Staff Scheduling for the Holiday Crush

Run the Shop · November 9, 2026

Extra December hours cost more when they push employees past 40 a week. Plan who works the longer days, set split shifts, and enter time off before clients book.

Extra December hours cost more when they push employees past 40 a week. Plan who works the longer days, set split shifts, and enter time off before clients book.

This is for the owner of a salon or barbershop with employed staff. If your stylists rent booths, they set their own hours, and our post on booth rent math is the one to read.

Work out what an extra hour costs

Under the federal Fair Labor Standards Act, a non-exempt employee is paid at least one and a half times their regular rate for every hour over 40 in a workweek. Some states, including California, also count overtime by the day.

Take a stylist on $18 an hour who usually works 40 hours. Add one extra eight-hour day in a December week:

The extra day costs $216 in wages. If that day books six $65 services, it brings in $390. If it books three, it brings in $195 and costs more than it earns.

Do this sum with your own rates before you add a day. The cheaper way to cover a busy Saturday is often to move someone's quiet Tuesday to the Saturday, so their week stays at 40 hours.

Lengthen the day without lengthening the shift

If the shop stays open later in December, nobody has to work 9 to 8. Split the day between two people, or give one person a split shift with a break in the middle.

In Booked, staff hours sit inside the shop's hours. Each staff member can have more than one time range on the same weekday, and the gap between them is not bookable. A stylist working 9 to 12 and 2 to 6 is set up as two ranges on that day.

If you extend the shop's hours for December, staff shifts do not widen to match. You extend each person yourself, on Dashboard → Hours. That step is where you decide who works the late finish.

Enter time off before the dates fill

Ask every staff member for their December days off this week. Enter each one as a time-off block for that person. A block stops new bookings in that window. It does not move or cancel anything already booked, and it does not tell anyone. Entered in early November, it costs nothing to move. Entered on 10 December, it can mean phoning clients to move them.

For a day the whole shop is shut, such as the 25th, use a closure, so your booking page says you are closed.

Write the rota down

Put December on one page: each person, each day, start and finish, and the weekly total next to each name. Any total over 40 is an overtime week. Check each one is worth the cost.

Share the page with the team before you open the dates to clients. Our post on running a two-person shop with a four-person calendar covers who covers whom when someone is out.

Do this now

Staff hours are explained in Set staff hours.