This work has been loaded to Production as part of Release 4.28.0 on
New permissions have been introduced for this functionality. Details can be found below under the “Permissions” heading.
Validation Windows
We have introduced optional booking window settings, within which planning meetings are booked. These can be found in the System Management → Configuration screen, on the Availability tab.
The purpose of this work is, as AO users you can configure validation windows for when a planning meeting can be booked by a Provider based on the EPA/Audit Submitted Date.
As an AO user you will have no such restrictions.
The new configuration options are as follow:
Booking Notice Additional Info - This is to define any extra information that you wish to provide relating to your bookings process, when users are booking planning meetings.
Booking Notice Period - This is the number of days notice needed to undertake the planning meeting. So, a planning meeting cannot be booked for a date before today, plus the number of days defined in this setting.
Estimated Gateway Processing Period - This is the estimated number of days required to completely process a gateway.
Booking Period Maximum - This is the maximum number of days after the apprentice’s EPA date, gateway submitted date or audit submitted date, depending on the status of the apprentice, that a planning meeting can be booked. The EPA date is included in this calculation.
The last available booking date is calculated from the booking period maximum.
If these optional settings have been set, and there is no capacity available, the EPAO will need to book the planning meeting using the Manage Planning Meetings screen.
We have also added a helper to the Planning Meeting Booking screen that provides details of where these configuration settings relate in regard to the availability that is displayed on the booking screen. This can be found on the Available Times section of the booking screen.
Where these configuration options have not been set, the slots will be calculated based on the user group, or EPA's availability - no notice periods will be taken into account, however, a one year restriction will be placed on when a booking can be made.
These optional settings will not be used in the slot availability calculations for AO users and will not change the functionality of the Manage Planning Meetings screen.
Booking Capacity Management
We have added a new screen to allow for a central place to manage planning meeting bookings (both provisional and approved) for the available resource.
This new screen is available via the Planning → Manage Planning Capacity menu item.
When first loading the screen you will be prompted to select the week to show bookings for, the start and end times which will control how much data and the times you see, and up to 10 users.
The users dropdown will list users inside the planning meeting user group, and also EPAs on the system. We have limited the user selection to a maximum of 10, as this screen pulls in data from various sources, including existing bookings within epaPRO and any external Microsoft or Google calendars if they have been configured, this means it can take time to process and the more users are requested the longer it will take.
The drop down list will display up to 50 users, it will prioritise those from User groups if you have them, load those 10 (if you have them) and then load the remaining 40 as EPAs.
You can use the search box to search for other users, and that will load new results, but it will still follow the same limit on the quantity shown.
Do also note that the searching will retain your selection, so if you selected and ticked Ricky to search for h, then searched for Mary, it would show both of them ticked and would remember the selection.
Once loaded the screen will display a grid of cells that can be used to see the availability of the selected users.
This screen shows a lot of data and so a key at the bottom can be used as a reference:
Scheduled is any meeting that can be edited on this screen
Changed is any meeting that has unsaved changes
Available is a time cell that is available and has no existing booking and the user’s working hours also make them available
Not working indicates the user’s working hours are configured in a way, that they do not work at that time
Unavailable indicates another booking. This could be one of the following:
An assessment element booking
Another planning meeting that cannot be edited, for example, if it’s completed
An absence configured in epaPRO
An external calendar event from our Microsoft or Google integrations
When viewing the week view, hovering over a cell with some kind of booking will show a popup with some additional details. If the cell has multiple bookings then the popup will say so and advise on what can be done.
Clicking on a cell with an editable planning meeting will open up the edit booking modal.
This modal provides a form where the assigned user, start time/date, and duration can be edited.
Clicking save will then update the screen, moving the booking to the new location, please note that the changes have not yet been saved. Should you wish to revert a change, you can find the booking and if changes have been made a “Reset” button will show next to the “Save” button when viewing the edit booking modal.
When clicking on a cell with multiple bookings, a popup will show a listing of the bookings within that cell along with some additional information. Clicking on a booking that can be edited will open the same edit booking modal.
If you would like to zoom in and view a day in more detail, you can click the Day View (Monday) at the top of the grid. There is also a button to allow you to view the previous or next day.
This will provide a zoomed-in view and where possible additional details will be shown. The details on the event block may be cut off due to the length of the event, in this instance the details can be found by hovering over the event.
This view will also act like a calendar, such as Outlook, and align bookings next to each other if they overlap. Clicking an editable booking within the day view will open the same edit booking modal.
If you would like to return back to the week view, click the “Back to week” button at the top.
When one or more bookings have been edited, the screen will now be in a “dirty” state. A warning will be shown when trying to navigate away, or reload the grid, due to unsaved changes. A “Confirm and Save” button will be shown at the bottom of the screen.
Clicking this button will open the confirm and save modal, this modal will list all of the changes that have been made so that they can be confirmed before saving. Clicking save with start updating the planning meetings in the background, a progress bar will also be shown to indicate the progress. Once the changes have been saved the modal will close, and the screen will update any bookings that had pending changes to now be unchanged, this will also remove the ability to reset a booking.
Do note that when saving a booking, notifications will be sent for each one as described in the notifications heading above, and based on the communication configuration.
Permissions
A new permission has been added called “Manage Planning Capacity” this new permission has been given to the owner and awardingorganisation roles by default. A user that has this permission will be able to view and use the new booking management screen.
Show source of the availability
We have added a new dropdown to the standard screen, allowing for the source the planning meeting booking screen will use for availability calculations. There are three options:
Default - This will cause this standard to behave as the system does currently. The system default group “Planning Meeting Bookings” will be used, and if that group has not been configured it will fallback to the apprentice’s assigned EPA if they have one
Apprentice’s EPA - This will force the calculations to always use the apprentice’s assigned EPA, if they have not had an EPA assigned then there will be no availability
Group - Currently only the system default “Planning Meeting Bookings” can be selected, this will force the calculations to always use the group selected. If the group has not been configured, then there will be no availability
Notification for Provisional Bookings
We have introduced a new notification for provisional bookings of planning meetings, found on the Planning tab of the Notification Management Screen (the Configuration menu item).
This will be dispatched when a planning meeting is provisionally booked for the first time, and will contain the date and time of the meeting as well as the duration.
This notification is enabled by default and will be sent to the following user types, if they are added as Attendees:
Apprentice (disabled by default)
Awarding Organisation (enabled by default)
Employer (enabled by default)
EPA (enabled by default)
EPA Manager (enabled by default)
Provider (enabled by default)
Guest (enabled by default)
Please note: that some of the above users cannot yet be added as attendees, until some further development is undertaken. EP-3296 - Getting issue details... STATUS .
Therefore currently notifications will only apply to the Apprentice, AO or EPA (if they are selected by the capacity engine).
The notification has been set to dispatch an email by default, but can also be set to send In-App Notifications or SMS (where configured).
Notifications
We have added and tweaked the handling of planning meeting notifications to make them much more consistent between the various planning meeting screens/processes and to add more configurable options when a planning meeting changes.
A new “meeting updated” notification has been added, by default this will be sent to the attendees of the meeting that have the following user type:
Awarding Organisation
Employer
EPA
EPA Manager
Provider
See also above warning note.
This new notification is sent when a planning meeting has been updated, this could be due to a status change or other date/duration being changed and applies to all screens that edit the meeting.
When a planning meeting is updated, we will now handle triggering the relevant notifications, these differ slightly between a provisional and confirmed booking. Below is a list of the actions and details of what happened, do note that the majority of these were already being sent, but this is to clarify the processes following the new addition and tweaks:
Booking Notifications | |
|---|---|
Provisional Bookings | |
Booked | when a provisional booking has been booked via the slot-based booking screen the new provisional booking invite notification will be triggered |
Updated | when a provisional booking has been updated the new meeting updated notification will be triggered |
Attendee removed | when an attendee has been removed from a provisional booking that attendee will receive a meeting cancelled notification |
Attendee added | when an attendee has been added to a provisional booking that attendee will receive a provisional booking invite notification |
Approved | when a booking is approved the meeting invite notification will be sent |
Rejected | when a booking is rejected the meeting rejected notification will be sent |
Confirmed Bookings | |
Booked | when a new meeting is booked that is not provisional the meeting invite notification will be sent |
Updated | when a meeting has been updated the new meeting updated notification will be sent |
Rescheduled | when a meeting has been rescheduled the meeting rescheduled notification will be sent |
Cancelled | when a meeting has been cancelled the meeting cancelled notification will be sent |
Attendee removed | when an attendee is removed they will receive a meeting cancelled notification |
Attendee added | when a new attendee is added they will receive a meeting invite notification |
Note that all of the above is based on the default configuration of communications and may differ on customer environments.
Workplace Mentor as an attendee for planning meetings
We have extended the Schedule Planning Meeting screen’s Add Other Attendees popup to include shortcut entries for adding the Workplace Mentor and/or On Programme Assessor as a guest user.
This is just a shortcut and adds them as a guest attendee, as these are not system users.
The phone number will not currently be carried over, as planning meeting guests do not currently support phone numbers.
The popup, when first adding the Workplace Mentor and/or On Programme Assessor will move them from the popup. However, once saved, or when editing an existing planning meeting, the shortcuts will be reshown, due to them just being entered as a guest.
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