Trigger email from Due Date in BPM?

[Keith]

I need help in figuring out how I can implement the following.

I am trying to implement a process to gather UAT testing. A user must provide UAT testing within 5 days. However, I want us to be reminded to chase the user at 3 days.

My intention was to have a task that has a start date, a due date and an expiry.

Start is immediate

Due would be 5 days

Expiry would also be 5 days.

 

Ideally I want to send an email to the request owner at 3 days. BUT I don't see a way to have a custom expression to that can do this.

What other options do I have? 

Can I set an expiry that is earlier than the due date and use the expiry to trigger the email? but still leave the task available to choose an outcome after the expiry?

 

I could consider breaking out into more actions/steps but I will need to be able to report on whether we completed within the due date, therefore think it will be much easier to do this if everything is contained in one task.

 

Thanks for any help you can offer.

 

[Steven Boardman]

@Keith ok i've been having a think about this one, and i can't see a way to do this with just the Due Date so i have detailed a long winded parallel process based approach which i think gives you the outcome but i appreciate might have a few compromises and workarounds. 

So below is an image of the process, but i've attached the process if you want to take a closer look

Steps

1. Assign to team and owner

2. Start parallel processing

2.1 Create testing task - set due date and expiry to 5 days

2.2 Update a custom field with a value - i have gone with 'Reminder Due'

2.3 Place request on hold (3 days in your example)

2.4 suspend and wait for request to come off hold

2.5 On coming off hold, get request info and check the value in the custom field

2.5.1 - If it is still 'Reminder Due' branch and send the owner of the request an email saying the task is still outstanding - then update the value to 'Email Sent'

2.5.2 - If the value is not 'Reminder Due' branch and don't send the reminder email

This is the important bit - off the back of the task being completed (inside the 3 days) although set to 5 days - it is followed by an update request details and i have set this to 'Completed intime' and then take the request offhold.  Therefore when the request checks the value of the custom field it will no longer be 'Reminder Due' and thus a chasing email will not be sent (which i am assuming is what you will want if the task has been completed.)

 

I've run it through and tested some scenarios

1. The task is not completed after 3 days - email sent 

2. Task is completed inside 3 days - no email sent

Hopefully this approach means you can still report on the task completion.

If you are uploading the process i've attached:

testing-stuff.bpm.txt

* You'll need to change the assignee team and owner

* Change the email template and from mailbox

* Change the task due and expiry dates and on-hold periods - i reduced these to minutes not days for testing  

Hopefully this maybe of use

 

 

[Keith]

Wow!! Many thanks for investing so much time into this @Steven Boardman. Good to have the masters input . A little complex but I'll give it a go.

 

Cheers

Keith