Defining Event Actions

Event actions are configurable actions that take place automatically when a user creates a document from a file upload, creates a new draft of an existing document, creates a copy of an existing document, or creates a new object record. For example, an event action could set the Review Due Date to 15 days in the future when users create a new document.

Event actions are defined much like entry actions. They:

Exist within a specific lifecycle; they are not specific to a single lifecycle state, but to the lifecycle generally
May be conditional based on the document or object record’s field values
Execute using “System User,” meaning that the user who initiates the triggering action does not need specific permissions for the event action

Accessing Event Action Administration

You can configure both document and object record event actions from within the related lifecycle:

For documents, navigate to Admin > Configuration > Document Lifecycles > [Lifecycle] > Event Actions.
For object records, navigate to Admin > Configuration > Object Lifecycles > [Lifecycle] > Event Actions.

Document Action Types

Event actions for documents support:

Update document field: These actions automatically update one or more fields on the document based on the configured value or formula. The action can update Text, Number, Picklist, Yes/No, Date, and DateTime field types. See Creating Formulas in Vault for details on building formulas.
Set Rendition Profile: This action selects a specific Rendition Profile based on your configured criteria.
Draft eConsent: This action is only available in Clinical Operations Vaults. See Configuring Veeva eConsent Authoring (Clinical Operations) for details.

Order of Operations for Documents

Vault triggers event actions at the end of the document creation process. Because this occurs after field defaulting rules have been applied, the event actions may be conditional based on fields set by the user or based on fields set with defaulting rules.

How to Create Event Actions for Documents

To add a new event action rule:

From the Event Actions tab, click into a specific event.
On the event configuration page, click Edit.
Click Create Event Action.
Optional: Add conditions to the event action rule by selecting All conditions are met or Formula evaluates to True.
Under perform actions, select the type of action and any other needed values. The other values will depend on the action configuration.
Optional: Create more actions within the same rule by clicking Add action. If the rule is conditional, these actions share the same conditions.
Click Save. The configured event actions become active immediately.

Note: Vault does not execute Event Actions for documents uploaded via API or Vault Loader in Document Migration Mode.

Object Record Action Types

Event Actions for object records support:

Update Record Field: These actions automatically update one or more fields on the object record based on the configured value or formula. The action can update Text, Number, Picklist, Yes/No, Date, and DateTime field types. See Creating Formulas in Vault for details on building formulas.
Start Workflow: These actions automatically start the specified workflow for the object record. Only workflows configured for auto-start are available.

Order of Operations for Object Records

Vault triggers event actions during the object record creation process as follows:

Update Record Field actions occur before field defaulting. If the event action sets a field value, Vault ignores any configured defaults for that field in order to not overwrite the value. Learn more about order of operations for object field defaults.
Start Workflow actions occur after triggers, field defaulting, and Update Record Field actions.

Note: If these event actions fail for any reason, object record creation will not complete.

How to Create Event Actions for Object Records

To add a new event action rule:

From the Event Actions section, click into the Create Record event. In 19R1, event actions will only support this event for object records.
On the event configuration page, click Edit.
Click Create Event Action.
Optional: Add conditions to the event action rule by selecting All conditions are met or Formula evaluates to True. If you select Formula evaluates to True, use a formula that returns a boolean (true/false) expression to define the condition.
Under perform actions, select the type of action and any other needed values. The other values will depend on the action configuration.
Optional: Create more actions within the same rule by clicking Add action. If the rule is conditional, these actions share the same conditions.
Click Save. The configured event actions become active immediately.

How to Define Conditions

Certain event actions are only needed when the document or object record meets a set of conditions. For example, you can configure an action that updates the document field Approval Due Date only if the Approval Required field was set to Yes. To do this, you’d define a condition based on the Approval Required field.

To define conditions, select All Conditions are met, and then a document field or object field, operator, and value. Some system fields are not available. You can also select Formula evaluates to True to use a formula expression that returns a boolean (true/false) expression to define the condition. The event action executes only if the formula returns a true expression. If needed, you can define multiple conditions by clicking Add condition.

A document or object record must meet all of the conditions defined within a rule for Vault to perform the event actions. If a condition uses a field that does not apply to the document or object record, Vault evaluates that condition as “false.” When the condition evaluates as false, the event (document creation, object record creation, etc.) continues, but the action does not take place.

Note: You cannot use document IDs in formula-based conditions for Create Document event actions.

About Referencing Missing Records in Criteria & Actions

When you clone a lifecycle configuration during Vault provisioning, references to specific object records in entry criteria or conditions may become invalid if those records do not exist in the new environment. If this occurs, references to missing object records are shown as empty in lifecycle configuration fields.

While Vault allows you to save configurations even with these missing records, we recommend resolving these missing references by recreating the records with the same ID values using Vault Loader or via the API if you want to use these conditions in the new environment. If you only want to update another configuration and take it back to the source environment, you can leave the missing references as is.

How to Edit or Delete Event Actions

To make changes to event action rules, click Edit. If you need to delete an entire rule, a condition within a rule, or an action within a rule, click the X icon. When your changes are complete, click Save.

Limits

For each lifecycle and event (for example, Create Document), you can define up to 25 event action rules. Within a rule, you can specify up to ten (10) event actions. If a rule is conditional, it can have up to five (5) conditions.

In addition, you cannot use document IDs in formula-based conditions for Create Document event actions.

To define document event actions, you must have a security profile with the Admin: Document Lifecycles permissions.

To define object record event actions, you must have a security profile with the Admin: Object Lifecycles permissions.