How to get your staff start dates out of an HR or payroll system

Last checked 17 Oct 2026. Great Britain only. Dates can change.

Run the system's employee list report, include only a staff ID and a start date (plus a leaving date and employment type if you have them), save it as a CSV, check the dates read correctly, then add six months to each with a spreadsheet formula. Keep the file somewhere restricted and delete it when you are done. Every system is different, so we do not give menu paths for any product. Use the help pages of your own system or ask your provider.

Why you need the list

From 1 January 2027 the unfair dismissal qualifying period is due to fall from two years to six months (see unfair dismissal from 1 January 2027). A clean list of start dates lets you see who reaches six months when.

How long this takes

Between 15 minutes and an hour, depending on how tidy your records are and whether you need to ask your provider for help.

Steps

1. Find the right report. Look in the reports or exports section for something like an employee list, headcount, starters and leavers or employee details report. If you cannot find one, ask your payroll provider or system supplier for a list of current employees with start dates.
2. Choose the fields. You need: a staff ID, the start date, the leaving date (to remove leavers), and employment type or status. If your system holds a separate continuous service date or original hire date, include that too. Section 211 of the Employment Rights Act 1996 says continuous employment begins with the day the employee starts work, and some earlier service can count, so the field that holds the right date matters.
3. Pick a format. Export as CSV. It opens in any spreadsheet and is easy to delete.
4. Leave out what you do not need. Do not include pay, bank details, National Insurance numbers, addresses, health information or notes. GOV.UK says employers should keep data only as long as needed and protect it.
5. Use staff IDs, not names. Keep a separate key if you need to know who is who, held by the person who needs it.
6. Check the dates. Open the file and make sure the dates are real dates and not text. Common problems: day and month swapped (03/04/2026 read as 4 March), two digit years, dates with text in them, blank cells and a mix of formats. Sort by the date column. If anything looks out of order, fix it at source if you can.
7. Remove people who should not be in the list. Leavers, and any agency workers or contractors who are not your employees.
8. Add the six month date with the formula below.
9. Store it safely. Put the file in a folder only the people doing this can open. Do not email it around or leave copies in downloads.
10. Delete it when finished. Keep the output you need, such as a diary of dates by staff ID, and delete the raw export and any copies.

The spreadsheet method: six months with EDATE

Put the start dates in column B, starting in row 2. In C2 enter this and fill down:

=EDATE(B2,6)-1

Format column C as a date. EDATE adds a number of calendar months and the minus 1 gives the day the six months is complete. If the target month is shorter, EDATE uses its last day, so a start on 31 August 2026 gives 27 February 2027 after the minus 1. You can test this in your spreadsheet with a few known dates. Two other checks:

• A start on 1 July 2026 gives 31 December 2026.
• A start on 31 May 2026 gives 29 November 2026.

To flag who has six months of service complete on or before 1 January 2027, add a column with =IF(C2<=DATE(2027,1,1),"Yes","No"). To see who already has two years, use =EDATE(B2,24)-1 in another column.

The paid Dateledger Staff Dates Checker does this for a whole export in your browser, so you do not have to build the sheet yourself.

What to record

• The date you ran the export and who ran it
• Which system and report you used (by description, not by menu path)
• Which fields you included
• Any date you corrected, and why
• Where the file is stored, and the date you deleted it

Common mistakes

• Exporting every column "just in case".
• Using names instead of staff IDs.
• Leaving dates as text, so the formula returns an error or a wrong answer.
• Trusting UK dates that were saved by software set to a different region.
• Using the contract signing date, or the date a record was created, as the start date.
• Forgetting to remove leavers.
• Leaving the export in an inbox or shared drive.
• Treating the six month date as a decision point. It is only a diary date. See how the effective date of termination works.

This guide is general information to help you prepare, not legal advice.

More guides

• How to work out when an employee reaches six months of service
• How to run probation reviews before 1 January 2027
• How to brief your managers on the Employment Rights Act changes in 20 minutes
• How to keep a dated record of what you do to prevent sexual harassment