Default action
At minimum, all activities support the 'default action', which exhibits different behaviour depending on the activity. For single-step workflows, this is the most appropriate behaviour to choose.
Request/Draft
This action collects the minimum amount of information required to construct a new record and, where supported, keeps the entry in a draft/pending state. It can be used to generate a request for another member to authorise or finalise the record.
It is supported by the following activities:
- Adjustment journal
- Bad debt recovery
- Bad debt write off
- Bill
- Business activity statement
- Credit note
- Creditor journal
- Creditor payment
- Creditor reconciliation
- Debtor receipt *
- Debtor refund
- Direct debit payment +
- Disbursement journal
- Disbursement payment
- Disbursement write off
- End of financial year journal
- File archival
- General account reconciliation
- General journal +
- General payment
- General receipt
- General receipt aggregation
- Leave application
- Opening balance journal
- Partitioning journal
- Payroll activity
- Superannuation activity
- Trust bank cheque
- Trust journal
- Trust receipt aggregation
- Trust payment
- Trust receipt
- Trust transfer *
- Trust account reconciliation
* Debtor receipts and trust transfers affect the file's debtor balance, even when pending.
+ Though supported, use of this behaviour is not considered best practice.
Authorise
This action serves as an intermediate step between requesting and finalising a record. It can be used to seek authority from another member and add extra detail to an existing record, but still retain its draft/pending status.
It is supported by the following activities:
- Bad debt recovery
- Bad debt write off ^
- Creditor journal ^
- Creditor payment
- Debtor receipt
- Debtor refund
- Direct debit payment
- Disbursement journal ^
- Disbursement payment
- Disbursement write off ^
- File archival
- General journal ^
- General payment
- General receipt
- General receipt aggregation ^
- Leave application
- Partitioning journal ^
- Payroll activity
- Superannuation activity
- Trust journal ^
- Trust payment
- Trust receipt
- Trust receipt aggregation ^
- Trust transfer
- Trust bank cheque
^ The 'authorise' and 'process' behaviours are semantically identical.
Process/Finalise
This action collects any remaining information needed to complete an existing record, then commits it in its final form. Where applicable, the pending/draft status is removed from the record.
It is supported by the following activities:
- Adjustment journal
- Bad debt recovery
- Bill
- Business activity statement
- Credit note
- Creditor payment
- Creditor reconciliation
- Debtor receipt
- Debtor refund
- Direct debit payment
- Disbursement payment
- End of financial year journal
- File archival
- General account reconciliation
- General payment
- General payment aggregation
- General receipt
- General receipt aggregation
- Opening balance journal
- Payroll payment
- Superannuation payment
- Trust account reconciliation
- Trust payment
- Trust payment aggregation
- Trust receipt
- Trust receipt aggregation
- Trust transfer
- Trust bank cheque
Fee/charge only
All activities support a workflow step which is solely used to record a
journal or
fixed charge. You must indicate which charge(s) apply; if you do not select either a journal or fixed charge, ContactsLaw will simply display the
task properties window for the step. You can decide whether this step follows immediately after the previous step, or whether a task should be created for it.
Print
This action isolates the "print" step of a particular process. It is used in situations where printing (and its related processes) are delegated to a different member. Some activities will alter their behaviour if a separate print step is detected in the workflow.
It is supported by the following activities:
- Bill
- General receipt aggregation
- Read document
- Trust bank cheque
- Trust receipt
- Trust receipt aggregation
Open a URL
This action opens a website (or other resource), allowing the member to complete an external process. If a journal is attached to this step, the member can indicate when the step has been completed; otherwise, the step will be marked as complete immediately after it starts.
All activities support this behaviour when used in conjunction with 'default action', 'request/draft', 'authorise' or 'process/finalise'.
Start another activity
This action allows activities to be chained together, optionally passing information between them. You can choose whether to start the activity immediately or create a task. It can be used to model advanced business processes.
All activities support this behaviour when used as the final step in a workflow.
Create a mutually exclusive task
This action looks through members' task lists to see if a task for a particular activity exists; if not, a new task is created. It is primarily used to facilitate
transaction aggregation.
Although all activities are capable of using this behaviour (as the final step in their workflow), it is only applicable to:
- Bad debt recovery
- Creditor payment
- Debtor refund
- Debtor receipt
- Disbursement payment
- General payment
- General receipt
- Payroll payment
- Superannuation payment
- Trust payment
- Trust receipt
- Trust transfer