A Schedule is what turns your Templates into recurring Tasks.
The Schedule is where you assign the User or Role, set the Start Date, the Frequency, if and when it stops running, a Due date, and select which Clients.
💡 Note
We recommend that users set up roles for your team members before making schedules to automatically assign and easily manage your team's tasks and workflow.
Click here to learn how to set up and assign roles to your team members.
Add a Schedule
On the Automation board, select the Template with the Schedule you'd like to add a schedule to. This will open up a Template Details Tile on the right-hand side.
Click on the Calendar icon on the top left of the Details Tile. This will open the Schedules page of the Template. Click on the +Add on the top right of this page.
Set up the Schedule
Name the Schedule
Choose the Role or User the tasks will be assigned to
💡 Note
You can assign the schedule to a specific role or user
Then select which User
or which Role
Select the Start Date
This is when you'd like the tasks to start to get generated.
Set the Frequency
💡 Note
When you select Daily, you choose which days of the week the schedule runs on.
If your Start Date is a Monday and you choose Weekly or Fortnightly, every task will start on a Monday.
If you select Quarterly or Yearly, your tasks will appear on the Date (10th, 15th, etc) you select, in this example the 21st.
When you select Monthly, you will have an option of which months you want the schedule to recur in.
👉 See Monthly schedules explained below.
Select the End Date
You must choose an End Date. This is for if or when you want the tasks to stop occurring.
If you want it to run indefinitely, select No End Date, otherwise select an end date or enter the number in Repeat.
Set the Due Date
The Due date is not a fixed date. It is a rule that XBert recalculates for every task the schedule creates, so the due date always moves with the task.
You build the rule from four parts, reading left to right across the picker: [number] → [Days or Months] → After → [a point in time]
Use the last drop-down to choose what that number counts from.
Start Date counts from the task's own start date.
End of Week Period counts from the Sunday of the week the task starts in.
End of Fortnight Period counts from the Sunday a week after that.
End of Month Period counts from the last day of that month.
End of Quarter Period counts from 31 March, 30 June, 30 September or 31 December.
End of Year Period counts from 31 December.
For example, a monthly task set to 14 days after End of Month Period with a start date of 5 March is due on 14 April. The next task in that schedule, starting 5 April, is due 14 May.
💡 Note
End of Year Period uses the calendar year and always counts from 31 December. It is not the end of the financial year.
Choose if you want to Create Tasks in the Future
As a default, your tasks will show on your board 2 days before the start date. Enter the number of weeks you want your tasks to show in advance.
For example - If you add 1 under weeks for a monthly recurring task, it'll get created a week in advance.
Activate Schedule Immediately
Schedules have an Active or Inactive state.
Tick this box if you want your Schedule to be Active when created.
Add Attachments
Attachments can be added at the Schedule level (as well as the Template level).
Select Clients
Select which Clients you want this Schedule to apply to by ticking the client from the list. The ticked clients will be moved to the top of the list.
If you have a large list of clients, use the Search to save scrolling.
💡Customising the estimated time for a client
Every task this schedule creates uses the Default Task Time from the template. If a client takes more or less time than that, you can give that client its own estimate.
1. In the client list, tick the clients this schedule applies to. The Edit button stays greyed out until at least one client is ticked.
2. Click Edit. The Client Time Customisation window opens, showing only the clients you ticked in step 1.
3. Tick the clients you want to give a different time to. This can be one client, a few, or all of them.
4. Enter the time under Update Time Estimations.
5. Click Update.
Each customised time now shows next to that client's name in the client list.
Any client you don't customise keeps the Default Task Time.
Save the Schedule
You will be taken to a Confirmation Page. This will confirm the details of the schedule that you want to create. Click Yes to continue or No to go back and make changes to your Schedule.
Your Schedule will now sit under the Template where it was set up, Templates can have multiple Schedules against them. You can set up as many schedules as needed for that template by selecting the +Add button.
💡 Tip
If you have multiple schedules, you can sort your Schedule list by clicking on the Status, Name, Recurs, Due Date, Attachments, Assigned, and Clients header columns.
Monthly Schedules Explained
When you select Monthly, two settings control when your tasks appear.
The day of the month comes from your Start Date.
Whatever date you chose as the Start Date is the date the task recurs on. If your Start Date is the 15th, tasks start on the 15th of every month you have selected.
You choose which months it recurs in.
Tick the months you want the schedule to run. Tick all twelve for a task every month, or tick only the months that apply to that piece of work.
💡 Note
Some months are shorter than others. If your Start Date is the 29th, 30th or 31st, the task will fall on the last day of any month that doesn't have that date, and the schedule then continues from the new date rather than moving back.
For example, a schedule starting 31 January creates its next task on 28 February, and the one after that on 28 March, not 31 March. If you need a task on a particular late-month date, check the first two or three tasks and adjust the schedule if the date has moved.
❗Important
Monthly schedules run on a date, not a day of the week.
XBert monthly schedules use a date of the month, for example the 1st, the 15th or the 30th. They cannot be set to patterns such as the 2nd Thursday, 3rd Wednesday or last Tuesday of the month.
There is no workaround for this. If you need a task to land on a particular weekday each month, set the Start Date to the closest date and then change the date on each task after it is created.
To find the tasks that need adjusting, go to the Automation board and filter your templates by Schedule Frequency → Monthly. Open a template and click View Tasks in the top right to see every task that template's schedule has created. 👉 See How to: View Created Tasks from a Template.
Non-Workday Scheduling
You can configure non-workday scheduling on the Features page.
This allows you to set which days are non-workdays and automatically push task dates to either the next or previous workday.
👉 Read more here: Activating the Non-Workday Scheduling Feature
Need help?
If you have any questions, our support team is here to help!
Reach out via the chat widget on the bottom left of your XBert screen (Help), or email us at support@xbert.io