Custom permission sets allow you to create new permission sets tailored to your team's needs.
In Productive, absence refers to both time off and remote work: time off means the person is unavailable for work, while remote work means the person is working but not in the office.
This article covers the View absence bookings for users they manage permission, which lets managers see absence data only for the people in their reporting line.
📌 This permission covers absence bookings only.
To manage absence allowance visibility, use the subsidiary-based permissions or the global View all users' absence allowances permission.
View Absence Bookings for Users They Manage
This permission lets a user see absence bookings for everyone they directly or indirectly manage based on the Manager field set on each person's profile.
📌 Visibility follows the reporting line, not the subsidiary. If someone is in the user's reporting chain (directly or through intermediate managers), their absence bookings are visible in full, including category, notes, and attachments.
With this permission enabled, users can see:
Absence bookings in the Resource Planner
Absence bookings and requests on user profiles, under the Absence tab
Absence overview in Time > Overview on user profiles
Absence bookings in reports: Bookings report, Capacity and Availability report, Overtime/Undertime report, and Payroll report
People outside the user's reporting line remain hidden: their Absence tab is not accessible and they don't appear in the above reports.
📌 Changes to the Manager field take effect immediately. If an admin updates who someone reports to, visibility updates in real time.
How to Set It Up
To make this permission work:
Go to each person's profile and set the Manager field under Info. This defines the reporting line
Open the relevant custom permission set and configure the following:
Enable:View absence bookings for users they manage: this lets the manager see absence bookings for all direct and indirect reports.
Disable:
View absence details for all users: this prevents the manager from seeing absence data for people outside their reporting line.
View absence bookings for users in their subsidiary (if not needed): if all users share one subsidiary, disabling this avoids unintentional cross-team visibility.
Assign the permission set to the relevant users.
📌 If the Manager field is not set for any employees, the permission has no effect — the user won't see anyone's absence data because no one is in their reporting line.
👉 Find out more about setting up custom permission sets and assigning permission sets to users.
Dependencies
This permission follows the same dependency logic as other absence permissions:
If View absence details for all users is enabled, View absence bookings for users they manage will automatically be enabled.
If View absence bookings for users they manage is disabled, View absence details for all users will automatically be disabled.
(Default) System Permissions
The View absence bookings for users they manage permission is automatically enabled for system permission sets that have View absence details for all users turned on:
Admin
Profitability Manager (restricted and unrestricted)
Manager (restricted and unrestricted)
Coordinator (restricted and unrestricted)
For all other system permission sets where View absence details for all users is off, this permission is also off.
Combining Subsidiary and Reporting Line Visibility
You can enable both View absence bookings for users in their subsidiary and View absence bookings for users they manage on the same permission set.
When both are active, the scopes are additive: the user sees absence data for anyone who meets either condition.
For example, a manager based in the German subsidiary who also manages someone in the Croatian subsidiary would see:
Everyone in the German subsidiary (via the subsidiary permission)
Their Croatian report (via the reporting line permission)