Skip Time Delay for Workflows

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Linden Tucker

• January 13, 2022 22:23

I use several Workflows to automate membership applications, but there are times, especially around conference registration time, when I'd like to be able to approve membership applications in the workflow faster than the normal time delay. I use a time delay so that I can check for spam or catch people who are ineligible for membership. When we offered a Starbucks gift card for a member giveaway, we got a BUNCH of spam member apps, for example, so I could stop the workflows altogether. I'd love to be able to click a button that's sort of the opposite of the Stop button in the workflow, that skips the remaining time in the time delay and moves to the next step. Perhaps this could be a toggle on/off, so certain things cannot be skipped? I don't know. Just spit-balling on that. But I'd definitely like the feature.

As it is now, I have to tell members, "Sorry, yes, I have received your application, but it's stuck in an automated approval process, so please wait 6 hours." I've taken to shortening the approval period during conference time for their convenience, but that also means I have to go check them in the middle of often very busy days for me when I had longer before and my own personal analog workflow at the middle and end of the day for checking apps.

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• Official comment

  

  Laura Block

  • February 24, 2022 17:21

  Thank you for the feedback, Linden! This is an interesting suggestion that we haven't run into previously, so we'll be sure to consider it for future upgrades to the Workflow module. 

  In the meantime, what might solve this problem is setting up a second workflow. When you encounter a membership application you want to approve instantly, you could go to the member's account, turn off the delayed workflow for that account via the Workflows tab, and instead trigger the new, expedited workflow.

  To make sure the expedited workflow doesn't trigger for anyone you don't specifically add to it, set a trigger that won't ever be triggered accidentally - for example, a conditional trigger based on a custom field could work well. When you manually add someone to a workflow from the Account Detail page Workflows tab, Neon will bypass the conditions set for the workflow and run the account through the approval process.

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