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Offboarding, Terminating, and Deleting Employees

Updated

Available for the following plans: Standard, Premium, Platinum, Unlimited
Available for the following user access levels: Admin

When an agreement between an employee and your organization ends, the platform provides two distinct paths: Offboarding/Termination (compliant) and Deleting (permanent removal). It is critical to choose the correct action based on your legal and auditing requirements.

Important: Offboard vs. Delete

In Canada, you must strictly distinguish between these two actions to remain legally compliant:

  • Offboard/Terminate (Recommended): This stops the person from being an active employee but retains their data for the 6 to 7 years required by the CRA and provincial auditors. Use this for anyone who has performed work for you.
  • Delete (High Risk): Deleting removes all records entirely. There is no record kept for auditing purposes. Only use "Delete" for duplicate profiles or "pending" files where the employee never signed documents or earned wages.

Note: An Admin cannot delete an employee if they have signed a contract, submitted a timesheet, or had an asset assigned.

Getting Started

Step 1: Pre-Offboarding Checklist

Before starting, ensure you have created an Offboarding Checklist. This generates a list of tasks (e.g., "Collect laptop," "Revoke server access") that must be completed.

Step 2: How to Offboard and Terminate
  1. Go to People > Employee List
  2. Click the Action button next to the employee who needs off-boarding.
  3. Click the Offboard employee button.
  4. Complete the following fields:
    • Termination Date: (Must be future-dated for all payroll options to appear).
    • Termination Type & Reason.
    • Employee Access: Specify how long they can log in. If no time is entered, access expires at 11:59 PM on the date chosen.

    • Payroll Cut-off Date: Helpful Hint: If you do not use today’s date for the Payroll Cut Off, the platform may not inform the Payroll module properly, and the employee may still appear on full salary in the next pay run.

      Helpful Hint

      Payroll Cut-Off Date: Use this field to set a specific time for the termination to sync with your payroll platform. This allows you to finish final pay runs, expenses, or time-off approvals before the record closes.

      Employee Access: If you enter a date in the "Give access until" field (without a specific time), the employee will have full access until 11:59 PM that day. After that, their access will be automatically restricted.

  5. Click the Terminate button.

  6. Review the Final Time Off Entitlement screen.

    Canadian Compliance: You are legally required to pay out all accrued but unused vacation pay (typically 4% or 6%).

  7. Click Accept and Terminate.

Warning

If the offboarded employee is a primary manager, then users with admin permission settings will see a note that the offboarded employee has direct reports. The admin user can also create a task to remind themselves to reassign the employees to the replacement primary manager.

Step 3: Post-Termination Actions

The Record of Employment (ROE)

You must issue an ROE via Service Canada within 5 calendar days of the final pay. If not auto-synced, download the file from the Payroll module and upload it to the ROE Web portal.

Cleaning up Task Reminders

Terminating an employee does not automatically cancel onboarding tasks assigned to them previously. To stop receiving "Past Due" alerts:

  1. Go to your Dashboard > To-do list widget.
  2. Click the ellipsis (...) and select View all tasks.
  3. Click the Other Tasks tab.
  4. Search for the terminated employee’s name.
  5. Select the tasks and click Actions > Delete.
Backfill a role with Find Talent: Recommended talent available

Important

Immediately after termination, a Need a Backfill panel will appear. You can use Find Talent to see recommended talent or create a job advert. If you skip this, you can do it later via the Recruitment module.

  1. Click the Update location button.
  2. Click the search bar and choose the correct location.
  3. Click the Submit button.

  4. Click the button to add the candidate to your saved list.

    Helpful Hint

    To view their profile, click the button. To start recruiting them, go to the Saved Candidates page in the Recruitment module.

Backfill a role with Find Talent: There is no talent to recommend

Important

The Need a Backfill panel only appears right after you terminate and offboard an employee. If you want to backfill the role at a different time, you can do so via the Recruitment module.

  1. Click the Get Started button.

    Helpful Hint

    We will send a reminder to create a backfill role a week before their termination date.

  2. If you choose to create an advert, this will open the Create a Job screen, where you will need to enter the required details.

  3. If you choose not to create a backfill role advert when you are offboarding the employee, you can do this retroactively:

    • Open the Employee page.
    • Click on the Actions button.
    • Click the Create Backfill Role button.

    Helpful Hint

    If you cancel the offboarding of the employee, we will then automatically close the related backfill role you created on Employment Hero.

Cancel an employee's offboarding

Important

You can only cancel offboarding if the termination date has not yet passed.

  1. Navigate to People > Employees List.
  2. Click the Action button next to the employee.
  3. Click Cancel Offboarding.
  4. Choose whether to keep or close the remaining offboarding tasks and click Confirm.

Deleting data

Deleting an Employee Record

Warning: Permanent Data Loss

Deleting an employee permanently removes all their information from the platform. There is no record kept for auditing or legal purposes. If you need to keep their data for tax or compliance reasons, follow the Offboarding steps instead.

When you cannot delete an employee

  • You cannot delete an employee if they have already:
  • Signed an HR document or contract.
  • Submitted or approved time off or timesheets.
  • Been assigned a company asset.
  • Onboarded another employee.

How to delete an employee record

  1. Go to the People menu and select Employees List.
  2. Find the employee and click the Action button.
  3. Select Delete.

  4. Type the employee's name into the text box to confirm.

    Note: Type the name only; do not include the parentheses shown on the screen.

  5. Click Delete.

FAQs

Why can't I see the payroll cut-off date?
These fields only appear if the termination date is set in the future.
How do I update or edit a termination date?
You will need to cancel the termination, then re-terminate the employee with the new information.
What about Maternity/Parental Leave?

To avoid paying for a license while an employee is on leave, offboard them but do not terminate them. You can reactivate their profile when they return by following the steps in this article: Find and re-activate a terminated employee.

What if I entered the incorrect Payroll Cut Off Date?

If you do not use today's date for the Payroll Cut Off Date, Employment Hero will not be able to inform the Payroll platform of the termination. This means the pay schedule will still show the employee's full salary.

Explore related content

  • Manage my tasks This feature shows you a list of offboarding tasks that your organization has assigned to you and that you must complete before you time off.