Control what employees see (visibility)
Show or hide a whole category in the Benefit Store, show or hide an individual benefit, and allow expense uploads for one category or several at once.
Every benefit category has switches that decide what employees see: whether the whole category shows in the Benefit Store, whether each benefit inside it shows, and whether employees can upload expense receipts against it. You set all of these per category from the Benefit Settings page, and the Benefit Store and expense upload switches are independent of each other. This article covers showing or hiding a whole category, showing or hiding a single benefit, and choosing which categories appear in the expense upload form, one at a time or across the page.
Show or hide a whole category in the Benefit Store
Every benefit category has a single switch that decides whether the whole category shows up for employees in the Benefit Store. Turn it off and employees stop seeing that category and everything inside it.
Go to Benefit Settings in the HR section and find the category you want in the list. Each category is its own expandable panel, so select its row to open it. Inside you will see two cards: Upload Expense Report at the top and Benefit Store & General below it. In the Benefit Store & General card, the first switch is labelled Benefit Store, with the description "Show this category in the benefit store."
- On: the category appears in the employee-facing Benefit Store.
- Off: the category is hidden from the Benefit Store, along with all the benefits inside it.
This toggle is about the Benefit Store only. Whether the category appears in the expense upload form is a separate setting, the Visible switch in the Upload Expense Report card above it. Hiding a category from the Benefit Store does not change its expense upload visibility.
When the Benefit Store switch is off, the individual benefits in that category cannot have their own visibility. In the benefits table for the category, each per-benefit Visible checkbox is disabled, and hovering it shows the tooltip "Enable the Benefit Store toggle above to control individual benefit visibility". To set visibility per benefit, turn the category toggle back on first.
The category header also reflects the toggle. When the category is visible in the Benefit Store, a small store icon appears on the right of the category row, with the tooltip Visible in Benefit Store. Flip the switch and that icon updates straight away, so you can confirm the state at a glance before you even save.
Show or hide an individual benefit
Sometimes you want a whole category visible in the Benefit Store but a single benefit inside it hidden, for example while you finish setting it up. The Visible checkbox on each benefit row does exactly that: it controls whether that one benefit appears to employees, independently of the other benefits in the same category.
In Benefit Settings, expand the category that holds the benefit. Inside the panel, the benefits sit in a table. On wider screens each row has a Visible column on the right; the checkbox in that column controls whether that single benefit shows in the Benefit Store.
- Checked: the benefit appears in the employee Benefit Store.
- Unchecked: the benefit is hidden from employees, even though the category itself is still shown.
New benefits start out visible, so a benefit you have just had added is shown to employees until you uncheck it.
On a narrow screen the table becomes a set of cards, one per benefit. The Visible control there is a labeled checkbox inside each benefit card, so look for the Visible label rather than a column.
Per-benefit visibility only does something while the category itself is visible in the Benefit Store. While the category's Benefit Store switch is on, each benefit's Visible checkbox is active and you can show or hide benefits one by one. While it is off, the whole category is hidden, so the per-benefit checkboxes are disabled.
Hiding a benefit is not the same as hiding its category. If you turn the category's Benefit Store switch off, every benefit in it disappears at once and the per-benefit checkboxes no longer apply. To hide just one benefit, leave the category switch on and uncheck that benefit instead.
Allow expense uploads for a category
Whether employees can upload an expense receipt against a category is a separate switch from Benefit Store visibility. You control it from the category's Upload Expense Report card, using the Visible switch.
Open the category you want to change and find the Upload Expense Report card. It is described as configuring how this category appears when employees upload expense receipts.
Find the Visible switch. Its helper text reads Show this category in the expense upload form.
Turn Visible on to let employees upload receipts against this category, or off to remove it from the upload form.
Select Save Changes. A confirmation appears, for example "Wellness settings have been updated successfully."
By default every category is available for expense uploads. The form only starts hiding categories once you turn some of them off, so you do not need to switch anything on for a brand-new category.
When Visible is on, the category shows up as a choice in the benefit category field when an employee uploads an expense receipt. When it is off, the category is removed from that list and employees can no longer file receipts against it. Saving applies the change to the employee upload form right away.
The category header shows a small upload icon while uploads are allowed, with the tooltip Visible in Expense Upload. The icon updates the moment you flip the switch, so you can confirm the state before you save.
Visible is not the same as BIK
The Upload Expense Report card holds two switches side by side, and they do different jobs:
- Visible decides whether employees can upload receipts in this category.
- BIK (Benefit in Kind) decides whether those uploads are taxed. It does not affect availability.
Leaving Visible on while BIK is off simply means employees can upload, and the expense is treated as tax-free. For how the BIK switch changes tax and payroll, see what the BIK setting does to cost and payroll.
Set upload visibility for several categories at once
If you want to decide the whole list of categories employees can pick from when they upload, work down the Benefit Settings page category by category. Each panel header shows small icons for where that category is currently turned on, so an upload icon with the tooltip Visible in Expense Upload means employees can already file receipts against it.
Open a category panel and find the Upload Expense Report card.
Use the Visible switch, with the helper text Show this category in the expense upload form. Turn it on for categories employees may upload receipts against, and off for the ones you want to hide.
Select Save Changes at the bottom of that category. The upload icon in the panel header updates to match.
Repeat for the next category. Each category saves on its own, so set one, save it, then move to the next. The list of options employees see on the upload form is simply the set of categories whose Visible switch is on.
Save your change
Changes are not live until you save the category. Select Save Changes at the bottom of the category panel. One save applies the category settings and all the benefit rows in that panel together, and the employee Benefit Store and the expense upload form refresh to match.
Troubleshooting
- The per-benefit Visible checkboxes are greyed out. The category is hidden from the Benefit Store. Turn the Benefit Store switch on and save, then you can set each benefit individually.
- I turned it on but employees still do not see the category. Make sure you selected Save Changes for that category. The store icon in the category header shows the unsaved state; the change only reaches employees after you save. If a benefit inside the category is still missing, check that benefit's own Visible checkbox.
- A new benefit is showing before I am ready. New benefits default to visible. Uncheck its Visible box and save to hide it until you are done.
- The category shows in upload but not the store (or the other way around). These are two separate switches. The Benefit Store toggle controls the store; the Visible switch in the Upload Expense Report card controls expense uploads.
- An employee says the category is missing from upload. Check that Visible is on in the Upload Expense Report card for that category and that you saved. If it is on and saved, the change reaches the upload form immediately.
- I want uploads allowed but untaxed. Keep Visible on and turn BIK (Benefit in Kind) off in the same card.