Create and manage an Affiliate Accounts job as the source account

Affiliate Accounts is an optional feature in vWork that enables you to share jobs between vWork accounts. You can learn more about this feature in the article, Use Affiliate Accounts to manage subcontracted work through vWork.

Once you have established an Affiliate Accounts relationship link with another vWork account, you can begin sharing jobs with that account.

As the source account in the affiliate account relationship, you will track the job through to completion. You may be involved in completing some steps in the job but at some point, you will pass the job to a subcontractor for them to continue with the job.

Your subcontractors can see your affiliate account details as a Sending Affiliate in their vWork Affiliate settings.
You can see your subcontractor in your vWork Affiliate settings as a Receiving Affiliate.
Your vWork account can have relationships with other vWork accounts as both a Sending Affiliate and a Receiving Affiliate.

Any dispatcher with the Jobs or Schedule web app user permissions set to Full can assign jobs to Receiving Affiliates.

Create a job and invite a subcontractor to complete it

To demonstrate how jobs are managed by the source account, we have created an Affiliate Accounts relationship between Orange Gecko as the source account that creates jobs and two subcontractors. The two subcontracting accounts are Indigo Inc and Freight it 2 U.

Indigo Inc and Freight it 2 U are both Receiving Affiliates in Orange Gecko’s vWork account.
Orange Gecko Group is the Sending Affiliate in Indigo Inc’s and Freight it 2 U’s vWork accounts.
Indigo Inc and Freight it 2 U don’t have an affiliate relationship with each other; they only have an affiliate account relationship with Orange Gecko.

You can learn how to set up Affiliate Account relationships in the article Set up an Affiliate Accounts relationship link in your vWork account.

Create a job and send a job invite

You create a job to send to an affiliate subcontractor from the Jobs tab, Schedule, or as a repeating job. You assign the job to the Receiving Affiliate in the Job Editor for the job. In this example, we assign a job to a Receiving Affiliate from the Jobs tab.

To create a job and assign it to a Receiving Affiliate subcontractor to complete:

Go to the Jobs tab and click to create a new job using your chosen template - or open an existing job that you want to assign to a Receiving Affiliate.
Enter the customer information then scroll to the Assign to Affiliate heading in the Job Editor and click the Affiliate Account drop-down list to display the list of your Receiving Affiliates.

In this example, we select Indigo Inc.
Complete the rest of the job information, including all tabs, then click to create (or update) the job and send the Receiving Affiliate subcontractor the job invite.

Note: If you want to include step addresses in the job you must enter these before you send the job to the Receiving Affiliate. Once the job is sent you can’t add, or edit, step address information from your vWork account.

In this example, we have set a Start Time, but you can see we are unable to assign a worker. The worker will be assigned by the Receiving Affiliate once they accept the job invite.

Note: If the Receiving Affiliate doesn’t have the user permission to alter the start time the job will be scheduled at the start time saved with the job.

Monitor a job while it is with the subcontractor

When the job is sent to the Receiving Affiliate (your subcontractor) you can monitor the status of the job from both the Jobs tab in the Jobs list and the Affiliate Jobs table, and from the Schedule.

To help you identify that the job is affiliated with another vWork account you can look at the job Status and Worker information.

In the Jobs list, and the Affiliate Jobs table, the status says Affiliate Pending until the job is accepted. After this, the status shows as it normally would for each stage of the job. The Worker information helps identify the job as being subcontracted to an affiliate as it lists the name of the Receiving Affiliate and also includes the name of the worker assigned through the affiliate’s account.
In the Schedule, an affiliate job will show with this icon next to the job status in the left-hand job information panel. When a job has a Start Date the job also shows on the Workbench until it is assigned to a worker by the Receiving Affiliate.

Monitor subcontracted jobs in the Jobs list

Once a job is sent to the Receiving Affiliate you’ll be able to observe its current status in the Jobs list as it progresses.

This example shows the jobs list from Orange Gecko Group (the source account). You can see that Orange Gecko Group has subcontracted several jobs to both Indigo Inc and Freight it 2 U. The various jobs are at different stages of acceptance, assignment, and completion.

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Affiliate pending

The first job, in the example above, is subcontracted to the Receiving Affiliate, Freight it 2 U. You can see their account name in the Worker information. You will always see the name of the Receiving Affiliate account in the Worker information even when a worker is not assigned to the job.
The job shows with the Status of Affiliate Pending to show Freight it 2 U is yet to accept the job.

Unassigned

When the Receiving Affiliate accepts the job the Status updates to Unassigned. From now on the Status of the job changes as it would for any other job as the job progresses to completion.
In the example above, the second job is subcontracted to Indigo Group. They have accepted the job for Animal Fluff but are yet to assign the job to a worker. No worker name shows in the Worker information yet, but you can see the name of the Receiving Affiliate account in the Worker information.

Pending or Assigned

When a worker is assigned by the Receiving Affiliate the worker's name is added to the Worker information in addition to the Receiving Affiliate account name.
The Status changes to Pending if the Receiving Affiliate has the Accept and Decline Jobs option enabled in their vWork account General Settings and the worker hasn’t yet accepted the job. Once a job is accepted by a worker from the Receiving Affiliate the Status shows as Assigned.
In the example above, Indigo Inc. has assigned a job to Bill Wagglesord. Bill is yet to accept the job through the mobile app. This job has a Status of Pending. Able Driver has accepted the job for Freight it 2 U. This job has a Status of Assigned.

Started

When the first step on the job is completed by the Receiving Affiliate’s worker the job changes Status to Started. You will continue to see the worker’s name, along with the name of the Receiving Affiliate, in the Worker information.
In the example above, Able Driver is currently working on a job subcontracted to Freight it 2 U.

Completed

Once all steps are completed in the mobile app by the Receiving Affiliate’s worker the job shows in the Jobs list with a Status of Completed. The Worker information continues to show the name of the Receiving Affiliate account and their worker.

Affiliate Rejected

If a Receiving Affiliate is unable to accept a job they will reject it. The Status shows as Affiliate Rejected and the account name of the Receiving Affiliate also shows in the Worker information.
When you see that a Receiving Affiliate has rejected a job you can open the Job Editor and either reassign the job to another Receiving Affiliate or assign it back to the same Receiving Affiliate with a new Start Time or no Start Time.

Monitor subcontracted jobs through the Affiliate Jobs table

When you add the Affiliates Account feature to your vWork account a new menu item shows under the Jobs tab called Affiliate Jobs. This is a searchable list of jobs shared with an affiliated vWork account. It shows jobs that you have sent to Receiving Affiliates and, if you are also a Receiving Affiliate for another vWork account, jobs that you are subcontracted to complete.

This example shows the Affiliate Jobs list for Orange Gecko. Orange Gecko has subcontracted out jobs to both Indigo Inc. and Freight it 2 U.

The Worker information is where you can see the Receiving Affiliate and worker assigned to the job.
You can tell which jobs you are the source account for and which jobs you are the Receiving Affiliate for by looking at the Created By information. This shows the name of the source vWork account that created the job (the Sending Affiliate). You’ll notice that Orange Gecko is listed for most jobs as the source account. For all these jobs Orange Gecko has subcontracted work to the Receiving Affiliates. The last job, however, shows Freight 2 U as the source account. This job was created by Freight 2 U and subcontracted to Orange Gecko as the Receiving Affiliate to complete. You can also see that this is the only job that doesn’t show the Customer information in blue text. Blue text is a clickable link. You can’t link to the customer record for this job as it is saved in your affiliate’s vWork account.

Monitor a subcontracted job through the Schedule

Affiliate jobs show on the Schedule in the job information panel on the left of the Schedule and on the Workbench.
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Job information panel

Affiliated jobs on the Schedule show this icon next to the job information in the panel on the left of the Schedule. The job status icon shows the progress of the job.

Workbench

Affiliate jobs that have a job Status of Affiliate Pending, Pending, and Assigned all show on the left of the workbench as unstarted jobs. Click this icon to see the details of these jobs on the workbench.
Note: The number represents the number of jobs on the workbench.
Unassigned jobs with a start time show on both the Workbench and in the job information panel.
When the job is started it is only visible in the job information panel to the left of the Schedule.

Which Affiliate Account does job information come from?

Before the job is started

The original job information, added to the job before it starts, comes from the source account (Sending Affiliate). This includes things like customer information, job steps and step addresses, custom fields completed before the job is assigned to a worker, and invoice line items added before the job begins. This information is passed through to the Receiving Affiliate when the job is shared with them.

Once the job has started

Once the job is with the Receiving Affiliate (subcontractor) and their worker completes the first job step, all information added to the job comes from the Receiving Affiliate’s vWork account. This includes invoice quantities, information added to custom fields, and additional step addresses added to the job. The Source account can’t change the job information once it is passed to the Receiving Affiliate.

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