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Tip

Looking for a section on this page? Hover your cursor over the Table of Contents icon  to the right to quickly navigate this page.

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When you click on any step in the workflow, a series of action icons displays depending on the step type. Creating a workflow step by dragging/dropping an existing form or a New Form from the Palette shows these icons:

  • Image ModifiedEdit Step Properties displays tabs to set up Settings, Assignment, Messages, Rejection, Precondition, Escalations, Emails, Web Hook, Quick Approval and Geo Location as shown in the image above. Clicking on a section in left-side properties panel will open the wizard to the corresponding tab.
  • Image ModifiedLink Step: Refer to Linked Steps in a Workflow for a discussion of this Workflow Design pattern and when you should use it.
  • Image ModifiedDownload Step allows you to download the step of the workflow as a standalone form. You may want to do this if you update the step in the workflow designer and you want to keep your Forms and Workflow libraries in sync.
  • Image ModifiedEdit Step opens the step in the Forms Designer for editing. Remember, the form in the Workflow Designer is a copy and any form changes will not automatically sync up with the original form in your library.
  • Image ModifiedDelete Step deletes a step in a workflow. You will NOT be asked to confirm the deletion. Once clicked, the deletion is permanent.

If your step is a Summary, HTTP or Linked step, you will only see the Image ModifiedEdit Step Properties and Image Modified Delete icons.

Properties Navigator

When you click on a workflow step, a Properties Navigator panel displays in the lower-left portion of the Workflow Designer. This panel shows information about important properties setup for this workflow step. Not all of the configured properties are shown in this view. Clicking inside a section or clicking on the  Edit Step Properties icon in a section of the Properties Navigator immediately displays the property tab for editing.

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  •  If you are working on several tabs at one time, you can navigate to other tabs and make changes there. Use the left and right arrows at the top of the screen to display additional tabs. You must click the Submit button when you are finished configuring Step Properties  to save your changes. Remember to save the workflow.
  • will validate the Property Settings when you click Submit. If a property value is invalid, the tab(s) will not close and a  message will display telling the designer that there are corrections to be made before saving. The screen will stay on the current tab if there is a validation error.  Otherwise, another invalid tab will be auto selected (starting from left to right) if another tab needs attention. Tab labels with invalid entries display in red.

  • Clicking on the Cancel button closes the tab(s). You will be asked to confirm if any changes were made.
  • Hover over any field on the Properties tabs to see a helpful hint providing information about the property. Some fields contain instructions to guide you.
  • Clicking on the down arrow for a property shows an unfiltered list of choices applicable to that property. For some properties, you may see templatized controls from your workflow and workflow/special templates provided in .
  • In some cases, you can type ahead to narrow down the list. Use the up/down arrows, the Enter key or click an option with your mouse to select an option. Use the Backspace, Delete or click the x on a selected property to delete it.
  • Typing a opening curly brace into some fields, followed by the name of a control, show a list of the fields in your workflow that match the entered text and will be added to the field as a control template.
  • On some tabs, you may have to slide the toggle to the right to turn on a feature.

Each step property setting is described below. 

Tip

Click the Help icon at the top of any tab for a quick tour of the features in that section. Currently tours are only available for Cloud customers.

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Roles are created by your tenant administrator or automatically imported from your LDAP or Active Directory server.     When a role is selected, the step in question can only be performed by users belonging to that role. For example, if you have a Purchase Request workflow where the first step is to be completed by any employee but the second (approval) step must be performed by someone with the "Manager" role, you can select the Manager role for the second step. When an employee uses the workflow, completes the first step and clicks Continue,  will first check if the logged in user (the employee) belongs to the Manager role. If yes, then the second step is displayed. If not,  will suspend the workflow, generate a task and place it on the task list for users with the Manager role and display the Pending Msg to the employee.

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One exception to this is when you have both a templatized user and a role assigned, the step will reroute to the Role(s) if the template resolves to null at run time. If the templatized user is valid, Role will be ignored.

Warning

Workflows created in v8.x and prior will not inherit the new "invalid-task-assignment" behavior if a templatized user, role or email resolves to null. Instead, they will retain the previous behavior of morphing into a screenflow.

Anonymous Steps and the Audit Trail

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  • You can enter any text you want for in the Subject and Message fields. Clicking on the DEFAULT button, shows "New Task" as the default subject and "You can access your task by clicking <a href="{task.perform.url}">this link</a>" for the default message.
  • Clicking on the down arrow, show a list of templatized fields from your workflow, workflow/special templates provided by and Task Templates that you can use in the body of your email.
    • Type the opening curly brace - {- followed by the control name to enter a field from your workflow as a template. Selecting an option enters the control name into the field with the closing curly brace

    • Built-in workflow templates

      • {flow.id} - The unique workflow instance id. This id is unique for each workflow submission.
      • {flow.type.id} - The unique id associated with a given workflow. See Sharing Forms
      • {flow.extid} - Client defined extId passed in the formtype Url parameter.
      • {flow.name} - The name of the workflow.
      • {flow.description} - Description of the workflow. 
      • {flow.activity.id} - The Id of the current workflow step.
      • {flow.activity.name} - The name of the current workflow step
      • {flow.activity.reject.reason} - The reason a workflow step is rejected

    • Built-in special templates

      • {subject.id} - logged in user's username. 
      • {subject.roles} - A list of all the roles for the logged in user 
      • {subject.email} - logged in users's email address
      • {subject.first.name} - logged in users's First Name

      • {subject.last.name} - logged in users's Last Name

      • {subject.reports.to} - the user id of the person the logged in user Reports To - configured in the user profile by the Tenant Admin. Typically used to designate a manager/supervisor.

      • {tn.id} - the Tenant ID where a form/workflow is located

      • {tn.name} - the Tenant Name where a form/workflow is located

      • {user.id} - Owner of form/workflow and user folder name in the filesystem 

      • {project.id} - The unique id associated with a given project (See Sharing Forms.)

      • {project.id} -The name of the project

      • {form.project.id} - The unique id associated with the project of the given form

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Expand
titleClick here

Let's say you have a 3 step Expense Report workflow. Step 1 (the Expense Report) is filled in by the employee, Step 2 is performed by the employee's manager who approves or rejects the report and Step 3 is performed by an employee in the payroll department who processes the Expense Report for payment.

<< Employee submits Expense Report (Step 1) ==> the workflow is routed to the employee's manager for approval (Step2) ==> once approved, the workflow is routed to the payroll department for payment>>.

Step 2 in our example workflow is assigned to the employee's manager which is collected by a field in the form named ManagerName. When the employee submits the Expense Report, the designer wants the employee to see the message "Your request has been sent to {Manager name}". {ManagerName} is an example of a template that is replaced at runtime by the name that is entered in the ManagerName field in Step 1.

Step 3 in our example is assigned to any user that is assigned the role of Payroll. When the manager approves the report and clicks submit, the designer would like to display the message "The Expense Report has been sent to Payroll for processing" to the manager.

To understand where you type in the text for your messages to get them to display when you want them to, think of the Pending Message property as the message that is displayed when users try to access workflow steps. In our example, when the employee submits step 1, the workflow moves to step 2, the manager approval step. The message typed into the Pending Msg field for Step 2 - "Your request has been sent to {Manager name}" is shown to the employee instead of the Step 2 form. When the manager approves the Expense Report and submits Step 2, the message typed into the Pending Msg field on Step 3 - "The Expense Report has been sent to Payroll for processing" is displayed to the manager when the workflow moves to the Payroll department employees instead of the Step 3 form.

To set up the Pending messages discussed in our example, follow these steps:

  1. Click the name of the workflow or the  Edit icon for your workflow on the Workflows Home Page.
  2. Click on the first workflow step to display the Properties Navigator panel.
    1. The Pending Message for Step 1 displays the default - "Your request is being processed"

    2. A Pending message set up on the first step of a workflow is only displayed if the Task for First Step feature is configured for your workflow. This feature is useful for auto-starting workflows programmatically. Do not assign a Pending Message for the first step if you are not using this feature.
      Image Modified

  3. Click on Step 2 of your workflow - in our example this is the Manager Approval step.

    1. Click the  Edit step Properties icon in the Messages section of the Properties Navigator.

    2. Type "Your request has been sent to {Manager name}" into the Pending Message field. The employee will see this message when he/she submits Step 1 and the task is placed on the Manager's Task List

  4. Click on Step 3 of your workflow - in our example this is the Payroll step. 
    1. Click the  Edit step Properties icon in the Messages section of the Properties Navigator.

    2. Type "The {flow.name} has been sent to Finance for processing." without the quotes into the Pending Message field. The manager will see this message after clicking Submit on Step 2 and the workflow is routed to the Payroll department. Click Submit. 

  5. Click Submit and then save the workflow.

Tip

If you want to display a custom message such as "Expense Report Processing is complete." after the Finance user clicks the Finish button, use the Workflow Properties Message tab for the workflow. 

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Steps performed by the same user in a workflow are referred to as a screenflow. The steps of the screenflow are considered one task. The reject functionality will allow users to reject only to the beginning of that screenflow. You cannot reject back to steps after step 1 in the screenflow.

Tip
Steps performed by the same user that are separated by Anonymous Task steps are considered to be a separate workflow tasks. For example, consider a Purchase Order workflow with the following navigation: Step 1 is performed by Sales employee > Step 2 is sent to the customer's Email Address (Anonymous user) > Step 3 is performed by the same Sales employee that performed Step 1. You can configure a Reject button on the Sales step that will show both steps as rejection targets even though Step 1 and 4 were performed by the same user. Refer to the Workflow Tutorial for an example.

Customize the Rejection Email

It is possible to customize the subject and email message body that is sent when a workflow task is rejected. The customized rejection email will be sent when the Reject button is clicked on a workflow step or Quick Approval screen.

You can choose controls from your form which will be added to the Message as templates or you can use built-in templates as described below. Click on theImage Modifieddown arrow shows the list.

  •  {flow.name} - Name of the workflow

  •  {subject.first.name} - First name of the user who rejected the task.

  •  {subject.last.name} - First name of the user who rejected the task.

  •  {flow.activity.name} - The step of the workflow that was being performed when the task was rejected.

  •  {flow.activity.reject.reason} - The reason for the rejection.

  •  {task.perform.url} - The URL to the rejected task.

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The "from" email for a rejection is the tenant "from" email. If no tenant "from" email is set, this will default to the admin user's email address.

Reject to Discard

Most often, steps in an Approval workflow can have three possible outcomes.They can be:

  • Approved
  • Sent back to a previous step for corrections/more information (Reject to Revise)
  • Rejected and terminated (Reject to Discard)

Consider a workflow where Step 1 is filled out by a user, the second Step requires approval by a manager and when approved, Step 3 of the workflow is routed to the VP for review. After approval by the VP, the workflow completes.

The designer must consider what actions the Manager and the VP could take when the workflow appears on their Task List.

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Troubleshooting the Reject Button

Here are some reasons why you might not see the Reject option on a step where "Reject From Here" is selected:

  1. If  the Reject To Here option is not selected in the previous steps, then user won't be able to see the Reject button on current step.
  2. When consecutive steps are executed by the same user,  treats it as a screenflow. Think of those steps in the screenflow as one task. The reject functionality allows users to reject only to the beginning of that screenflow/task i.e. where the previous user started his work. It won’t allow a reject to the in-between steps.
  3. If the immediate steps prior to the current step were performed by the same user, then he/she cannot reject to those steps (the user is rejecting the workflow to himself). Users can reject only to those steps performed by other users, or to steps performed by himself that do not come immediately before the current step.
  4. If a previous step was skipped because its precondition failed, then the user won't be able to reject to such a step.
  5. If a precondition on previous step passed when that step was being performed, but the control values change causing the precondition to now fail, the user might not be able to reject to that step.
  6. The Reject button will not be displayed at all if the conditions are such that users cannot reject to any prior steps.

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Tip

In general, a condition is selected that acts as a trigger for the escalations. If the condition is NOT met, then the designer can specify what actions to take. You can elect to reassign, notify, send reminders or skip the task but you do not have to choose all three. However, once a condition is selected one of the actions must be reassign,notify or skip.

  1. You can skip a task when the deadline expires and the workflow automatically navigates to the next step. This is set up on the Action tab.
  2. You can reassign the task to another user/role. This is set up on the Action tab.
  3. You can send notifications to the user(s) that currently have the task that the deadline has been reached and the task has been reassigned. This is set up on the Notifications tab.
  4. You can use templatized values of controls in any of the Assignee(s) fields in the Escalation setup screen. The username that is filled in as that control's value will be picked up during escalation.
  5. You can send reminder emails to the user(s) who have the task on their task list at specified intervals reminding them that the deadline for the task is approaching. This is set up on the Reminders tab.

For example. if you wanted to send reminder emails to the user(s) who currently have the task on their Task List that the deadline is approaching and then send an email notification to them when the deadline is reached, you would configure the Notifications and Reminders tabs and check None (Notify Only) on the Action tab. Continue reading for more details.


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  1. Click on the step in your workflow where you want to set up escalation criteria
  2. Click on Setup Escalation link in the Properties pane. The wizard will display.
  3. Clicking the ADD ESCALATION button displays the Escalation Condition tab. Multiple escalation triggers can be setup for the same step in a workflow.
  4. Select a condition from the dropdown. There are 4 choices:

    1. Perform By - This condition is met when the user clicks the  (if the task is assigned to a particular user) or ( if the task is assigned to a role) Perform icon on the task in the users Task List or Saves/Locks the task before the configured due date. If the Task Notification email includes the {task.perform.url} then the deadline is met when the user clicks the link in the email to display the task.

    2. Perform Within - This condition is met when the user clicks the (if the task is assigned to a particular user) or ( if the task is assigned to a role) Perform icon on the task in the users Task List or Saves/Locks the task before the configured the configured duration). If the Task Notification email includes the {task.perform.url} then the deadline is met when the user clicks the link in the email to display the task.
    3. Complete By - This condition is met when the user clicks the Continue/Finish button on a form step in a workflow before the configured due date.

    4. Complete Within - This condition is met when the user clicks the Continue/Finish button on a form step in a workflow before the configured duration.

      Info

      An invalid due date template value will resolve to the current time to prevent any use-mode errors. The following message will appear in the frevvo logfile: "Escalation Due Date {DueDate} resolves to an invalid value":

  5. Selecting the Perform By or Complete By conditions displays the following screen:
    1. The Due Date control dropdown displays all date controls in your form. Select from one of these choices or check the Use Fixed Date checkbox to enter a date/time as the deadline.

  6. Selecting Perform Within or Complete Within displays this screen:
    1. Specify the amount of time the user has to perform or complete the task in Days, Hours or Minutes.
    2. Check the Business Calendar checkbox if you want to use the business days, times and timezone specified for your tenant to calculate a task deadline. The business calendar is set up at the tenant level by the tenant admin.

    Once the condition is selected,  click the Action tab to continue. If the condition specified is not met, then you must specify Reassignment of the task to a different user/role or Notification to the user/role it is currently assigned to that the deadline has expired.  You can configure both but at least one of these actions is required.
    1. Select from the following choices:
      1. None (Notify only) - Check this option if you want to send reminder emails to the user(s) who currently have the task on their Task List that the deadline is approaching and then send an email notification to them when the deadline is reached. The Notification tab becomes required. The task will not be reassigned or skipped. 
      2. Reassign Task - Reassignment sends the task to the user/role selected if the deadline is passed. Select whether the task will be reassigned to a Role, User or Unlock to Role: 
        1. If you select Role or User, then you must select the user or role in Select Role or User Assigne(s) field. Type ahead to display the Roles/Users in your tenant that begin with the letter you are typing and select from the list or enter comma separated templates. Remember that  userids and roles are case sensitive. If reassigning to a specific user, only one user id can be selected but you can reassign to more than one role.

        2. Unlock to Role - This option unlocks the task. Use this option for a step in your workflow that has a role assigned to it and you want to handle the situation where one user with that role has the task locked and the deadline for the task has passed. Selecting Unlock to Role unlocks the task and keeps it on the Task list of all users with the role after the deadline expires. Now it can be performed by any user with the specified role again.
          For example, let's say you have a step in your workflow that is assigned the manager role. Users Jerry and Jim are managers so the task shows up on both their task lists. Jerry clicks the Perform icon but he does not complete the step. The task remains on his task list and it is locked by him. If Jim tries to access the task or checks the Audit Trail he will see that the task is locked by Jerry. The deadline to complete the task passes. If Unlock to Role is selected as the reassignment option, the task remains on the task list of users with the manager role, in this case, Jerry and Jim, but it is unlocked and the audit trail shows a status of pending. Now it can be performed by any user with the manager role again.

        3. Reassigned users receive the Task Information email specified by the designer. So be sure to Setup Task Notification Email for the step in your workflow where you assigned escalations and you want to reassign the task after the deadline.

      3. Skip Task - check this option if you want the workflow to escalate automatically to the next step when the timer expires. When checked, no further configuration is required.

    Info

    Skipping a task is only supported if the next step in the workflow is a form/summary step. Configuring the Skip a task feature on the last step of your workflow will not work. 

      

  7. To set up Notifications:

    1. Click on the Notifications tab.

    2. Slide the toggle icon to the right to turn on Notifications

      1. Select whether a Role, User or the Current Owners from the Send To dropdown to specify who will receive email notification reminders when the deadline is reached.

      2. If you select Role or User, then you must list them in the Select User(s) or Role Recipient(s) field. Type ahead to display the Roles/Users in your tenant that begin with the letter you are typing and select from the list or enter comma separated templates. Remember that   userids and roles are case sensitive. You can specify more than one user or role.

      3. Specify an email(s), user(s), or role(s) to receive a CC: of the notification (optional.)

      4. Current Owners refers to user(s) who currently have the task on their task list. Partial templates with prefixes and suffixes can be used to create a complex role such as floor-manager when setting up Escalations.

        Expand
        titleClick here for an example
         
        Insert excerpt
        Templatized Strings
        Templatized Strings
        nopaneltrue

      5. The subject and body of the notification email are shown once the Recipient(s) are selected. You can customize the email message by adding controls from your form as templates, workflow templates, common templates, escalation or task templates. Simply click the to show the templates or type ahead to filter the list.

      6.  provides built-in templates that can be used in escalation emails.

        • {flow.activity.escalation.duedate} - provides the deadline due date in GMT timezone. The tenant admin can change the timezone by selecting the correct timezone for your tenant when configuring the  Business Calendar . 
        • {flow.activity.escalation.condition} - resolves to either 'start' or 'complete' depending on the condition value.
        • {flow.activity.assignee} - current user/role
        • {flow.activity.escalation.reassignee} - resolves to the new user/role that the task is assigned to.

        For example, when a task is reassigned, you may want to specify the user/role that the task is being reassigned to (reassignee) in the email to avoid confusion. Simply add some text with this template in the Notification message section:  {flow.step.escalation.reassignee}.

  8. Emails that serve as reminders as the deadline approaches are configured on the Reminders tab. Reminder emails notify the roles/user(s) originally assigned to this step.
    1. Specify the interval between reminders by entering the number of reminders in the Every field and select Days, Hours or Minutes from the Unit dropdown.
    2. You can limit the number of reminders by sliding the toggle icon to the right and entering the number of reminders closer to the deadline in the Occurence(s) field. If you enter a negative number in this field by mistake,  will change it to a 1 when you exit the field.
    3. Specify an email(s), user(s), or role(s) to receive a CC: of the notification (optional.)
    4. You can customize the email message by adding controls from your form as templates, workflow templates, common templates, escalation or task templates. Simply click the to show the templates or type ahead to filter the list.. Select them from the Control dropdown.  provides built-in templates that can be used in escalation emails.

  9. Click the Submit button to save your setup. 

Escalations and Screenflows

Escalation should always be defined on the first step of a task - this is relevant when setting up Escalations for a Screenflow.

Screenflows are steps in a workflow that are performed by the same user. Consider a New Employee On-boarding workflow where steps 1 - 5 are designed to collect the Personal Information, W - 4 Allowances, State Allowances, Health Insurances preferences and Banking Information. Step 6 in the workflow is routed to the new employee's manager and step 7 is routed to HR for final processing. Steps 6 and 7 are not part of the screenflow as they are performed by users other than the new employee.

Think of the 5 steps of the screenflow as one task. Escalation for the screenflow task will work as long as you define the escalation on the first step of the screenflow task. The escalation configured on the first step of the screenflow applies to all steps of the screenflow. For example, if a Complete Within 2 days escalation is configured on Step 1 of screenflow, then the escalation is triggered if the whole screenflow is not completed within 2 days.

Tip

If the first steps of a workflow consist of a screenflow, you must configure the workflow to use the Save on Navigate and/or Task for First Step properties for escalation triggers to get created.

Escalation Examples

Expand
titleClick here to see some Escalation Examples

Escalation Example 1

Let's consider a Time Sheet workflow consisting of 3 steps: 
  • The employee accesses the Time Sheet workflow, fills in the form, signs it and clicks Continue. Live Forms sends that employee's manager a notification via email
  • The manager clicks on the notification [on any device], views the Time Sheet approval request and approves it or sends it back for corrections.
  • If approved by the manager, the workflow is routed to employees in the payroll department for final processing. 

In this example, the designer has configured a 10 minute interval for the Manager to approve/reject the task. The Escalation tabs are shown:
Image Modified

Employee William submits his Time Sheet at 12:55 PM. The deadline to complete this task is 1:05 PM. William's Manager Jerry receives a Task Notification email notifying him there is a task that requires his attention. The email includes a link he can use to access it.
Image Modified
In this example, the deadline to complete the task is 1:05 PM. Based on the setup of the Reminder(s) section shown above, Jerry will receive 3 reminders every 3 minutes as the deadline approaches. The emails contain a link that Jerry can click to get to the task. The first one arrives as 12:56 PM, the second at 12:59 PM and the final reminder before the deadline arrives at 1:02 PM.
Image Modified
At 1: 05 PM, the task is removed from Jerry's task list since it was not completed in the allotted time and is routed to the task list of any users with the role of Supervisor. Jerry receives an email informing him that the deadline for the task has expired and the task is now assigned to any user with the role of Supervisor.
Reassigned users receive the Task Information email specified by the designer. So be sure to Setup the Task Notification Emails.

When Jack, a user with the role of Supervisor, access his task list he will see a task sent to him by the system and the Audit Trail shown in the image:
Image Modified

Escalation Example 2

Let's consider a situation where you might want to skip the task after the deadline has been reached. Imagine a workflow with a requirement that it must be approved by specific users in sequence. To prevent the chain of approvals from being delayed if one user does not perform their approval before the deadline, the designer can check the Skip the Task checkbox on the workflow steps and  will automatically complete the current step and create a pending task on the Task List of the next user.

The Project Approval workflow shown in the image must be approved by Approver 1 and Approver 2 in that order. The escalation set up on the Approver 2 step automatically skips this step and advances the workflow to the next next step . Notice that notification and reminder emails are also configured.

In this example,
  • The Approver 1 and Supervisor steps do not have Escalation configured.
  • The Approver 2 step has an escalation that specifies the step must be completed within 3 minutes. 
  • If Approver 2 does not complete the task within 3 minutes, the Approver 2 step is skipped and the workflow advances to the Supervisor step.
  • Approver 2 receives an Notification email stating that the workflow is now assigned to a Supervisor.
  • Approver 2  receives 1 Reminder email during the 3 minutes interval. 
    Image Modified
Here's what happens:   

  1. Project Details are submitted for approval. 
  2. Approver 1 receives a Task Notification email, clicks the link in it and performs step 1 of the workflow. The task is placed on Approver 2's task list.
  3. Approver 2 receives a Task Notification email which includes a link to the task. Approver 2 does not click the link in the email to perform the task.
  4. Approver 2 receives 1 reminder email. Approver 2 does not perform their approval within the 3 minutes.
  5. When the 3 minutes expires, the task is removed from Approver 2's Task List.  Approver 2 receives a customized email stating that the workflow has moved to a Supervisor for approval.
  6. All users with the role of Supervisor receives a Task Notification email which includes a link to the task. 
  7. Someone in the Supervisor group approves/rejects the task.

Activity Document Actions

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When you click on any step in the workflow, a series of action icons displays depending on the step type. Creating a workflow step by dragging/dropping an existing form or a New Form from the Palette shows these icons:

  • Image ModifiedEdit Step Properties displays tabs to set up Settings, Assignment, Messages, Rejection, Precondition, Escalations, Emails, Web Hook, Quick Approval and Geo Location as shown in the image above. Clicking on a section in left-side properties panel will open the wizard to the corresponding tab.
  • Image ModifiedLink Step: Refer to Linked Steps in a Workflow for a discussion of this Workflow Design pattern and when you should use it.
  • Image ModifiedDownload Step allows you to download the step of the workflow as a standalone form. You may want to do this if you update the step in the workflow designer and you want to keep your Forms and Workflow libraries in sync.
  • Image ModifiedEdit Step opens the step in the Forms Designer for editing. Remember, the form in the Workflow Designer is a copy and any form changes will not automatically sync up with the original form in your library.
  • Image ModifiedDelete Step deletes a step in a workflow. You will NOT be asked to confirm the deletion. Once clicked, the deletion is permanent.

If your step is a Summary, HTTP or Linked step, you will only see the Image ModifiedEdit Step Properties and Image Modified Delete icons.

Properties Navigator

When you click on a workflow step, a Properties Navigator panel displays in the lower-left portion of the Workflow Designer. This panel shows information about important properties setup for this workflow step. Not all of the configured properties are shown in this view. Clicking inside a section or clicking on the  Edit Step Properties icon in a section of the Properties Navigator immediately displays the property tab for editing.

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  •  If you are working on several tabs at one time, you can navigate to other tabs and make changes there. Use the left and right arrows at the top of the screen to display additional tabs. You must click the Submit button when you are finished configuring Step Properties  to save your changes. Remember to save the workflow.
  • will validate the Property Settings when you click Submit. If a property value is invalid, the tab(s) will not close and a  message will display telling the designer that there are corrections to be made before saving. The screen will stay on the current tab if there is a validation error.  Otherwise, another invalid tab will be auto selected (starting from left to right) if another tab needs attention. Tab labels with invalid entries display in red.

  • Clicking on the Cancel button closes the tab(s). You will be asked to confirm if any changes were made.
  • Hover over any field on the Properties tabs to see a helpful hint providing information about the property. Some fields contain instructions to guide you.
  • Clicking on the down arrow for a property shows an unfiltered list of choices applicable to that property. For some properties, you may see templatized controls from your workflow and workflow/special templates provided in .
  • In some cases, you can type ahead to narrow down the list. Use the up/down arrows, the Enter key or click an option with your mouse to select an option. Use the Backspace, Delete or click the x on a selected property to delete it.
  • Typing a opening curly brace into some fields, followed by the name of a control, show a list of the fields in your workflow that match the entered text and will be added to the field as a control template.
  • On some tabs, you may have to slide the toggle to the right to turn on a feature.

Each step property setting is described below. 

Tip

Click the Help icon at the top of any tab for a quick tour of the features in that section. Currently tours are only available for Cloud customers.

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  • You can enter any text you want for in the Subject and Message fields. Clicking on the DEFAULT button, shows "New Task" as the default subject and "You can access your task by clicking <a href="{task.perform.url}">this link</a>" for the default message.
  • Clicking on the down arrow, show a list of templatized fields from your workflow, workflow/special templates provided by and Task Templates that you can use in the body of your email.
    • Type the opening curly brace - {- followed by the control name to enter a field from your workflow as a template. Selecting an option enters the control name into the field with the closing curly brace

    • Built-in workflow templates

      • {flow.id} - The unique workflow instance id. This id is unique for each workflow submission.
      • {flow.type.id} - The unique id associated with a given workflow. See Sharing Forms
      • {flow.extid} - Client defined extId passed in the formtype Url parameter.
      • {flow.name} - The name of the workflow.
      • {flow.description} - Description of the workflow. 
      • {flow.activity.id} - The Id of the current workflow step.
      • {flow.activity.name} - The name of the current workflow step
      • {flow.activity.reject.reason} - The reason a workflow step is rejected

    • Built-in special templates

      • {subject.id} - logged in user's username. 
      • {subject.roles} - A list of all the roles for the logged in user 
      • {subject.email} - logged in users's email address
      • {subject.first.name} - logged in users's First Name

      • {subject.last.name} - logged in users's Last Name

      • {subject.reports.to} - the user id of the person the logged in user Reports To - configured in the user profile by the Tenant Admin. Typically used to designate a manager/supervisor.

      • {tn.id} - the Tenant ID where a form/workflow is located

      • {tn.name} - the Tenant Name where a form/workflow is located

      • {user.id} - Owner of form/workflow and user folder name in the filesystem 

      • {project.id} - The unique id associated with a given project (See Sharing Forms.)

      • {project.id} -The name of the project

      • {form.project.id} - The unique id associated with the project of the given form

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titleClick here

Let's say you have a 3 step Expense Report workflow. Step 1 (the Expense Report) is filled in by the employee, Step 2 is performed by the employee's manager who approves or rejects the report and Step 3 is performed by an employee in the payroll department who processes the Expense Report for payment.

<< Employee submits Expense Report (Step 1) ==> the workflow is routed to the employee's manager for approval (Step2) ==> once approved, the workflow is routed to the payroll department for payment>>.

Step 2 in our example workflow is assigned to the employee's manager which is collected by a field in the form named ManagerName. When the employee submits the Expense Report, the designer wants the employee to see the message "Your request has been sent to {Manager name}". {ManagerName} is an example of a template that is replaced at runtime by the name that is entered in the ManagerName field in Step 1.

Step 3 in our example is assigned to any user that is assigned the role of Payroll. When the manager approves the report and clicks submit, the designer would like to display the message "The Expense Report has been sent to Payroll for processing" to the manager.

To understand where you type in the text for your messages to get them to display when you want them to, think of the Pending Message property as the message that is displayed when users try to access workflow steps. In our example, when the employee submits step 1, the workflow moves to step 2, the manager approval step. The message typed into the Pending Msg field for Step 2 - "Your request has been sent to {Manager name}" is shown to the employee instead of the Step 2 form. When the manager approves the Expense Report and submits Step 2, the message typed into the Pending Msg field on Step 3 - "The Expense Report has been sent to Payroll for processing" is displayed to the manager when the workflow moves to the Payroll department employees instead of the Step 3 form.

To set up the Pending messages discussed in our example, follow these steps:

  1. Click the name of the workflow or the  Edit icon for your workflow on the Workflows Home Page.
  2. Click on the first workflow step to display the Properties Navigator panel.
    1. The Pending Message for Step 1 displays the default - "Your request is being processed"

    2. A Pending message set up on the first step of a workflow is only displayed if the Task for First Step feature is configured for your workflow. This feature is useful for auto-starting workflows programmatically. Do not assign a Pending Message for the first step if you are not using this feature.
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  3. Click on Step 2 of your workflow - in our example this is the Manager Approval step.

    1. Click the  Edit step Properties icon in the Messages section of the Properties Navigator.

    2. Type "Your request has been sent to {Manager name}" into the Pending Message field. The employee will see this message when he/she submits Step 1 and the task is placed on the Manager's Task List

  4. Click on Step 3 of your workflow - in our example this is the Payroll step. 
    1. Click the  Edit step Properties icon in the Messages section of the Properties Navigator.

    2. Type "The {flow.name} has been sent to Finance for processing." without the quotes into the Pending Message field. The manager will see this message after clicking Submit on Step 2 and the workflow is routed to the Payroll department. Click Submit. 

  5. Click Submit and then save the workflow.

Tip

If you want to display a custom message such as "Expense Report Processing is complete." after the Finance user clicks the Finish button, use the Workflow Properties Message tab for the workflow. 

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Steps performed by the same user in a workflow are referred to as a screenflow. The steps of the screenflow are considered one task. The reject functionality will allow users to reject only to the beginning of that screenflow. You cannot reject back to steps after step 1 in the screenflow.

Tip
Steps performed by the same user that are separated by Anonymous Task steps are considered to be a separate workflow tasks. For example, consider a Purchase Order workflow with the following navigation: Step 1 is performed by Sales employee > Step 2 is sent to the customer's Email Address (Anonymous user) > Step 3 is performed by the same Sales employee that performed Step 1. You can configure a Reject button on the Sales step that will show both steps as rejection targets even though Step 1 and 4 were performed by the same user. Refer to the Workflow Tutorial for an example.

Customize the Rejection Email

It is possible to customize the subject and email message body that is sent when a workflow task is rejected. The customized rejection email will be sent when the Reject button is clicked on a workflow step or Quick Approval screen.

You can choose controls from your form which will be added to the Message as templates or you can use built-in templates as described below. Click on theImage Modifieddown arrow shows the list.

  •  {flow.name} - Name of the workflow

  •  {subject.first.name} - First name of the user who rejected the task.

  •  {subject.last.name} - First name of the user who rejected the task.

  •  {flow.activity.name} - The step of the workflow that was being performed when the task was rejected.

  •  {flow.activity.reject.reason} - The reason for the rejection.

  •  {task.perform.url} - The URL to the rejected task.

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Click here for an example showing how the Easy Reject feature works.

Reject to Discard

Most often, steps in an Approval workflow can have three possible outcomes.They can be:

  • Approved
  • Sent back to a previous step for corrections/more information (Reject to Revise)
  • Rejected and terminated (Reject to Discard)

Consider a workflow where Step 1 is filled out by a user, the second Step requires approval by a manager and when approved, Step 3 of the workflow is routed to the VP for review. After approval by the VP, the workflow completes.

The designer must consider what actions the Manager and the VP could take when the workflow appears on their Task List.

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Troubleshooting the Reject Button

Here are some reasons why you might not see the Reject option on a step where "Reject From Here" is selected:

  1. If  the Reject To Here option is not selected in the previous steps, then user won't be able to see the Reject button on current step.
  2. When consecutive steps are executed by the same user,  treats it as a screenflow. Think of those steps in the screenflow as one task. The reject functionality allows users to reject only to the beginning of that screenflow/task i.e. where the previous user started his work. It won’t allow a reject to the in-between steps.
  3. If the immediate steps prior to the current step were performed by the same user, then he/she cannot reject to those steps (the user is rejecting the workflow to himself). Users can reject only to those steps performed by other users, or to steps performed by himself that do not come immediately before the current step.
  4. If a previous step was skipped because its precondition failed, then the user won't be able to reject to such a step.
  5. If a precondition on previous step passed when that step was being performed, but the control values change causing the precondition to now fail, the user might not be able to reject to that step.
  6. The Reject button will not be displayed at all if the conditions are such that users cannot reject to any prior steps.

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Tip

In general, a condition is selected that acts as a trigger for the escalations. If the condition is NOT met, then the designer can specify what actions to take. You can elect to reassign, notify, send reminders or skip the task but you do not have to choose all three. However, once a condition is selected one of the actions must be reassign,notify or skip.

  1. You can skip a task when the deadline expires and the workflow automatically navigates to the next step. This is set up on the Action tab.
  2. You can reassign the task to another user/role. This is set up on the Action tab.
  3. You can send notifications to the user(s) that currently have the task that the deadline has been reached and the task has been reassigned. This is set up on the Notifications tab.
  4. You can use templatized values of controls in any of the Assignee(s) fields in the Escalation setup screen. The username that is filled in as that control's value will be picked up during escalation.
  5. You can send reminder emails to the user(s) who have the task on their task list at specified intervals reminding them that the deadline for the task is approaching. This is set up on the Reminders tab.

For example. if you wanted to send reminder emails to the user(s) who currently have the task on their Task List that the deadline is approaching and then send an email notification to them when the deadline is reached, you would configure the Notifications and Reminders tabs and check None (Notify Only) on the Action tab. Continue reading for more details.


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  1. Click on the step in your workflow where you want to set up escalation criteria
  2. Click on Setup Escalation link in the Properties pane. The wizard will display.
  3. Clicking the ADD ESCALATION button displays the Escalation Condition tab. Multiple escalation triggers can be setup for the same step in a workflow.
  4. Select a condition from the dropdown. There are 4 choices:

    1. Perform By - This condition is met when the user clicks the  (if the task is assigned to a particular user) or ( if the task is assigned to a role) Perform icon on the task in the users Task List or Saves/Locks the task before the configured due date. If the Task Notification email includes the {task.perform.url} then the deadline is met when the user clicks the link in the email to display the task.

    2. Perform Within - This condition is met when the user clicks the (if the task is assigned to a particular user) or ( if the task is assigned to a role) Perform icon on the task in the users Task List or Saves/Locks the task before the configured the configured duration). If the Task Notification email includes the {task.perform.url} then the deadline is met when the user clicks the link in the email to display the task.
    3. Complete By - This condition is met when the user clicks the Continue/Finish button on a form step in a workflow before the configured due date.

    4. Complete Within - This condition is met when the user clicks the Continue/Finish button on a form step in a workflow before the configured duration.

      Info

      An invalid due date template value will resolve to the current time to prevent any use-mode errors. The following message will appear in the frevvo logfile: "Escalation Due Date {DueDate} resolves to an invalid value":

  5. Selecting the Perform By or Complete By conditions displays the following screen:
    1. The Due Date control dropdown displays all date controls in your form. Select from one of these choices or check the Use Fixed Date checkbox to enter a date/time as the deadline.

  6. Selecting Perform Within or Complete Within displays this screen:
    1. Specify the amount of time the user has to perform or complete the task in Days, Hours or Minutes.
    2. Check the Business Calendar checkbox if you want to use the business days, times and timezone specified for your tenant to calculate a task deadline. The business calendar is set up at the tenant level by the tenant admin.

    Once the condition is selected,  click the Action tab to continue. If the condition specified is not met, then you must specify Reassignment of the task to a different user/role or Notification to the user/role it is currently assigned to that the deadline has expired.  You can configure both but at least one of these actions is required.
    1. Select from the following choices:
      1. None (Notify only) - Check this option if you want to send reminder emails to the user(s) who currently have the task on their Task List that the deadline is approaching and then send an email notification to them when the deadline is reached. The Notification tab becomes required. The task will not be reassigned or skipped. 
      2. Reassign Task - Reassignment sends the task to the user/role selected if the deadline is passed. Select whether the task will be reassigned to a Role, User or Unlock to Role: 
        1. If you select Role or User, then you must select the user or role in Select Role or User Assigne(s) field. Type ahead to display the Roles/Users in your tenant that begin with the letter you are typing and select from the list or enter comma separated templates. Remember that  userids and roles are case sensitive. If reassigning to a specific user, only one user id can be selected but you can reassign to more than one role.

        2. Unlock to Role - This option unlocks the task. Use this option for a step in your workflow that has a role assigned to it and you want to handle the situation where one user with that role has the task locked and the deadline for the task has passed. Selecting Unlock to Role unlocks the task and keeps it on the Task list of all users with the role after the deadline expires. Now it can be performed by any user with the specified role again.
          For example, let's say you have a step in your workflow that is assigned the manager role. Users Jerry and Jim are managers so the task shows up on both their task lists. Jerry clicks the Perform icon but he does not complete the step. The task remains on his task list and it is locked by him. If Jim tries to access the task or checks the Audit Trail he will see that the task is locked by Jerry. The deadline to complete the task passes. If Unlock to Role is selected as the reassignment option, the task remains on the task list of users with the manager role, in this case, Jerry and Jim, but it is unlocked and the audit trail shows a status of pending. Now it can be performed by any user with the manager role again.

        3. Reassigned users receive the Task Information email specified by the designer. So be sure to Setup Task Notification Email for the step in your workflow where you assigned escalations and you want to reassign the task after the deadline.

      3. Skip Task - check this option if you want the workflow to escalate automatically to the next step when the timer expires. When checked, no further configuration is required.

    Info

    Skipping a task is only supported if the next step in the workflow is a form/summary step. Configuring the Skip a task feature on the last step of your workflow will not work. 

      

  7. To set up Notifications:

    1. Click on the Notifications tab.

    2. Slide the toggle icon to the right to turn on Notifications

      1. Select whether a Role, User or the Current Owners from the Send To dropdown to specify who will receive email notification reminders when the deadline is reached.

      2. If you select Role or User, then you must list them in the Select User(s) or Role Recipient(s) field. Type ahead to display the Roles/Users in your tenant that begin with the letter you are typing and select from the list or enter comma separated templates. Remember that   userids and roles are case sensitive. You can specify more than one user or role.

      3. Specify an email(s), user(s), or role(s) to receive a CC: of the notification (optional.)

      4. Current Owners refers to user(s) who currently have the task on their task list. Partial templates with prefixes and suffixes can be used to create a complex role such as floor-manager when setting up Escalations.

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        titleClick here for an example
         
        Insert excerpt
        Templatized Strings
        Templatized Strings
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      5. The subject and body of the notification email are shown once the Recipient(s) are selected. You can customize the email message by adding controls from your form as templates, workflow templates, common templates, escalation or task templates. Simply click the to show the templates or type ahead to filter the list.

      6.  provides built-in templates that can be used in escalation emails.

        • {flow.activity.escalation.duedate} - provides the deadline due date in GMT timezone. The tenant admin can change the timezone by selecting the correct timezone for your tenant when configuring the  Business Calendar . 
        • {flow.activity.escalation.condition} - resolves to either 'start' or 'complete' depending on the condition value.
        • {flow.activity.assignee} - current user/role
        • {flow.activity.escalation.reassignee} - resolves to the new user/role that the task is assigned to.

        For example, when a task is reassigned, you may want to specify the user/role that the task is being reassigned to (reassignee) in the email to avoid confusion. Simply add some text with this template in the Notification message section:  {flow.step.escalation.reassignee}.

  8. Emails that serve as reminders as the deadline approaches are configured on the Reminders tab. Reminder emails notify the roles/user(s) originally assigned to this step.
    1. Specify the interval between reminders by entering the number of reminders in the Every field and select Days, Hours or Minutes from the Unit dropdown.
    2. You can limit the number of reminders by sliding the toggle icon to the right and entering the number of reminders closer to the deadline in the Occurence(s) field. If you enter a negative number in this field by mistake,  will change it to a 1 when you exit the field.
    3. Specify an email(s), user(s), or role(s) to receive a CC: of the notification (optional.)
    4. You can customize the email message by adding controls from your form as templates, workflow templates, common templates, escalation or task templates. Simply click the to show the templates or type ahead to filter the list.. Select them from the Control dropdown.  provides built-in templates that can be used in escalation emails.

  9. Click the Submit button to save your setup. 

Escalations and Screenflows

Escalation should always be defined on the first step of a task - this is relevant when setting up Escalations for a Screenflow.

Screenflows are steps in a workflow that are performed by the same user. Consider a New Employee On-boarding workflow where steps 1 - 5 are designed to collect the Personal Information, W - 4 Allowances, State Allowances, Health Insurances preferences and Banking Information. Step 6 in the workflow is routed to the new employee's manager and step 7 is routed to HR for final processing. Steps 6 and 7 are not part of the screenflow as they are performed by users other than the new employee.

Think of the 5 steps of the screenflow as one task. Escalation for the screenflow task will work as long as you define the escalation on the first step of the screenflow task. The escalation configured on the first step of the screenflow applies to all steps of the screenflow. For example, if a Complete Within 2 days escalation is configured on Step 1 of screenflow, then the escalation is triggered if the whole screenflow is not completed within 2 days.

Tip

If the first steps of a workflow consist of a screenflow, you must configure the workflow to use the Save on Navigate and/or Task for First Step properties for escalation triggers to get created.

Escalation Examples

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titleClick here to see some Escalation Examples

Escalation Example 1

Let's consider a Time Sheet workflow consisting of 3 steps: 
  • The employee accesses the Time Sheet workflow, fills in the form, signs it and clicks Continue. Live Forms sends that employee's manager a notification via email
  • The manager clicks on the notification [on any device], views the Time Sheet approval request and approves it or sends it back for corrections.
  • If approved by the manager, the workflow is routed to employees in the payroll department for final processing. 

In this example, the designer has configured a 10 minute interval for the Manager to approve/reject the task. The Escalation tabs are shown:
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Employee William submits his Time Sheet at 12:55 PM. The deadline to complete this task is 1:05 PM. William's Manager Jerry receives a Task Notification email notifying him there is a task that requires his attention. The email includes a link he can use to access it.
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In this example, the deadline to complete the task is 1:05 PM. Based on the setup of the Reminder(s) section shown above, Jerry will receive 3 reminders every 3 minutes as the deadline approaches. The emails contain a link that Jerry can click to get to the task. The first one arrives as 12:56 PM, the second at 12:59 PM and the final reminder before the deadline arrives at 1:02 PM.
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At 1: 05 PM, the task is removed from Jerry's task list since it was not completed in the allotted time and is routed to the task list of any users with the role of Supervisor. Jerry receives an email informing him that the deadline for the task has expired and the task is now assigned to any user with the role of Supervisor.
Reassigned users receive the Task Information email specified by the designer. So be sure to Setup the Task Notification Emails.

When Jack, a user with the role of Supervisor, access his task list he will see a task sent to him by the system and the Audit Trail shown in the image:
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Escalation Example 2

Let's consider a situation where you might want to skip the task after the deadline has been reached. Imagine a workflow with a requirement that it must be approved by specific users in sequence. To prevent the chain of approvals from being delayed if one user does not perform their approval before the deadline, the designer can check the Skip the Task checkbox on the workflow steps and  will automatically complete the current step and create a pending task on the Task List of the next user.

The Project Approval workflow shown in the image must be approved by Approver 1 and Approver 2 in that order. The escalation set up on the Approver 2 step automatically skips this step and advances the workflow to the next next step . Notice that notification and reminder emails are also configured.

In this example,
  • The Approver 1 and Supervisor steps do not have Escalation configured.
  • The Approver 2 step has an escalation that specifies the step must be completed within 3 minutes. 
  • If Approver 2 does not complete the task within 3 minutes, the Approver 2 step is skipped and the workflow advances to the Supervisor step.
  • Approver 2 receives an Notification email stating that the workflow is now assigned to a Supervisor.
  • Approver 2  receives 1 Reminder email during the 3 minutes interval. 
    Image Modified
Here's what happens:   

  1. Project Details are submitted for approval. 
  2. Approver 1 receives a Task Notification email, clicks the link in it and performs step 1 of the workflow. The task is placed on Approver 2's task list.
  3. Approver 2 receives a Task Notification email which includes a link to the task. Approver 2 does not click the link in the email to perform the task.
  4. Approver 2 receives 1 reminder email. Approver 2 does not perform their approval within the 3 minutes.
  5. When the 3 minutes expires, the task is removed from Approver 2's Task List.  Approver 2 receives a customized email stating that the workflow has moved to a Supervisor for approval.
  6. All users with the role of Supervisor receives a Task Notification email which includes a link to the task. 
  7. Someone in the Supervisor group approves/rejects the task.

Activity Document Actions

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