We are excited to announce several fantastic new features and enhancements to the platform this month, including new Automation features, a new look Lists and more. These updates reflect our commitment to continuous improvement and providing valuable enhancements for our users.
The Automations engine now has new options to improve where and how users can run Manual automations. When creating a Manual automation, three new 'Run From' options will be available for selection: From Workspace, From Process Step, and From List (Beta). These options allow more control over where Automations can be run from. For example, when a Manual Automation has the "From Workspace" enabled, this will allow the automation to be run from the workspace, such as Job or Client. Additionally, From List, currently in Beta this month, will allow a user to run an Automation from a List workspace, saving time on having to navigate to a workspace. Refer to Setting up Custom Processes.
With these new Run From Automation Options, additional User Permissions are now also available for FYI Admins to control which users are able to Run an Automation from a List (Beta) or From a Workspace. Any users that have the Automations permission enabled, will automatically have both new permissions turned on. Refer to Managing Users.
More enhancements were made to the Automations workspace, with FYI Admins or Users with Automations permissions now able to Bulk Archive and Bulk Restore automations. This provides even more efficiency when performing any housekeeping of redundant automations. Refer to Automation Processes.
Finally, when a Create Task step is added to a process, users now can select a Delegator for the task. This will default to 'System' however a user can now select an appropriate user as the delegator using Merge Fields or the drop down options. Refer to Process Step Details - Creating Emails, Documents and Tasks.
This month a fresh update was made to Lists in FYI, introducing more intuitive and streamlined ways to interact with your data. When in a List in FYI, a Filter icon and List Menu icon have been added next to each column. Refer to Sorting and Filtering Document Lists:
- The dedicated Filter icon provides a clear visual for users to to identify information that is able to be filtered. This icon will also appear green, to indicate when that column has a filter applied to it.
- The List Menu icon, displayed as three vertical dots, provides quick access to column functions. When clicking this icon users will now be able to efficiently auto-size or pin their columns.
Our Learn platform was given a make over this month, with updates made to the Learn for New Users section. For a smoother training experience, we've combined the 'Before you Begin' Learn course with 'Learning the Essentials'. All the content from Before you Begin course can still be accessed through the Before you Begin article, while all other courses can be found in FYI Learn. Refer to FYI Learn.
The Collaborate Sharing Settings window has been improved with a more accessible Client Folder link, clearer "Copy Link" options and a new Settings tab for the client's Folder Name. In addition, deleting a guest user now notifies users if they still have access to other client folders. Enhancements were also made to folder management and troubleshooting, with the Status Check feature now detecting expired OneDrive Admin tokens and automatically resubscribing Webhooks if the correct admin account is logged in. Refer to Troubleshooting New Collaborate using Status Check and Sharing the Share Folder and Upload Folder with Clients.
For practices integrated with Xero Practice Manager, Workflow Jobs were renamed to "XPM Workflow Jobs" to reduce confusion with the Elite plan feature. Practices enabling this feature will notice the name change in Practice Settings—Jobs. Rest assured, the change has no effect on the existing Workflow Jobs functionality. Refer to Managing Practice Settings for Jobs.
For practices integrated with APS Practice Sync, a new Company Number field has been introduced to the APS Automation app. Providing our APS practices the ability to now map specific APS fields to the Company Number in FYI. As a default, the ACN/ARBN field in APS field will be selected. Refer to Practice Sync Integration with APS (Australian and New Zealand).
For practices on the FYI Elite plan, came many new features and enhancements this month. This included:
- An exciting new step added to Automations, allowing practices to Create Time. Using the create time step, practices can now automatically create time entries as part of a process, including both chargeable and non-chargeable time. Refer to Process Step Details - Create Time.
- Practices can now create draft Job Templates, when migrating to FYI for Practice Management. This allows practices to setup their job templates in draft, prior to enabling Time and Billing in their settings and connecting the practice Xero Ledger. These templates can then be bulk updated to efficiently update the details of the template. This includes updating the status from draft to active, once FYI has been selected as the Practice Manager source. Refer to Create Draft Job Templates and Managing Job Templates.
- When entering time manually, the drop down to select a job will now only display standard and workflow jobs. This provides users with more efficiency on only needing to select one job when entering their time. Refer to the articles in Creating Time and Disbursements.
- After migrating to FYI as your practice management source, practices can now convert standard jobs to workflow jobs in both an Update Job Automation step or using Jobs Bulk update within the Jobs workspace. Refer to Converting Standard Jobs to Workflow Jobs.
- To ensure visibility, the ability to delete Time and Disbursement rates has been replaced with an Archive and Restore function. Once archived, rates will not be available to select when creating or editing timesheet entries, but will remain assigned to any existing time entries. Refer to Managing Rates for Time and Disbursements.
It was again another busy month of feature enhancements. For further details on the features mentioned above, and other enhancements, refer to the October 2024 Release Notes.