| Some of the functionality described in this article is available as part of our Zinfandel release and will not be available if your Practifi instance is not upgraded to this release. |
| Please note: This content is intended for Practifi System Administrators and is technical in nature. The steps described in this article may not be able to be completed without System Administrator permissions. Please discuss your integration installation plans with your Practifi Customer Support Team for their assistance. |
Overview
Service Types capture the different varieties of mutually agreed-upon work that your firm performs for a client. Practifi is packaged with standard Service Types included, and admins can create new Service Types to capture the full range of services your firm provides. This article outlines the creation and modification of existing Service Types. For more information on Services, please consult our Understanding Services and Deals article.
As of the Pinot Blanc release in July 2024, we've added settings to Service Type records that, when enabled, affect how Deals, Services and Deliverables operate in your Practifi organization. This article explains the impact of these new settings.
Creating New Service Types
Practifi Administrators can create Service Type records in the Settings app:
- Click the App Launcher and select Settings.
- In the Settings app, click the Navigation menu and select Service Types.
- On the Service Types page, click the New button. A new tab opens.
- On the New Category screen, enter the following information:
- Category Name (required) - Enter a name for the Service Type. Users will see this name when creating new Deals or new Services for prospects or clients.
- Short Name - Enter an abbreviated version of the Service Type's name if the name is lengthy. This field is not required for Service Type creation.
- Related To - Set this picklist to Service Type.
- Active - Check this box if you want the Service Type to be available immediately upon saving.
- Description - Enter a short explanation of the service being provided. This will be visible to end users in the New Deal and New Service workflows and on Deal and Service records.
- Code (required) - We recommend entering a value that begins with SERV followed by a descriptive abbreviation of the service. For example, an Investment Management service could have the code SERVINVESTMGMT. This value is used in business rules and must be unique from other Service Types.
- Group/Group Code - These are optional fields used to group Service Types. If you intend to associate this Service Type with assets marked as Under Advice, enter Asset-Based in the Group field.
- Default asset-based service? - When an asset is marked as Under Advice, the system automatically generates an asset-based Service for the associated Entity. Check this box if you want the Service Type you're creating to be used as the default Service in this scenario.
- Order - Enter a whole number to determine the placement of this Service Type in the list of available options in the New Deal and New Service workflows. If your organization has multiple asset-based services, use the Order field to specify which one will be used for creating the service on the Entity. If this field is left blank or contains duplicate values across multiple Service Types, then priority will be given to the most recently modified Service Type for Service creation on an Entity.
- Available in - This field determines where the Service Type will be available to end users. Select New Deal action, New Service action or New Deal and New Service actions. For more on the implications of this setting, see the Understanding Service Type Settings section below.
- When a Deal is won - This field appears conditionally when the Available in field is set to New Deal Action or New Deal and New Service actions. The default value is Add to existing Service (if available). The other options are Create a new Service or Let the user decide. See more on this setting in the Understanding Service Type Settings section below.
- Complete automatically with Deliverables - Check this box if you want the Service's status to be automatically updated to Complete when all its related Deliverables are completed. This setting is intended for transactional rather than ongoing services. For more on the implications of this setting, see the Understanding Service Type Settings section below.
- Deal Record Type/Service Record Type - These fields appear when the Related To field is set to Service Type. The Record Type fields are used only if your organization is enabling custom stages for Deals and Services. For more information, please see our Creating Custom Stages for Deals and Services article.
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Fee Information - The fields in the Fee Information section are to be filled out only if you are configuring an asset-based service.
- Click Save to finalize the creation of the new Service Type. To create another Service Type, click Save and New to begin the creation process again.
Managing Service Types
In addition to creating new Service Types, you can also edit or deactivate existing ones on the Service Types page in the Settings app.
Editing an Existing Service Type
To make changes to a Service Type record:
- Click the App Launcher and select Settings.
- In the Settings app, click the Navigation menu and select Service Types.
- On the Service Types page, click the hyperlinked name of the Service Type you want to edit. The Service Type record opens in a new tab.
- On the Service Type record page, click the Edit button.
- Make the desired changes in the edit window, then click Save.
- To apply your changes to active Services, click the Sync with Services button.
Please note: If the Deliverable Type's Initial Calculation Basis is set to Based on Service Start Date and you are syncing with existing Services, today's date will be used to calculate the Next Due Date of the initial Deliverable, with the Frequency length added to it.
If you modified the Frequency settings of a Deliverable Type, a picklist appears in the Sync with Services window to allow you choose how to recalculate the Next Due Date for existing Deliverables. If the Last Fulfillment Date is missing, today's date will be used to calculate the Next Due Date.
Deactivating Service Types
If you no longer want a Service Type to be available in your Practifi organization, do the following:
- Click the App Launcher and select Settings.
- In the Settings app, click the Navigation menu and select Service Types.
- On the Service Types page, click the hyperlinked name of the Service Type you want to edit. The Service Type record opens in a new tab.
- On the Service Type record page, click the Edit button.
- In the edit window, uncheck the Active box.
- Click Save to finalize this change.
- On the Service Type record page, click the Sync with Services button. Deactivated Service Types will no longer display as an option within the Service Type picklist but may remain displayed on records with this service type already selected.
Understanding Service Type Settings
Some of the settings on Service Type records can significantly impact how Deals, Services and Deliverables operate in your Practifi organization. It's important to understand the implications of these settings before enabling them.
Available In
The Available in setting determines how end users will be able to initiate services of that type in your Practifi organization. This setting has the following options:
- New Deal action
- New Service action
- New Deal and New Service actions
Choosing the option for New Service action or New Deal and New Service actions enables a New Service button on Client records and changes how users progress through the Promote to Prospect and Promote to Client workflows.
Please note: For existing Service Types, the Available in field is set to New Deal action, as this is the default behavior for Services.
New Service Button
If an active Service Type has its Available in setting configured to New Service action or New Deal and New Service actions, end users will see a New Service button in the Services & Pipeline section of Client records. This allows users to create a Service for the client directly without first having to create a Deal.
Please note: Only Service Types that have been made available in the New Service action will be available for selection in the New Service workflow.
Promote to Prospect Workflow
If an active Service Type in your organization has its Available in setting configured to New Service action and a user chooses that Service Type in the Promote to Prospect workflow, they will see a message informing them that a Deal will not be created. The Service Type will be saved in the Potential Service field on the Entity record and suggested if and when the prospect is promoted to a client.
If an active Service Type in your organization has its Available in setting configured to New Deal or New Service actions and a user chooses that Service Type in the Promote to Prospect workflow, they will be asked whether or not they want to create a Deal.
If they choose No, a Deal will not be created. However, if the prospect is promoted to a client, the Service Type will appear as a suggestion in the Promote to Client workflow.
If your Practifi instance is set up to have all Service Types available in the New Service action, a Deal will not be created by the Promote to Prospect action. Users will select a Service Type in the Promote to Prospect action as usual. A message will inform them that no Deal is being created. The selected Service Type will be saved as the prospect’s Potential Service, which can be referenced when generating pipeline reports.
Promote to Client Workflow
If an active Service Type in your organization has its Available in setting configured to New Service action or New Deal and New Service actions, the Promote to Client workflow will present the option to close the one or more Deals for the prospect or create a new Service.
- If users choose to close existing Deal(s) and create Service(s), they are presented with the option to close a single Deal in the prospect’s pipeline or multiple Deals (if available) and create corresponding Services.
- If users choose not to close existing Deal(s), they are given the option to choose a Service Type and create a standalone Service.
If a user goes through the Promote to Client workflow and there are no existing Deals to close, they will be notified that no Deals will be closed. Instead, a new Service record is created as part of the promotion process. Users are presented with the option to create multiple Services simultaneously during this action. The Service Type value saved in the Potential Service field during the Promote to Prospect action will be the default selection to create a new Service record.
Potential Service Field
The Potential Service field was added to the Entity object with the Pinot Blanc release. This is a lookup field to the Service Type (Category) object. The Potential Service field serves as a reference to the Service a prospect is interested in. Additionally, this field is utilized to prefill the Promote to Client action. It also facilitates retaining the name of the Service Type that the prospect is interested in for pipeline reporting purposes. The Potential Service field is populated with the Service Type selected during the Promote to Prospect action.
The Potential Service field is located in the Overview - Basics - Key Measures section below the Potential Annual Revenue field on a Prospect record page. If the user hasn’t selected a Service Type during the Promote to Prospect action, the Potential Service field remains blank. This allows users to manually input a Service Type value later.
Logic for populating the Potential Service field:
- If there are open Deals on the Entity, regardless of the client stage, the following criteria are applied:
- If all open Deals have Annual Revenue populated, the ST with the highest value is selected.
- If one or more Deals lack Annual Revenue but have AUM populated, the Service Type with the highest AUM is chosen.
- If none of the Deals have AUM, the Service Type with the highest Annual Revenue is selected.
- If none of the Deals have Annual Revenue, the Service Type that was most recently updated is chosen.
When a Deal is Won
The When a Deal is Won setting, which appears conditionally when the Available In setting is set to New Deal action or New Deal and New Service actions, controls what happens when a Deal is marked as Closed Won. This setting has the following options:
- Add to existing Service (if available)
- Create a new Service
- Let the user decide
Please note: These options apply only when the Mark As Closed Won action is used on a single Deal. For mass actions, the default option of Add to existing Service (if available) will be applied.
Add to existing Service (if available)
Choose this option if you want to associate all closed Deals with a single Service record. If an Entity has an existing Service and a Deal with the same Service Type is marked as Closed Won, that Deal will be merged with the existing Service. If the Entity does not have an existing Service of that type, a new Service is created.
Create a new Service
Choose this option if you want a new Service record to be created every time a Deal is closed. A new Duplicate Service will be created regardless of whether the Entity already has an active Service of the same type.
Let the user decide
Choose this option if you want to give the end user a choice of what to do when using the Mark as Closed Won action. The user will be asked if they want to add the Deal to an existing Service or create a new Service.
Complete Automatically with Deliverables
This setting is intended for transactional services like tax preparation rather than ongoing services like investment management. Used in conjunction with the Complete after X fulfillments setting at the Deliverable Type level, which allows Deliverables to be automatically marked as complete when they are fulfilled a set number of times, the Complete Automatically with Deliverables setting allows a Service to have its status automatically updated to Complete when all its related Deliverables are completed.
Whenever a Deliverable’s status is updated to Completed or Canceled and the above setting is enabled, the system checks all other Deliverables related to its Service. If each of them has also been completed or canceled, then the Service’s Stage is set to Completed.
- If this occurs as part of a single-record Complete Deliverable or Cancel Deliverable action, the user who invoked the action is sent a system notification informing them that their action completed the related Service.
- If this occurs as part of a Complete Deliverable or Cancel Deliverable mass action, a system notification informs them of the number of services that were automatically completed because they have no more active Deliverables.
You should not enable this setting if you don't want this type of automation to occur for the Service Type.
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