Overview
This article explains how AMC staff use the Admin Rule Profiles page in Appraisal Scope® to create and manage rule profiles that control order assignment and visibility. It introduces key options such as Round Robin and Monitor Only and how those settings affect what appears on staff dashboards.
Mixed configurations: Round Robin and Monitor Only settings
Monitor Only configuration is one of the elements available to be set on a parameter-by-parameter basis in Admin Rule Profiles. This availability allows an AMC to use both Round Robin assignment and Monitor Only configuration within the same Admin Rule Profile. In order for both settings to be used, the Round Robin check box just above the configuration table must be selected.
When Round Robin assignment is turned on for an Admin Rule Profile, a blue toggle setting that reads [round robin] will appear to the right of each individual parameter in the configuration table. When a staff user clicks [round robin] in any given instance where it appears alongside a parameter, this toggle control will change to read [monitor only].
This action changes the setting of any single parameter from Round Robin assignment to Monitor Only. What this means is that when an order is placed that triggers the Admin Rule Profile by virtue of matching the specific parameter that has been changed to Monitor Only, Appraisal Scope won’t automatically assign the order.
In this case, the Admin Rule Profile assignees will be able to view the order on their dashboards, but these users will be responsible for deciding how the order is assigned. All other parameters having remained in a Round Robin configuration, any order that triggers the Admin Rule Profile by matching any of these other parameters will still be assigned automatically by the round robin process.
Let’s consider the following configuration table:
Note that the [round robin] toggle control corresponding to the Client parameter Offshore Bank has been clicked so that [monitor only] now displays. By this configuration table, an order placed by JTM Loans Plus for a property in either Michigan or Oklahoma will trigger the Admin Rule Profile. The assignees of this Rule Profile will be assigned that order automatically by round robin process.
On the other hand, an order placed by Offshore Bank in either Michigan or Oklahoma will also trigger the Admin Rule Profile, but the assignees of this Rule Profile will not be automatically assigned the order. Instead, they will be able to view the order on their dashboards, but they will be responsible for assigning the order among themselves.
Admin Rule Profile configurations that utilize both Round Robin assignment and Monitor Only configurations can be used by AMCs in a variety of circumstances. Round Robin assignment is a good option, for instance, in a scenario where a short turnaround time is critical for the types of orders that will match a particular parameter.
For example, let’s consider once again the following Admin Rule Profile:
We can imagine that of these two clients, JTM Loans Plus is particularly important to the AMC due to their high order volume. Offshore Bank, on the other hand, is a smaller lender that produces orders less frequently.
In the case of JTM Loans Plus, the AMC believes that it’s necessary for their orders to be assigned immediately. As a consequence, a staff user has set Round Robin assignment to handle orders from this client.
In the case of Offshore Bank, though, the AMC wants all of its Admin Rule Profile assignees to be able to view all orders and control who is assigned to them. This way, the staff users can account for who among them has the lightest workload.
Conflicting configurations
Conflicting configurations is a term that refers to rule profiles that have been configured with overlapping conditions. AMCs should be aware that these conflicting configurations will cause their platform-version to behave in ways that are inconsistent with what they’ve intended.
AMC staff users can inadvertently create conflicting configurations when they set up a new Admin Rule Profile. This usually happens when a different Admin Rule Profile already exists that is using a common parameter in a conflicting way.
AMCs can prevent making conflicting configurations by tracking which parameters are being used in each Admin Rule Profile and how they’re being used. They should also monitor the objectives that each Admin Rule Profile was created to carry out and verify that they’re still working in the way they were intended.
Conflicting Configuration Scenario 1.
To illustrate what conflicting configurations look like and how they might occur, let’s construct a scenario. For this scenario, our AMC is setting up Admin Rule Profiles to manage orders placed by Five Oaks Credit Union.
They’ve created the first Admin Rule Profile as a way to manage all orders placed by Five Oaks Credit Union in Oklahoma and Texas. They will assign this rule profile to a group of staff users who will be responsible for all orders.
They’ve called this Admin Rule Profile Five Oaks Admins; see screenshot below for a view of this rule profile.
The AMC has also created a second Admin Rule Profile, which they intend to assign to a user who will serve in a management capacity for orders placed by this lender. The AMC wants this staff user to concentrate on monitoring the progress of all orders that Five Oaks Credit Union places.
They’ve called this Admin Rule Profile Five Oaks Management; see screenshot below for a view of this rule profile.
Right away, we can see that overlapping conditions have been set up between these two rule profiles (as previously mentioned, for columns that are blank all possibilities are implied). These rule profiles technically overlap at the Client parameter, and the reason they’re conflicting configurations in this case is because they’re both set up to assign automatically by Round Robin.
The way that the AMC intends this to work and believes it will work is that all orders placed by Five Oaks Credit Union for properties in the states of Oklahoma or Texas will be automatically assigned by a round robin process to staff users who are assigned the Five Oaks Admins rule profile.
Then, the staff user assigned the Five Oaks Management rule profile will be able to monitor all orders placed by the credit union, not just for properties in Oklahoma or Texas, but for all regions that Five Oaks covers. There is a conflicting configuration here, however, that will prevent these profiles from carrying out the tasks that are expected of them.
Because the Round Robin check box has been selected in both of the screenshot examples, one of two things could happen. If the Five Oaks Admins profile was created and assigned first, then the orders will carry on assigning among those staff users who have been assigned this profile. The staff user who is assigned the Five Oaks Management profile will not ever see these orders to monitor them.
If, however, the Five Oaks Management rule profile was created and assigned first, then the orders will be assigned to the staff user assigned this profile. The fact that this profile was created and assigned first means that it will supersede the Five Oaks Admins rule profile and so the staff users assigned Five Oaks Admins will never be assigned any orders.
Either way, in this scenario, the Appraisal Scope platform-version will not be assigning orders among staff in the way that the AMC intends it to. The reason is that because the Round Robin check box has been selected in both cases, the overlapping Client parameter, Five Oaks Credit Union, is in conflict. In order to fix this conflicting configuration and bring the Admin Rule Profiles into alignment with the AMCs intent, a staff user would just need to clear the Round Robin check box associated with the Five Oaks Management rule profile.
An alternative resolution of the conflict in this scenario would be to give what is essentially view-only permission to allow the user tasked with monitoring order statuses access to orders that trigger the Five Oaks Admins rule profile. A staff user with this permission would be able to click the Rule Profile dropdown and select Five Oaks Admins from the list to filter their dashboard. This would allow them to see only and all of the orders that trigger the Five Oaks Admins rule profile.
Conflicting Configuration Scenario 2.
For our second scenario, our AMC has decided to take a different approach to how they manage orders placed by another client, National Trade Bank. They will set up three different Admin Rule Profiles, and they will use the Process Status parameters to separate responsibility for the orders into segments of the workflow.
The AMC has broken their staff users up into three groups, each group corresponding to an Admin Rule Profile. The first group will oversee order intake tasks, the second will oversee inspection scheduling tasks, and the third will oversee client delivery tasks. Below is the first rule profile.
All new orders placed by National Trade Bank will assign to staff users who are working under the National Trade Bank Intake profile. This Admin Rule Profile will be used by the group overseeing intake tasks.
As the orders progress through the opening stages of the workflow, they will remain assigned to the same user. When they reach the Accepted status, though, the National Trade Bank Intake rule profile will de-assign the staff user and the next Admin Rule Profile will kick in to re-assign the order to a different user.
Although the order will no longer be assigned to the original staff user, it will still be visible from the dashboard view of users assigned to the National Trade Bank Intake rule profile until the process status associated with the order progresses beyond Accepted. This way, the period of transition from the first Admin Rule Profile to the second can be monitored.
Now let’s consider the second rule profile below (see following screenshot).
In this scenario, we can see that the National Trade Bank Scheduling rule profile will be used by the group overseeing scheduling tasks. When one of the orders placed by National Trade Bank reaches the workflow status Accepted or Accepted with Conditions, National Trade Bank Scheduling will kick in and assign the order to one of the staff users responsible for overseeing the scheduling tasks.
The AMC intends with this Admin Rule Profile that the staff user who is assigned an order continue to be assigned until the order status progresses beyond Inspection Complete, at which point a third Admin Rule Profile will kick in and re-assign the order based on its configuration.
Note that in National Trade Bank Scheduling, the AMC has also included the Ready for Review status. As was the case with our National Trade Bank Intake group, the AMC wants orders to be visible from the dashboard view of users assigned to the scheduling rule profile. However, the Process Status parameter has not been configured appropriately to meet this object, and an overlapping parameter has been introduced.
To see how this overlapping parameter will cause conflicting configurations, let’s consider the third rule profile below.
The National Trade Bank Client Delivery rule profile will be used by the group that oversees delivery of the final appraisal to the client. The AMC intends that the staff users assigned this profile will be assigned orders placed by National Trade Bank that have reached the Ready for Review status. As we’ve seen, however, the AMC has introduced an overlapping parameter with the Ready for Review status.
Because the Ready for Review parameter of the National Trade Bank Scheduling rule profile is set to [round robin], this rule profile will be effectively blocking the National Trade Bank Client Delivery profile, which is also configured for Round Robin at the Ready for Review parameter, from performing as it should. To fix this situation, a staff user would need to modify the National Trade Bank Scheduling configuration table by going to Staff > Admin Rule Profiles, choosing National Trade Bank Scheduling from the Profile name drop-down list, finding the Process Status parameter Ready for Review, and clicking [round robin] to the right of the parameter.
This action will switch the toggle control next to Ready for Review to read [monitor only]. This rule profile will now de-assign the order from the user who’d been managing it, allowing the National Trade Bank Client Delivery rule profile to re-assign the order. A correctly configured National Trade Bank Scheduling rule profile would look like the following:
Outcome
After reading, staff will be able to set up Admin Rule Profiles that mix Round Robin and Monitor Only behavior and predict how each configuration affects assignment and dashboard visibility. They will also be able to identify common causes of conflicting configurations and adjust profile settings so orders route to the intended staff group.