Features & Compliance
Canonical time, work policies, approvals, and payroll export architecture
Work Policy Service
The work policy layer provides unified management of schedules, regulations, and expected-time calculations.
- Policy resolution follows employee -> team -> organization fallback.
- Schedule validation compares expected hours and actual logged time.
- Regulation checks enforce break rules and working-time constraints.
Change Policy Service
Change policies govern how far back entries can be edited, when approvals are required, and when self-service is allowed without manager intervention.
This keeps correction behavior consistent across time-tracking and approval flows.
Work Category Service
Work categories apply business meaning to tracked time.
- categories can carry factors such as overtime multipliers
- the same category model feeds time summaries and payroll mappings
- category assignment stays organization-scoped so one tenant's wage logic does not leak into another's
Canonical Time Model
Recent time-tracking work centers on a canonical time-record model that normalizes work records, absence records, approval transitions, and downstream payroll/export processing.
At a feature level this gives Z8 one shared vocabulary for:
- tracked work and breaks
- approved and pending absences
- approval history attached to the same record lineage
- project and cost-center allocation
- payroll-ready data preparation
The result is less drift between what employees see in time tracking, what managers approve, and what payroll integrations consume.
Payroll Export Architecture
The payroll export system uses the same normalized work-period, absence, and wage-mapping inputs across different targets.
File-Based Formatters
File-based targets generate downloadable artifacts.
| Formatter | Purpose |
|---|---|
| DATEV | CSV-style payroll export for DATEV-compatible processing |
| Lexware | File export for Lexware payroll flows |
| Sage | File export for Sage payroll flows |
| SuccessFactors CSV | CSV-oriented export path for SuccessFactors environments |
API Exporters
API-based targets validate configuration, push records to the destination system, and track per-record outcomes.
Current technical examples include:
- Personio
- Workday
- SAP SuccessFactors API flows
Connectors And Target Maturity
Different payroll targets are not identical in behavior:
- file-based targets focus on deterministic artifact generation
- API targets focus on connection validation, push semantics, and record-level sync feedback
- some systems expose both file and API-style integration paths depending on the connector
Operators configure payroll targets in organization settings, while system-wide secrets and infrastructure remain environment-backed.
Wage Type Mappings
Wage type mappings bridge Z8's domain model to target-specific payroll codes.
- work categories map tracked work into payroll-specific wage codes
- absence categories map leave and non-work periods into target-specific codes
- special categories cover cases such as overtime or compensatory handling
The same source meaning can therefore feed multiple export targets without redefining the business meaning of the time itself.