How Invitations Get Scheduled

This information is covered in REDCap itself and on other wiki pages, but we're adding it here as a helpful reminder and to give some context to the tips.

• By default, creating or updating a record (via user data entry, data import, or a participant's responding to a survey) triggers REDCap to check the conditions of all activated ASIs in a project to determine if an automated invitation should be scheduled or canceled for a participant.
• If an ASI's conditions include a temporal condition, i.e. datediff() function, additional ASI checks are run in the background, approximately every 10 minutes.
• REDCap also checks the survey response status of the survey itself, and if the survey response is complete (i.e. participant completed the survey) REDCap does not schedule or send an automated invitation.
• If reminders have been enable for an activated ASI, the reminders are scheduled when the invitation is scheduled, and REDCap automatically removes a reminder when the participant completes the survey.

ASI Peculiarities

• Date or Time Invitation is Scheduled to Send is a Date or Time in the Past

  • If an ASI is configured to send at an exact date and time, or after or before a date or date/time that's captured in each participant's record, or ASI logic conditions include a temporal condition (i.e. datediff() function) that evaluates a date or date/time captured in each participant's record, and the actual date or date/time hard coded into the ASI, or entered in the participant's record is a date or date/time in the past, the automated invitation will be sent to the participant immediately.

• Manually Sending Invitation to a Survey that has an ASI Activated

  • If an automated invitation is already scheduled to send to a participant but has not sent out yet (i.e. the invitation is listed in the Survey Invitation Log filtered for Future Invitations), and in the interim you or another user manually schedule and send an invitation to the participant for the same survey, the automated invitation will be canceled.
  • If an automated invitation is NOT yet scheduled to send to a participants(i.e. the automated invitation is not listed in the Survey Invitation Log filtered for Future Invitations), and before the automated invitation is scheduled, you or another user manually schedule and send an invitation to the participant for the same survey, the automated invitation will still be scheduled and send out, unless the participant completes the survey beforehand.

• User Completing as a Form a Survey that has an ASI Activated

  • If you or another user completes a survey as a form, it's not the same as the participant completing the survey, regarding the impact on sending an automated invitation, meaning:
    • If the activated ASI configuration includes designating a specific survey has to be completed as part of the conditions for sending an automated invitation, and you or another user has completed the designated survey as a form, the automated invitation will not get scheduled or sent.
    • If an ASI is activated for a survey/form and you or another user complete that survey as a form before the automated invitation is sent, the automated invitation will still be triggered to send to the participant.

Canceling & Rescheduling Invitations

Canceling Invitations

By canceling invitations, we mean deleting or removing automated invitations that are already scheduled (i.e. invitations listed in the Survey Invitation Log filtered for Future Invitations), and if needed preventing new invitations from being scheduled.

• De-activating an ASI will not not cancel automated invitations that are already scheduled.
• Automating Cancelations
  • Modify data in a participant's record so that the ASI's conditional logic evaluates to be false.
    • This is why we recommend the setting up a kill switch field, a checkbox field that you refer to the ASI logic statement statement, and that if checked would cancel scheduled invitations and prevent new invitations from being scheduled.
    • Modifying data can be done by manually editing a participant's record or through importing data into one or more participant records.
    • If conditions in other ASI's refer to the kill switch checkbox, any already scheduled invitations for these ASI's would also be canceled and no new invitations would be scheduled.
    • Confirm the invitations and associated reminders have been canceled in the Survey Invitation Log.
• Manually Canceling
  • Through the Survey Invitation Log, select one or more automated invitations to be deleted.
    • By default, the invitation(s) is not permanently deleted and if the participant's record is updated and the data in the record meets the conditions of the activated ASI, the invitation will be scheduled again.
    • If you select the option to permanently cancel the invitation, the automated invitation cannot be re-scheduled through the ASI, even if the data in the participant's record meets the ASI conditions.

Rescheduling Invitations

By rescheduling invitations, we mean changing the date or date/time automated invitations already scheduled (i.e. invitations listed in the Survey Invitation Log filtered for Future Invitations) will be sent out. Which approach will work best for you, depends on your use case for re-scheduling.

• Bulk Rescheduling
  USE CASE: Permanently change when an invitation is to be sent for all participants eligible to receive the invitation and some invitations have already been scheduled. 
  • Track the participant record ids of the invitations that will need to be canceled.
    • If you will be automating the cancelation via importing data into participant records, save the import file to track the participant ids.
    • If you will be manually updating records or canceling invitations, download from the Survey Invitation Log, a list of the scheduled invitations for the ASI.
  • Cancel scheduled invitations via one of the methods described in the section above.
  • De-activate the ASI.
  • Edit the ASI configuration.
  • Activate the ASI.
  • For participants for whom invitations were canceled, update their records to trigger REDCap to check the conditions of the activated ASI's and re-schedule invitations.
    • If you automated the cancelation, you can either manually uncheck the kill switch checkbox on each participant's record or you import data to uncheck the kill switch box for multiple participants' records.
    • If you manually canceled invitations via the Survey Invitation Log, you will need to manually update each participants record, by opening and saving a form.
• Individual Rescheduling
  USE CASE: Change when an automated invitation that already been scheduled needs to be sent for an individual participant.
  • Find the invitation Survey Invitation Log and click the pencil icon to edit when the survey will be sent.

Editing Invitations

By editing invitations, we mean modifying the message, changing the email address for the sender or the recipient for automated invitations already scheduled (i.e. invitations listed in the Survey Invitation Log filtered for Future Invitations).

• Once an invitation is scheduled to send to a participant (i.e. the ASI is listed in the Survey Invitation Log filtered for Future Invitations), the following can't be edited without first canceling the invitation:
  • The subject line and message
  • The sender
• Change the participant email
• Cancel and reschedule

Re-evaluate Auto Invitations Tool

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