, etc.) prompting the on-call resource to confirm availability.
• If the user does not confirm within the time limit, the system automatically escalates to the backup.

Considerations

• This approach requires customizations using Flow Designer, Business Rules, or UI Actions.
• Ensure that the check-in time window is reasonable to allow rapid escalation if needed.
• If your organization operates across different time zones, ensure the check-in logic accounts for these differences.

I hope this helps. If this answer was useful, please mark it as helpful to assist other community members.

Best regards.