Unpaid leave
Unpaid leave is approved time away from work during which the person is not paid. It is also called unpaid time off. The absence is authorised and recorded like any other, but no paid balance is drawn down. The type typically carries a quota of zero.
Unpaid leave is what a system reaches for when a legitimate absence has no paid balance behind it. A paid allocation exhausted in August, and a genuine reason for a day in October.
Recording it properly still matters, and the reason is not payroll. It is cover. An unrecorded unpaid day is a person missing from the capacity plan with nothing explaining the gap.
It is also a signal. Regular unpaid leave usually means a paid allocation that does not match how people live.
Longer unpaid arrangements are a different animal from an odd day. A month away raises questions about the role, the cover and the return. None are answered by approving a request. Handle those separately, with an agreed end date written down.
Where this shows up in PeopleMuster
PeopleMuster's live leave configuration includes an unpaid type with a zero-day quota. That is how an absence gets approved and recorded without drawing on any paid balance.
Questions people ask
Is unpaid leave the same as unpaid time off?
Yes. The two phrases describe the same thing. Which one a team uses is habit rather than a distinction worth maintaining.
Does unpaid leave need approval?
Yes, for the same reason any absence does. Approval is about cover and the record, not about whether anybody is paid for the day.
Why would a leave type have a quota of zero?
Because an unpaid type is not an allocation to spend. The zero says there is no balance to draw down, while the type still exists so absences can be recorded.