Employee management is the foundation for all further functions in ZEP. This article covers how to create employees, edit their data, end their employment period, and pseudonymize or delete their record when needed.
Which fields are available on the employee in detail depends on your product line and the modules you have booked. A complete field reference with all availability notes is in the article Employee Data.
Note: Employee management is included by default in ZEP Clock, ZEP Compact, and ZEP Professional. You access it via the main menu Employees; the list shows all employees who are currently employed by default.
Permissions for employee management
Who is allowed to create, edit, or remove employees in ZEP follows from their role. This overview summarizes which role can perform which action. The full role reference with all permissions is in the article Employee data.
Action | Who is allowed |
Create employees | Administrators company-wide. Department managers for their own departments (with the Locations and Departments module). |
Edit master data | Administrators company-wide. Department managers for their own departments. Every person for their own master data within the User role. |
Change role | Administrators. Department managers within their own department, but cannot demote administrators. |
Change username afterwards | Administrators only. |
Deactivate employees (end of employment) | Administrators. Department managers for their own departments. |
Pseudonymize employees | Administrators only. |
Delete employees | Administrators only. A person cannot delete themselves. |
Creating employees
Employees are created directly from the employee list. Administrators and Department Managers (for their own department) are authorized to do so.
How to create a new employee:
Open Employees in the main menu.
Click New employee in the top right.
Fill in the required fields in the dialog: Salutation, First name, Surname, Username, and Department.
Choose a role from the dropdown. When in doubt, User is the safest default.
Optional: price group, language, e-mail, abbreviation, and personnel number.
Confirm with Save.
The username may be up to 32 characters long and may only contain safe characters (letters, digits, hyphen, underscore, dot). It must be unique across the entire system. After saving, the username is locked; a later change is only possible via the special workflow Edit username (see the section Editing employees).
Note: A small Edit icon appears next to the username field in the employee data for administrators. Clicking it opens the Edit username dialog. Once the new username is confirmed, ZEP automatically updates all dependent records.
After saving, ZEP forwards to the detail page of the newly created employee.
Assigning access data: When creating an employee for the first time, you decide how access data reaches the employee. Two options are available:
Send by e-mail (default): The employee receives a welcome e-mail with a setup link valid for 24 hours. They set the initial password themselves; no administrator knows it. Prerequisite: the e-mail address in the Contact tab is filled in.
Set password manually: You specify an initial password that you communicate to the employee personally. They are prompted to change it on first login. Useful when no business e-mail address is available or login happens via a terminal.
Editing employees
Master data can be updated at any time. Administrators and Department Managers (for employees of their own department) are authorized. Each person can also maintain their own master data.
How to edit an employee:
Open Employees in the main menu.
Click the name of the employee in the list. The detail page opens with the General tab as the starting view.
Change the desired fields in the tabs General, Settings, Contact details, or Bank account.
Save your changes with Save.
Which fields you maintain in detail, from salutation and language to bank account, is fully described in Employee Data. The article also documents all availability notes per product line and module.
Changing the username after creation: The username is read-only after creation because it serves as a technical identifier in time entries, reports, and interfaces. Administrators can still change it. To do so, open the detail page of the employee and choose Actions > Edit username. ZEP then updates all dependent records.
Deactivating employees
When employees leave the company, end their employment period. This keeps past time entries and reports unchanged while the person no longer appears in the standard employee list after the end date.
How to end an employment period:
Open the detail page of the employee via Employees.
Switch to the tab Employment Periods.
Fill in the field to with the last working day in the current entry.
Save your changes.
After the end date, the employee is no longer considered currently employed. The employee list hides them by default. With the filter Employment period in the list configuration, you can still display former employees, for example for historical reporting.
Note: Ending the employment period releases the associated license. You can use the freed slot for a new employee or adjust the license count in the next contract cycle.
Pseudonymizing employees
Pseudonymization replaces personal data with generic values without destroying the accounting history. It applies when former employees invoke their right to be forgotten under GDPR Article 17 while the auditability of past data must be preserved.
How to pseudonymize an employee:
First end the employment period (see the previous section).
Open the detail page and choose Actions > Pseudonymize.
In the dialog, decide per data category between deleting and pseudonymizing: absences and calendars, assignments (Department Manager, project manager, key account manager), and change history.
Confirm with Execute.
First name, surname, and username are always replaced by generic values, for example Vorname001, Nachname001, and user001. ZEP automatically picks the next free number. All other personal data is deleted: e-mail address, postal address, phone numbers, bank details, date of birth, personnel number, and profile picture. The password is regenerated, so a login with the previous credentials is no longer possible.
Project times, receipts, and other time entries remain under the new pseudonymized name so that reports and evaluations of the past stay consistent. Only administrators may execute this action.
Warning: Pseudonymization is not reversible. Before executing, make sure all required reports have been exported.
Deleting employees
Deleting removes an employee completely from ZEP, including all dependent data. This action is only meaningful for test accounts or accidental creations. For all other cases, pseudonymization is the correct choice because it preserves history.
Warning: You can only delete an employee if there are no project times, receipts, tickets in which this employee is entered as an editor (only with the Tickets, Tasks & To-dos module) and absences (only with the Overtime, Absences & Vacation module).
How to delete an employee:
Open the detail page and choose Actions > Delete employee.
ZEP automatically checks whether open project assignments, active time entries, or other dependent data exist.
If the checks succeed, confirm with Execute.
When deleting, ZEP removes all dependent records automatically: project and task assignments, employment periods, internal hourly rates, monthly employee data, overtime and vacation accounts. Only administrators may execute this action. You cannot delete yourself.