Your vWork account Administrators can change the default vWork settings to tailor vWork to your business requirements and workflows. Some general settings are account-wide, such as time zone, units, and branding. Other settings set parameters for what users can do with the mobile and web app. You may also have additional settings that relate to optional features you have added to your account.
In this article
This article explains the general settings Administrators can customize through the Settings tab in the General menu option. Where more detailed instructions are required for a specific setting we link to other articles that provide this information.
Topics include:
- Time and unit settings
- Mobile worker settings
- Administrator and dispatcher settings
- Customer settings
- Branding
Click any of the topic links above to learn about the groups of settings you are interested in. You can return to this topic list by clicking this icon:
Time and unit settings
The time and unit settings determine the basic time and unit settings used across the account. These settings include:
Time Zone
The Time Zone settings specify the main time zone used by your business. Select the time zone that works best for your job scheduling.
Note: If your account has the Groups feature you can set a different Time Zone for each Group.
Units
The Units setting is used to specify the preferred distance unit measure applied to your account. Select the distance unit measure most commonly used in the region where your mobile workforce operates. Choose between Kilometers and Miles.
Mobile worker settings
The mobile worker settings change how jobs are accepted and managed when published to workers’ mobile devices, and also how mobile workers manage their shifts. Some of these settings only require you to enable them in the General Settings, and others require some additional setup.
The specific settings that relate to mobile workers are:
- Accept and decline jobs
- Multi-assign
- Keep canceled jobs on devices until completion
- When should workers receive jobs
- Shift on/off
- Workers can reschedule jobs
Accept and decline jobs
When you enable the Accept and Decline Jobs setting, workers can accept or decline a job published to their vWork mobile app. This setting has many options and features including selectable reasons for declining a job, setting an automatic decline period, and having jobs automatically accepted but with an option to decline before the job starts. There is more information about this setting in the article, Set up workers to Accept, Decline, or Reschedule Jobs.
This setting is useful to use with both the Multi-assign and Workers can reschedule jobs settings.
Multi-assign
Multi-assign (broadcast dispatch) enables a job to be published at the same time to selected workers or all workers. All workers who receive the job on the mobile app can accept or decline it. The first worker to accept the job has it added to their schedule and all other workers have the job removed. This setting must be used with the Accept and Decline Job setting. There is more information about this setting in the article, How do I set up and broadcast a job to multiple workers?
Keep canceled jobs on devices until completion
When enabled, this option keeps a canceled job on the mobile app until the scheduled end time for the job is reached. The end time is determined by the expected job duration and the job's scheduled start-time.
When should workers receive jobs
This setting determines when workers will see jobs that are assigned and published to them on their vWork mobile app. By default, all published jobs display on workers’ mobile apps as soon as they are published. You can select from a drop-down list to change the default so that jobs show on the mobile app using any of these other options:
- As Soon as Published
The default option. Jobs are published and shown on the mobile app as soon as they are published. - Same day as job scheduled
Once published, the job silently shows on the mobile app at 12:00 am on the day of the scheduled start time. This setting turns off notifications for jobs published at 12:00 am to prevent job published notifications from disturbing mobile app users who may be asleep.
If the job is published with a start time that is set for the same day it displays on the mobile app as soon as it is published. This option is useful if your dispatchers plan and publish the schedule several days or weeks in advance. - Two days before job is scheduled
Once published, the job shows on the mobile app 2 days before the job’s scheduled start time. If a job is scheduled to start within the next 2 days it shows at the time it is published. This is another useful option if your dispatchers plan and publish the schedule more than 2 days in advance. - Minutes before job is scheduled
Once published, the job shows on the phone a specified number of minutes before the job is scheduled to start. You specify the number of minutes when you select this option in the settings. You can specify a minimum of 1 minute and a maximum of 4320 minutes (72 hours).
Shift on/off
When enabled, mobile workers can set their status to off-shift and revert their status back to on-shift again using the mobile app. Workers can set a period of time that they are off-shift for or go off-shift until they select to go back on-shift again through the mobile app. This is useful to show the dispatcher when they are on a break.
When a worker shifts off through the mobile app their schedule is greyed out on the Schedule tab and the clock icon next to their name on the schedule changes from green to red. The dispatcher can still assign and publish jobs to workers that are off-shift. The dispatcher can also change the worker’s status to on-shift in the schedule.
Workers can reschedule jobs
When enabled, mobile workers can change the scheduled date, start time, and duration for jobs that are assigned to them through their mobile app.
Note: If they have the ability to reassign enabled in their user profile they can also reassign the job to another mobile worker after rescheduling it.
Administrator and dispatcher settings
Settings for administrators and dispatchers change how jobs can be managed in the web app. Some of these settings only require you to enable them in the General Settings, and others require some additional setup.
The specific settings that relate to the administration and dispatch permissions are:
Only Admins can delete jobs
When enabled, this setting ensures only a user with the Admin permission enabled in their user profile can delete a job. This means users with full dispatch permission who don’t have the Admin permission enabled can’t delete jobs from the Jobs tab, job editor, or the Schedule.
Note: Deleted jobs can’t be reinstated.
Reasons for cancellation
When a dispatcher cancels a job in the web app you can have them select a reason for cancellation from a custom list. This reason is recorded with the job and shows on both the Schedule and the Jobs list in the vWork web app. This is also useful for reporting on canceled jobs. There is more information about this setting in the article, Set up a list of reasons for cancellation of a job.
Repeating jobs
When enabled, this setting turns on the Repeating Jobs feature. Repeating jobs enable you to automate the process of creating scheduled jobs that occur on a regular and cyclical basis.
There are two versions of Repeating Jobs in vWork. The standard Repeating Jobs feature is called Repeating Jobs v1. You can find out more about this in the article, How do I set up Repeating Jobs (v1)? vWork also has a more advanced version of Repeating Jobs called Repeating Jobs v2. This is an optional feature that works with the optional vWork Assets feature. You can read more about this in the article, How to set up Repeating Jobs v2 (with Assets).
Mandatory job templates
This setting is enabled by default. When enabled it ensures that users with dispatcher permissions and without the Admin permission can only create jobs that are based on your pre-defined job templates. Dispatchers can’t modify the steps and custom fields for Jobs that they create from a job template.
This setting is used to ensure job consistency and reduce the chances of making errors when creating and assigning jobs. You can read more about this setting in the article, Using the Mandatory Job Templates setting.
We recommend you leave this setting enabled.
Customer settings
There is only one setting that relates specifically to customers - Customers can postpone jobs.
Customers can postpone jobs
When this setting is enabled you can set up an email alert for a customer contact that gives them the option to postpone the job and request a preferred new schedule date and start time. This setting works with one of three alert types, the Job Assigned Alert, Job Accepted Alert, or Job Start Reminder Alert. The article, Enable customers to postpone jobs from an email alert, explains how to set up an alert to work with this setting.
Note: The alert is only sent when jobs are scheduled with a start time more than 30 minutes into the future.
Branding
There is only one setting that relates to branding - Customize branding.
Customize branding
The Customize Branding section is where you upload your logo in JPG, GIF, or PNG file format. This is used in the banner for all customer communications sent from vWork such as PDF reports and email alerts. The article, Can I Add my Logo to vWork? explains how to upload your logo. If you want to add additional business information, such as your payment and contact details, this can be done in the Finance settings once you have enabled invoicing. You can find out more about using invoices in vWork in the article, Invoicing with vWork.