Alerts can be created either for a specific Contract milestone (such as Quarterly Reviews, Renewals or Cancellation requests), or to prompt for an action to be performed (for example, against a Party record to remind Suppliers to send in their latest contact information).  Created Alerts trigger an email notification message to nominated people to action.


Creating a Alert


Alerts can be created via the option within the Navigation bar:

  • Navigate to Alerts
  • Press [New], you will be presented with the Create Alert form


Fig 1 - Completed Alert Form


Complete the Alert details, linking it to either a existing or new Contract, Party, Contract Document or Contract Amendment record (you must first select the entity and then select the record from the list of values underneath) then assign the relevant 'Linked People' to be notified.  


People can be linked to a record in two ways. Click in the field and a drop down list will appear, the top values will be the Contract Role Placeholder values such as 'Contract Manager' this allows you to assign an alert to a 'Role' rather than an actual named Person.  


Note: These placeholders are not available for 'Party Alerts'


Further down the list are specific People, use the scroll bar and the search bar to find your record (multiple People/Placeholders can be selected).  


Fig 2 - Linking People to an Alert


Note: Alert Notifications will only be sent out to those Users that have a licence and that are 'Active' ie. no End Date reached.


The Magnifying Glass can also be used to launch the 'Find screen'. This screen will display more information about People records, and you can use the filters to help you find the correct value. (Roles are not displayed in this pop up screen)


Fig 3 - Using the 'Find' screen


Placeholders


The Placeholder option allows you to assign a Role to the Alert instead of selecting a specific Person.  This means that even if a Role changes from one Person to another across the lifetime of a Contract, it will still trigger to the correct Person.  


At the time in which the Alert is triggered, the system will link to the Person record that has been assigned that Role and trigger the Alert to them.  The Alert record will keep the Placeholder value, as it can be set to trigger in the future and the Role can change multiple times before triggering.


Multiple Placeholder Roles can be assigned to an Alert record, and if more than one Person is nominated with the selected Role, then they will also receive the Alert notification.


Configuration switch 'Allow External People to receive Alerts'.  If set to 'No' then Email Notification Alerts to 'Roles' will only be sent to 'Internal People' 'External' People will not receive them.


People are classed as 'Internal' if their Person record is assigned to an Internal Party - this is the 'Company' field on the Person form - if this field is left blank then they are classed as an External Person.


Note: These Role placeholders are not available for 'Party Alerts'

Fig 4 - Placeholders


Once your Alert is created, take a look at the Linked People field, if there is a green tick next to a Person's name, then their 'Communication Enabled' flag is set to 'Yes' and they will receive the Alert.


If they have red 'x' then there is a reason why the Alert cannot be sent, if you hover over the red 'x' then a popup will inform you why the Alert cannot be sent to them.  This could be that the Configuration switch mentioned above is set to 'No', the Communication Enabled flag is switched off or they are an unseated User.


Fig 6 - Email Notification Identifiers


There maybe the case where you have selected a Role rather than a specific person, if you have multiple people assigned to that Role and one of them is unable to receive the Alert then an orange icon will appear as a warning, the hover will tell you which person is unable to receive the Alert and why.


Fig 7 - Email Notification Identifiers

Dates


The date that the Alert is to be triggered can either be a specific date or one relative to a date captured within the entity selected.  A document can be attached to the Alert if required (for example a copy of existing contract agreement for review). A copy of this document will be attached to the email notification.  


Use the Recur Rule section to set if the Alert should recur on a regular basis, such as Annually or Quarterly until the Alert end date specified has been reached.


TIP: Alerts can be created in relation to Custom date fields created for specific milestones. Once the custom date field is created and placed on the record form, it will appear as an option within the Alert Date Setting drop down list.

Creating an Alert within a Contract record


If you are creating a new Alert for an existing Contract:

  • Navigate to Contracts
  • Find the specific Contract record and open
  • Scroll to the bottom of the form to the sub tabs, select the Alert tab
  • Press [New], you will be presented with the Create Alert form with the Contract link already present
  • Complete as detailed above


Creating an Alert within a Party record


If you are creating a new alert for an existing Party:

  • Navigate to Parties
  • Find the specific Party record and open
  • Scroll to the bottom of the form to the sub tabs, select the Alert tab
  • Press [New], you will be presented with the Create Alert form with the Party link already present
  • Complete as detailed above

TIP: For further details on all the fields within the Alert record, please refer to the article 'Working with the Alert Form'

Processing an Alert

Each person linked to the Alert will receive an email on the date of trigger with the Alert information for them to action. The notified person then has 3 options within the email.  People added to the Alert do not need to be Users of intelligentcontract, they can be sent out to external people if required. 

Fig 8 - Alert emails

  • Complete - click to complete the Alert
  • Review - click to open up intelligentcontract and review the Alert and Contract details and process
  • Snooze - click to close the Alert for a pre-nominated number of days before triggering again 

Note: If the Alert is sent to a non User of the solution then they will not have the orange [Review] button within the email

TIP: Alert Snooze days are set within the Manage Account Configuration page, click here for more details

Whilst within a Contract or Party record, you can view all the Alerts associated to it via the sub tab 'Alerts'. The Alert can be processed using the [...] Action button to the left of the record.  Please note this field will not appear unless you hover your mouse in the column.



Fig 9 - Alerts within a contract

  • Navigate to the Contract or party option and open up the relevant record
  • Scroll to the bottom of the form and select the Alert tab
  • Either, open up the Alert record to review and action
  • Or, use the [...]  Action button 
  • Choose a relevant option


Additionally, you can view and process all Alerts across the whole of your Contracts via the Alert Summary screen.


Fig 10 - Alert summary screen view

  • Navigate to the Alerts option and find the relevant Alert record
  • Either, open up the Alert record to review and action
  • Or, use the [...] Action button
  • Choose a relevant option


Any Alert that is past its due date will be highlighted in red.  The Navigation panel will display if there are any Alerts that require the logged in Users' attention. By clicking on the red circle, the Alert summary screen will open up displaying the view for 'Alerts requiring attention'.


Fig 11 - Alerts on the Navigation bar



Fig 12 - Alerts requiring action view


Recurring Alerts


The Recur Rule section on the Alert form allows you to set up a rule when a regular Alert should trigger next (for example, you may wish to have an Alert for a Quarterly meeting that must take place).  You can create the Alert and then set it to trigger Quarterly; this means that you only have to create the Alert once, and then the system will automatically create the rest until it reaches a specified end date to stop.


Create the Alert and set when it should trigger initially, then set the Recur rule to stipulate when the next and ongoing Alerts should generate. You can either leave the Alerts to trigger indefinitely, or to stop on a specific or relative date.


Fig 13 - Recurring Alerts


If an Alert has been Snoozed prior to completion, when you try to then complete the Alert, the next scheduled alert trigger will be out of sync. The system will give the user the option to schedule the next Alert either from the date the Alert should have been completed, or from the actual date the Alert was completed.


The example below is an Alert scheduled to trigger 05-June. This has been snoozed until the 12-June. When completing this Alert, the user now has the ability to set the next Alert to either trigger one month after the last Alert Date (05-July), or to trigger one month from the actual completion date (12-July).


Fig 14 - Recurring Alert options


If you select a relative date based upon a Term Date, then Recur rules may automatically be set.  For example, if you want to set an Alert for a Recurring Contract against the Renewal date, then the system will set an automatic Recur for the Alert to generate each time the Renewal is due.  


If you then alter the relative date that you have selected on the Contract term, the existing Alert and all Recurring ones will automatically update to reflect the adjusted date.


Fig 15 - Default Recur option


The Recur default will be set if you select the date options of End Date, Renewal Date, and Cancel By date.