Attendance Points Calculator
Enter your occurrences and your employer's own point values. The calculator totals your points, shows how much room is left before the next warning or a termination review, and projects what happens once older points age off your record.
Attendance Points Calculator
Policy Preset
Presets are typical values, not a legal standard. Overwrite any number with what your handbook or collective bargaining agreement actually says.
Your Point Values
Set a value to 0 if your policy does not point that occurrence at all. Half points (0.5) and quarter points (0.25) both show up in real policies.
Your Occurrences This Period
Your Thresholds
Leave a threshold at 0 to skip a step your policy does not use. These four defaults are typical, not authoritative: your handbook or union contract sets the real numbers.
Carryover & Rolloff
The rolling period is just a label for your policy. It does not change the total. Enter the points that are about to age out below.
Pull the occurrence dates off your write-ups. Anything earned roughly one rolling period ago is about to drop off.
Enter a termination review threshold to see how much room you have left.
This is arithmetic, not a prediction. Progressive discipline steps, manager discretion, protected leave, union grievance rights, and appeal procedures all sit between a point total and an actual firing. Ask HR for your official point record in writing.
Estimates only. Attendance point systems are set by each employer and are not standardized by law. This tool does not provide legal advice, and it cannot tell you whether a specific absence is protected. Check your employee handbook or collective bargaining agreement, and talk to an employment attorney or the DOL if you think you were pointed for protected leave.
Where Your Points Came From
| Occurrence | Count | Points each | Subtotal | Share |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Total | 0 | 100% | ||
How Much Room Is Left
Whole occurrences only, measured against your termination review threshold. The warning steps land first, usually well before that.
If You Take No New Occurrences
You have entered more points aging out than you currently have on record, so both projections are floored at 0.
Keep Your Own Record of Every Shift
Timeclock44 keeps clock-ins, tardies, and shift history on your phone. When a point shows up that you do not recognize, you have your own timestamps to check it against.
How attendance point systems work
An attendance point system (often called a "no-fault" policy) puts a number on each attendance event instead of judging the reason behind it. Clock in ten minutes late and you pick up a fraction of a point. Miss a shift without calling in and you pick up several. The points sit on your record for a set period, and fixed totals trigger the next disciplinary step.
Nothing in federal or state law sets those numbers. Every point value, every threshold, and every rolloff rule is written by your employer or negotiated into a collective bargaining agreement. Two workers with identical attendance, doing the same job at two different companies, can be one point from a written warning and five points from one. That is why every field in this calculator is editable. The defaults are a starting point, not an authority.
| Occurrence | Commonly cited value |
|---|---|
| Tardy under 1 hour | 0.5 to 1 point |
| Leaving early / early out | 0.5 to 1 point |
| Late over 1 hour or partial-day absence | 1 to 2 points |
| Unexcused absence with proper notice | 1 to 2 points |
| Call-off without required notice | 2 to 3 points |
| No-call / no-show | 3 to 5 points |
Whether a late punch becomes a point at all often depends on the grace period and the rounding rule your employer applies to your clock-in. The time clock rounding calculator shows how a seven-minute rounding rule turns a real punch time into a recorded one.
How many points before a warning or termination?
Termination thresholds cluster between 8 and 12 points over a rolling 12-month window. The spread is wide because it tracks industry and staffing model more than anything else. Retailers and quick-service employers with deep applicant pools sometimes act at around 5 points. Manufacturers who spent real money training you often sit at 12. The policy the U.S. Department of Labor examined in Opinion Letter FMLA2018-1-A did not terminate until 18.
Most policies also require documented steps on the way there: a verbal warning, a written warning, a final written warning, then a termination review. Hitting the top number usually triggers a review rather than an automatic firing, and a skipped step is a common basis for a union grievance.
Take the default scenario loaded in the calculator. Two tardies at 0.5 each is 1.0 point, plus one absence with proper notice at 1.0 point, for a total of 2.0. Against a 9-point termination threshold that leaves 7 points of room: 14 more tardies, or 7 more absences with notice, or 2 more no-call/no-shows. Occurrences are the unit people actually think in, which is why the calculator converts the leftover points into them.
Rolling periods and when points fall off
Three models dominate. A rolling window (most common, usually 6 or 12 months) drops each point on its own anniversary: a point earned March 3 disappears the following March 3. A calendar-year reset wipes everyone's balance on a fixed date. An "active service" rolloff pauses the aging clock during long leaves, so a 12-month rolloff can stretch past 12 calendar months if you were out for a while.
Rolloff can matter more than anything you do going forward. Someone sitting at 6.5 points with a 5-point written warning threshold and 2 points aging out next month drops back under that threshold without changing a thing.
This tool does not guess dates for you, and that is deliberate. Occurrence dates live in your employer's records, and being off by a week produces a confident wrong answer. Pull your write-ups or ask HR for your point record, count what you earned roughly one rolling period ago, and type that number into the rolloff fields. If earned time off covers some of your absences, check your balance with the PTO accrual calculator, since plenty of policies waive or reduce a point when approved PTO covers the day.
Absences your employer cannot point you for
Point systems are generally lawful, but they cannot be applied to legally protected absences. FMLA leave is the clearest case: 29 C.F.R. § 825.220(c) bars using FMLA leave as a negative factor, and protected absences cannot be counted under a no-fault policy. The DOL did permit freezing an employee's existing points during FMLA leave in Opinion Letter FMLA2018-1-A, as long as non-FMLA leave is treated the same way.
The same limit applies to ADA reasonable-accommodation absences (see the EEOC's 2016 guidance on employer-provided leave, which requires exceptions to no-fault attendance policies absent undue hardship), pregnancy-related leave, state and local paid sick leave, jury duty, USERRA military service, and whatever your union contract carves out. State sick leave is the one people miss most often, and the sick leave accrual calculator covers how those hours build up.
If you were pointed for a protected absence, ask for the written policy and your official point record, then ask HR in writing to reverse the point. Keep your own clock-in records while you do it. If nothing gets corrected, contact the DOL Wage and Hour Division or the EEOC. Independent timestamps are worth having in that conversation, which is one reason to track your own shifts with Timeclock44. And if a point total does end in a termination, the final paycheck calculator covers what your employer owes and by when.
Estimates only, not legal advice. Attendance point systems are entirely employer-defined and are not standardized by any federal or state law. Check your handbook or collective bargaining agreement for the numbers that actually apply to you.
Frequently Asked Questions
Common questions about attendance points calculator
What is an attendance point system?
A "no-fault" attendance policy puts a number on each attendance occurrence and never asks why it happened. A tardy costs points. So does an early out, an unexcused absence, or a no-call/no-show. The points stack up over a set window, and certain totals trigger the next step of discipline: verbal warning, written warning, final warning, then a termination review. No federal or state law defines any of those numbers. Every one of them comes out of your employer's handbook or your union contract.
How many attendance points before you get fired?
Entirely up to your employer. Most termination thresholds land between 8 and 12 points over a rolling 12-month window. Some retailers move at around 5. Some large employers give you a lot more room: the policy the U.S. Department of Labor reviewed in Opinion Letter FMLA2018-1-A did not terminate until 18 points. Your handbook is the only authoritative source, so type your own threshold into the calculator instead of guessing at a typical one.
How many points is a tardy? What about a call-off?
Published policies tend to use 0.5 to 1 point for a tardy under an hour, 0.5 to 1 for leaving early, 1 to 2 for an unexcused absence where you called in properly, 2 to 3 for calling off without the required notice, and 3 to 5 for a no-call/no-show. Half points and quarter points are both common. Those are ranges observed across employers, not a standard, so read your handbook and overwrite the defaults with what it actually says. And whether a late punch counts as a tardy at all can come down to your employer's grace period and rounding rule, which the time clock rounding calculator works through.
Can my employer give me attendance points for FMLA leave?
No. Under 29 C.F.R. § 825.220(c), an employer cannot use FMLA leave as a negative factor in employment actions, and FMLA-protected absences cannot be counted under a no-fault attendance policy. Single days taken as intermittent FMLA leave are covered too. The DOL did allow one thing in Opinion Letter FMLA2018-1-A (Aug. 28, 2018): an employer can freeze a worker's existing points during FMLA leave, so nothing accrues and nothing rolls off while you are out, as long as equivalent non-FMLA leave is frozen the same way. If you were pointed for a certified FMLA absence, put it to HR in writing and contact the DOL Wage and Hour Division.
Are attendance point systems legal?
Generally yes, as long as they exclude legally protected absences. FMLA leave, ADA reasonable-accommodation absences, pregnancy-related leave, state and local paid sick leave, jury duty, and military service generally cannot be pointed. The EEOC's 2016 guidance, Employer-Provided Leave and the Americans with Disabilities Act, says employers must make exceptions to maximum-leave and no-fault attendance policies as a reasonable accommodation unless doing so causes undue hardship. Policies rigid enough to fire someone automatically at a point total, with no individual look at the reasons, have drawn EEOC enforcement more than once. Paid sick leave you have already earned is another common carve-out, and the sick leave accrual calculator shows what you have banked.
When do attendance points fall off?
Most policies use a rolling window, commonly 6 or 12 months, where each point disappears on its own anniversary. A point earned on January 15 drops off the following January 15. A smaller number of employers reset everyone's balance on a fixed calendar date instead. And some count only "active service" toward rolloff, so a long leave pauses the clock. The rolloff projection above asks you to enter how many points are about to age out, because only your own occurrence dates can tell you that.
Do several sick days in a row count as one point or one per day?
It varies, and this is one of the biggest gaps between policies. Some employers count consecutive days from a single illness as one occurrence. Others point every missed shift. Plenty land in between and treat the run as one occurrence only if you bring a doctor's note covering all of it. Read the exact wording before you assume anything, because the difference between 1 point and 3 points for the same flu is entirely a handbook question. Some policies also waive or reduce a point when approved PTO covers the day, so check your balance with the PTO accrual calculator.
Can I be denied unemployment if I'm fired over attendance points?
Possibly, but hitting a point threshold is not automatically disqualifying. State agencies apply their own "misconduct" standard, and absences caused by illness, an emergency, or protected leave are often found not to be willful misconduct even though they broke the attendance policy. File the claim anyway, explain what was behind each occurrence, and appeal a denial if the reasons were outside your control. Rules and definitions differ by state. If a termination does happen, the final paycheck calculator covers what your employer owes you and when.