How do I schedule repeating tasks?

This enhanced version of recurring tasks will enable the user to schedule tasks to repeat at varying frequencies over a given period. New features will offer flexibility in creating or updating recurring tasks on a weekly, biweekly, monthly, yearly or ad hoc basis. This guide will assist you in managing repeat tasks, configuring skip or alternate options for exception days, and uploading repeat tasks in bulk.

How to configure the schedule for repeating tasks?

1. Go to Tasks > Options > Repeat
2. Click on Add button to add a new task.
3. As you can see below the schedule box below allows users to manage a task that is to be repeated over a period of time. 
4. Tick the schedule check box and the region as displayed below will be displayed. 
5.  
6. 

7. The user can manage the frequency of repeat tasks on a weekly, biweekly, monthly, yearly or ad-hoc basis as needed.
   1. Weekly - You can select any number of days from Sunday, Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, Friday and/or Saturday for a weekly schedule.

Note: If the repeat tasks require to be scheduled daily, then select all the days of the week.

1. Biweekly - You can select a single day of the week for the tasks to be generated on a biweekly schedule.

1. Monthly - Three options are available for the monthly schedule of any repeating task as follows:
2. The Administrator can select ‘First day of the month’ such as 1st Jan, 1st Feb, 1st March etc. or ‘First day of the week of the month’ for example first Sunday, Monday, Tuesday or Wednesday etc.
3. Last day - Last day of the calendar month.
4. Fixed date - Select any fixed date of the month. 

Note: If selected date chosen will not be available in next calendar month, then that date will be skipped automatically e.g., 31st date will be skipped in the month with 30 or less days and next repeat task will skip to the next month.

1. Yearly - Select day and month for the task to be repeated on a particular day of the year.

1. Adhoc – This option will give you a calendar view of the whole year and you can select dates to schedule the task against any date. To delete an existing task then click on it to view the remove pop up box as in the 2nd screenshot below. 

8. Users can configure Start date, Stop date and Start time for a repeat task.

Note: Stop time needs to be configured through Task - Type which is known as default time for the task. A quick guide is shared in the next step to update the default time for any particular task.

Users can also update the default time for any particular task through following steps:

1. Go to Administration —> Task —> Type
2. Edit the existing task Type and navigate to the Time region.
3. Update the Default time and Unit as needed.

Note: Default time will be calculated from the Start time of the repeat tasks.

10. You can also Exclude exception days by ticking the checkbox against it.

How to configure exception days

Users may want to skip or choose alternative days. For example, a clash of dates with a bank holiday. Users can prevent such scenarios occurring by configuring exception days, allowing tasks to be rescheduled. The two most recent features are exampled below.

Task type 

Type of action – Skip (Skip the task) or Alternate (Choose an alternate day)

1. Go to Administration —> General —> Exceptions
2. Edit any existing exception or Add a new exception.
3. On clicking Task type, you can assign exceptions for any task type.
4. New options are available to Skip or select the Alternate date for the task schedule.

If you select Skip, the use must select one or more task types, choose the exception date for which the tasks will be skipped, and add the exception.

 For example, in the screenshot below, all the tasks under the selected task type will be skipped on the mentioned exception date: 26-Jan-2023.

If the user selects ‘Alternate’ then they need to select one or more task types against which the action needs to be taken. They must choose the exception date and alternate date for which the tasks will be changed and add the exception. 

How to view parent and child repeat task details?

1. Go to Tasks >Options >Repeat > Options > Use filters, select the date range and search for repeat tasks as per Type, Status and Priority.
2. Edit any recurring task and navigate to the Recurring task region to view all the child repeat tasks created under the parent repeat task.
3. Navigate to the Timings section and click on View schedule details to view or update the previously selected schedule for repeat tasks.

Note: Once the repeat task has been created then the Subject, Action, Description, Location etc. details will remain the same in all the child tasks.

How to upload the repeat tasks in bulk?

1. Go to Tasks > Options > Import-Repeat
2. Click on the Download template button.
3. Fill the task details in a CSV file as per the sample data available.
4. Upload the file and click on the Submit button to upload the tasks in bulk.

This will create the repeating tasks as per schedule and task details uploaded in the file. 

Note:

1. Users must strictly adhere to the sample data format to avoid errors.
2. If the data is not as per allowed criteria, then errors will show up next to that task’s column. 
3. Users must upload the updated bulk tasks again which have shown errors while uploading.
4. Users are not to upload the already submitted tasks which have been successfully uploaded to avoid duplication.
5. A task ID will be assigned against all the successfully uploaded tasks.
6. The scheduler will run at midnight to generate the tasks.
7. All the repeating tasks will be created 7 days in advance. For example, today is the 15th of January, so tonight the scheduler will generate all the tasks for the 22nd of January. This will allow the user to check and edit/make changes to the task in advance.