Requests

In this article

• Overview
• Setup
• Feature Experience
• Additional Info

Overview

The Requests feature adds new functionality in the Submission Portal, you can allow your constituents to request a collaboration to be submitted as part of their overall submission. One example of this would be letters of recommendation. This would allow the constituent (portal user) to enter in the collaborator (recommender) details. The collaborator will receive an email that will allow them to submit a recommendation form on behalf of the constituent. This feature also allows the constituent to see the status of the request, send a reminder email and you can even make a response required before submission.

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Setup

The following will outline the setup steps for the Requests feature. This can only be enabled using the Submission Portal.

1. Login to Zengine as an admin and gain access to your workspace that you will create the request.
2. Create a new form via form builder to be used as the Request form. This form will contain fields the constituent will interact with, the following fields are required by the setup of this feature:
   • Linked Form field to the primary form in the submission portal 
   • Text field for the Collaborator Name
   • Text field for the Collaborator Email (validated as email address)
   • Text Box field for Note to Collaborator (not required, best practice to include)
   • Text field for Status
   • Text field for Status Date
   • Text field for Request URL
   • * Include other fields, if needed
     
3. Create a new form via form builder to be used as the Response form. This form will contain fields the collaborator will interact with, the following fields are required by the setup of this feature:
   • Linked Form field to the primary form in the submission portal
   • Linked Form field to the request form created in Step 2
   • *included fields the collaborator will interact with to complete their response (i.e. an upload field for an uploaded letter of recommendation)
     
4. Navigate to the Settings and Tools area of your workspace (gear icon in upper left corner) and click on the Submission Portal tile under Plugin Settings. Click the pad and pencil button to edit the submission portal you would like to enable the requests feature.
5. You will find Portal Sections on the left side of the configuration screen. Find the Requests section and click the word Requests, then click on "+ ADD REQUEST"
6. General Settings tab - On this tab you will give your request a name (i.e. Letter of Recommendation), choose your Request form (built in Step 2), map all fields from that request form required by the configuration, give a description (this will display in the portal to your constituents and updated at anytime), and lastly set a min and max number of request that can be sent. Once you have mapped all fields, if you click the "Save all settings" button, you will receive an error....this is normal. You cannot save until all settings are complete across tabs.
7. Response tab - On this tab you will choose your Response form (built in Step 3), the other items are all related to the collaborator. You can set a due date for the response, date and time the collaborator has until they can no longer submit the response. Response Description and Submitted Response Confirmation Message are both on screen text the collaborator will see.
8. At this point, you can click the blue "Save all settings" button in the lower right corner. Just know that the Request and Response forms will be locked in place. You can go back and edit on screen text, min/max requests, response due date and the email templates at anytime.
9. Email tab - On this tab you can configure the Request Email and Reminder Email. Place holder text is in place for you, but feel free to update at anytime. You can change the From Name, Reply To, Subject, and Body of the email messages. You can use the "+ Insert Field" button to add in data tags. Request Email is sent when the constituent completed their Request form and sends the request. Reminder Email is triggered by the constituent and can only occur after the Request Email and once per 24 hours.If you added a field on the Request form for a note to the collaborator, you will need to insert that field into the body of your email template.
10. The newly configured Request, now has to be added as a Step in your submission portal. Requests are unique in that they can be added to both required and external stages. In most cases you are adding to a required stage as part of the overall submission. Navigate to the Stage where you want to add the request. Click on the Steps tab and click on "+ADD STEP."
11. On the + ADD STEP screen, you will give the step a name. Then, check the box for "Is this Step a Request?" and this will give you the option to select a request that was configured in this portal. Choose the Request Name from the dropdown. The last option is to make the response required or not. Unchecked means the constituent only needs to complete the request in order to submit the entire stage. Checked means the constituent will no be able to submit the entire stage until the required number of request have received a response from the collaborator (you can change this setting at anytime).Click "Save all settings" button in the bottom right corner.
12. Your Request Step has been added to your stage and active in the portal. On the Step Settings screen, you can change the Request (if needed), add a Step Description and Request List Description, both are on screen text to your constituents.The last option is the "Require Response?" option which was covered in Step 11. Make sure to save any update
13. Test your new addition to the submission portal. Login as a constituent using the "Test Submission Portal" button in the upper right corner. SETUP COMPLETE!

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Feature Experience

The following will show you what the constituent and collaborator will experience using the Request feature once setup has been completed.

The request will appear in the portal like any other step in the stage that the constituent will need to complete.

Once on the Request List screen, the constituent can manage their requests and add new requests. Existing requests can be in a draft status, which can be completed and sent. Reference sent requests and send reminder emails, if needed. A request can be deleted or viewed. The two statuses you would see below are "Sent" and "Complete." Sent requests were sent and not yet responded. Complete requests were sent and the collaborator submitted their response.

The collaborator will receive an email when the constituent clicks the "Send" button. You can add in data tags for additional details to be included in this email message. This is what a base level email will look like:

Once a collaborator clicks on the link in the email, they will be redirected to the Response form to complete and submit. After submission, they will see the on-screen response submission message. If they click on the link in that email again, they will see the submission confirmation message. Below is a simple upload field only letter of recommendation response form the collaborator would submit.

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Additional Info

• Constituents can interact with the Request step after submission.
• Requests can be added to an external stage.
• If you set the minimum number of requests to zero, the request step will appear as optional to the constituents.
• You can have up to 10 different requests in one submission portal to be used throughout different stages.