Please note: This article is for those using our upgraded rostering. Please see this collection to see how to set this up on your rostering.
If you don't have access to upgraded rostering yet and would like to learn more, you can book a demo with our team.
Birdie's activity management features will transform how you organise and deliver care. By separating activity creation from visit scheduling, you create more structured care plans while reducing administrative work. The system helps prevent missed tasks, ensures medication compliance, and makes it easy to adapt to changing client needs - all while providing clear visual cues when activities aren't properly attached to visits.
When setting up care for a new client, we recommend starting with creating their tasks and medications before creating visit schedules. This ensures all necessary care activities are ready to be attached to visits and that your carers will have this crucial information for their visit.
Creating Tasks and Medications
In order to create an activity list, you must first add the client's tasks and medications. If you have not yet done this, please follow the instructions below:
Attaching Activities to Visits
Once you have created tasks and medications, you will need to attach them to visits, this is so your carers can see what needs to be completed during their visit. There are two ways to do this:
Method 1: Attach Activities When Creating a Visit Schedule
You can attach an activity list when you first create a visit schedule(s).
Go to the Visit Template tab
Click the Add Visit Schedule button
Set up your visit details (time, frequency, carers needed)
In the activities section, select the routine you want to attach
Click Save Changes
For a more in-depth guide, please see this article.
Method 2: Add Activities to an Existing Visit Schedule
Use this method if you've already created visit schedules:
Go to the Visit Template tab
Select the visit schedule you want to edit
Click Edit on the drop-down menu
Select a routine from the activities list to add to the visit schedule
Click Save Changes
When you return to the Activity Calendar tab, you should now see the activities within the visit card, indicating they are properly linked.
Remember to add routines to all visit schedules on each day!
Seeing lots of lists unlinked to visits? read this article to see how to fix it.
Linking activities to overnight visits
You can now seamlessly link activity lists from both the start and end days of visits that cross midnight, ensuring no medications or tasks are missed during extended care periods. This means you can accurately schedule 24-hour care, giving you confidence that the right activities are assigned to the right visits every time.
How overnight visit linking works:
For visits that cross the day boundary, the activity list dropdown will show day-level headings to help you select the correct activities:
Visit Instances: Shows full calendar dates (e.g., "Tuesday, 11 March" and "Wednesday, 12 March")
Single Visit Schedules: Shows template format (e.g., "Monday, Week 1" and "Tuesday, Week 1")
Bulk Visit Creation: Shows relative format (e.g., "Visit Start Day" and “Visit End Day”)
Key benefits:
Prevents missed medications: Early morning exact-time medications (e.g., 05:30) are properly linked to overnight visits
Accurate care delivery: Tasks scheduled for the second day of an overnight visit are correctly assigned
Eliminates workarounds: No need to create additional one-off visits to capture cross-midnight activities
Creating overnight visit schedules
Option A: Creating a New Overnight Visit Schedule
Go to the Visit Template tab
Click Add Visit Schedule
Set up your overnight visit details (e.g., 20:00-08:00)
In the activities section, you'll see day-level headings showing both days
Select activity lists from either or both days as needed
Click Save Changes
Option B: Editing an Existing Visit Schedule to Overnight
Go to the Visit Template tab
Select the existing visit schedule you want to modify
Click Edit from the dropdown menu
Update the visit times to span overnight (e.g., change from 20:00-23:00 to 20:00-08:00)
Once you save the new overnight times, the activities section will automatically update to show day-level headings for both days
Select activity lists from either or both days as needed
Click Save Changes
Note: When you extend an existing visit to span overnight, any previously linked activity lists will remain attached, but you will now have the option to add activity lists from the second day as well.
Managing duplicate activity lists
You may need to use the same activity list for multiple visits - for example, using a "Night" activity list for both Monday and Tuesday overnight visits.
If your selection might result in the same activity list being linked to more than one visit, the system prevents this and makes it clear to you in the activity list dropdown where there is attempted duplication. This ensures no tasks or medications are delivered twice in two different visits by mistake.
How the system helps you:
Clear dropdown indicators: Duplicate selections are clearly differentiated, so you can see when you are selecting the same list multiple times
Unique activity labels: When the same list is used multiple times, each instance shows unique labels so you can tell them apart
Automatic conflict prevention: During bulk creation, the system will warn you if unintentional duplicates are detected
Important safety considerations regarding overnight visits
Always verify in the Activity Calendar that overnight activities are properly linked to the correct visits on the correct day, especially:
Early morning medications (typically 05:00-06:00)
Tasks scheduled for the second day of overnight visits
Activities that span the Night and Morning sessions
Example Scenarios:
Night session medication at 05:30: Now correctly links to overnight visits starting before midnight.
Morning tasks during overnight care: Activities from the second day's morning session can be linked to overnight visits.
24-hour visits: Can access activity lists from all relevant sessions across both days.
How to Skip a Task or Medication for One Visit
Sometimes you may need to skip a specific task or medication for just one visit. This may be because it is not needed for this particular visit, but it will be needed again in the future. When you need to skip an activity for a specific visit, the system ensures complete removal from all areas of the carer app. This comprehensive approach gives you full control over what carers see and deliver, supporting safer care management and reducing the risk of unintended activity delivery.
Key Safety Feature: When you skip an activity in the Agency Hub, it's completely removed from the carer app in all locations:
Task and medication list within the visit
See all today's tasks section
Scheduled medications tab (when carers click on PRNs)
This comprehensive removal ensures carers only see and deliver the activities you intend, giving you complete control over care delivery.
How to
Go to the Activity Calendar tab
Find the session you would like to skip a task for
Find the task/medication in the list
Click the arrow skip icon on the task/medication
A pop-up box will appear confirming your actions (specific day, date and session time)
Click Save Changes to confirm skipping
The task/medication will now appear with a strikethrough, indicating it won't be visible in the visit.
How to Reinstate a Skipped Task or Medication
If you need to reinstate a previously skipped activity:
Go to the Activity Calendar tab
Find the session you would like to skip a task for
Find the skipped task/medication (with strikethrough)
Click the plus button next to it
A pop-up box will appear confirming your actions (specific day, date and session time)
Click Save Changes to confirm reinstatement
The activity will now be reinstated and ready to be completed by your carers.
Skipping medications & the MAR chart
When you skip a medication, it will appear as "N/V" (No Visit) in the eMAR, providing a clear audit trail for compliance purposes. This documentation helps maintain accurate medication records whilst ensuring the medication isn't administered when not intended.
Warnings when skipping a task
The system will warn or prevent you from skipping activities in certain situations to maintain safety and accuracy:
You will receive a warning when:
The visit is in progress or missed - you can still skip the activity, but you will be advised that the carer might not see the update immediately if they're offline. We recommend contacting the carer directly to inform them of the change.
You will be blocked from skipping when:
The visit is completed - this maintains consistency between the Agency Hub and what actually occurred during the visit
The carer has already recorded an outcome for the activity - this preserves accurate reporting and prevents conflicting information
Important Safety Considerations
To ensure safe and effective care delivery, please be aware of these critical points when using the activity management system:
Always check the Activity Calendar for conflicts after making changes to visits or activity schedules. Look for activities without visits or visits without activities. In a future update, there will be an alert on the left-hand menu and in the agency-level client tab to help identify conflicts.
Activities may appear in the same session but not be attached to a visit. Always verify that activities are properly attached to visits in the Activity Calendar, even if they appear to be in the correct time period.
Activity order changes can create detached lists. If you change the order of activities in a visit instance, that activity list becomes detached from the parent activity order. Subsequent changes to the Activity Template order won't affect these detached lists. Remember to update detached lists separately if order changes should apply universally.
Visit schedules can be created before activities. You can create a new activity list from the visit schedule modal by selecting the desired session. This creates a blank linked activity list that will automatically include any tasks and medications scheduled later for that session.