Creating Recurring Work Orders (RWO's) in Facilitron Works

This article will assist primary users with submitting RWO’s for preventative maintenance and other recurring maintenance tasks.

About Recurring Work Orders (RWO)

Recurring Work Orders (RWO’s) and Preventive Maintenance (PM’s) work orders are essentially the same. In Facilitron Works, they are referred to as RWOs to clarify that these types of auto generated work orders are simply recurring, and can be used for any kind of maintenance - not only preventative maintenance. An RWO can also be created for any inspection (e.g., quality of service reminders or a task list to be performed at a certain time of year).

RWO’s may also have tasks added to them, enabling you to create multi-point inspections. We will go through this below as well.

The RWO setup process is broken down into two steps below. The second step is optional, however it may be beneficial to use according to your preferences.

Step 1: Inspection Profile Setup

General Information and Frequency

From the navigation bar at the top, go to Work Orders > Recurring > Add/Edit Inspection Profile. Within this profile, you may designate an RWO’s frequency - weekly, monthly, quarterly, etc. Click Add Profile to create a new RWO.

Within this profile, you may designate an RWO’s frequency - weekly, monthly, quarterly, etc.

Next, fill in the blanks on the form and press Save. A profile name and inspection category are required.

Then, fill in the following fields as needed for the inspection profile. Purpose and Status to Assign are required. These are located in the Elective Settings section.

The fields present in the General Info and Elective Settings sections are further explained below:

General Info

Profile Name: This populates in the Description box when a work order is generated from the profile.
Inspection Category: This classification used to organize inspections by type or operational purpose.
Inspection Standard: If the RWO profile you are creating requires this, you can configure it via Manage > Web Site Configuration > Inspection Standards & Ratings, otherwise you can default to Not Set.
Governing Agency: This is an optional field. Complete only if applicable to this profile.
Governing Code ID: Optional field. Enter only if a governing code or compliance requirement applies.
Materials: Optional field. Include materials only if they are relevant to this profile.

Elective Settings

Purpose: The purpose is the most general categorization of a work order, primarily used to route work orders to the correct department. For RWOs the purpose is usually preventative maintenance. This dropdown includes other pre-configured purposes to choose from to fit a wide array of maintenance needs.
Trade: The trade determines which type of staff will be getting the work done (e.g. grounds, custodial, etc). Assigning a trade allows all workers assigned to the selected trade to access the RWO if needed.
Work Category: Work category is a specific label to categorize the type of work getting done related to the trade and purpose.
Calendar Foreground Color: This is optional. Here, you can set the text color for work orders generated from this profile when displayed on the calendar.
Calendar Background Color: This is optional. Here, you can set the background color for work orders generated from this profile when displayed on the calendar, helping visually identify this type of recurring work on the schedule.
Status to Assign: If a status is selected here, the status will automatically be applied to RWOs created using this inspection profile.

If no workers or contractors were selected, set the Status to Assign to "Approved" for the newly created RWOs to populate in the Receive screen. Options in the Receive screen can also be used to add further dimension to work orders, e.g., assigning to a site’s supervisor. You may also set RWOs to an Approved status so they appear on the Receive screen or in the Dispatcher inbox where the supervisor can assign as needed.

The Status to Assign can be set to Received to have the work orders directly sent to the worker or contractor if a default worker or contractor was selected.

Note: NEVER set "Status to Assign" to "Received" or "Assigned" with no workers or contractors. If this happens, no one will be assigned to the work order, and it will not be completed.

Status to Assign can also be set to "Approved" to have the work orders still populate in the Receive screen with the worker pre-selected.

Priority: The priority helps identify the urgency of the work order, ensuring the work order is addressed as quickly and efficiently as possible. Here you may designate if an RWO is low, medium, or high priority.
Requestor: The person who requested the work order.
Contact Email: The email address for the person who requested the work order
Budget: This dropdown lists available budget lines to assign to the work order. When recurring work orders are created, the budget code will only be assigned to work orders whose location supports the selected budget code.

At the end of the Elective Settings section, you’ll see an option to create one work order per selected asset. This setting controls how RWOs are generated when multiple assets are associated with the profile.

When toggled on, One work order per selected asset will generate a separate work order for each selected asset. For example, if five assets are selected, the system will create five individual work orders (one for each asset) each time the profile runs.

By default, this option is toggled off. When toggled off, the system will generate one work order that includes all selected assets together.

The expected work order count will display once a property is selected, and you will be able to see how many work orders will be created for each recurrence cycle.

Adding Properties/Locations/Assets

Configure scheduling and save the profile before adding properties. After saving the profile, you can come back in and add the property by clicking + Add Property.

After selecting a property, you will see options for adding a worker, contractor, location, and asset. Use the corresponding dropdowns to select any of the information needed to fill in these fields.

Scheduling

First, enter a start date for the first work order to go out. This can be any future date. You can also set a designated prefix in the work order number if desired. This allows work orders created from a specific profile to be easily distinguished from other work orders. For example, using the prefix “PM” would create work orders such as PM-10025 instead of the standard fiscal year format like FY25-26-10025.

Next, choose either a Fixed Schedule or Closure-Based work order generation mode. The Fixed Schedule option is selected by default.

The Fixed Schedule mode schedules work orders to generate on set dates or at defined intervals. For example, work orders can be scheduled for the first of every month, every Monday, or every 60 days from the start date, regardless of when the previous work order was completed. This option is usually best for tasks that must be done on specific dates, such as compliance inspections.

The Closure-Based mode generates the next work order at a set interval after the previous work order is closed. The lead time buffer generates the work order X days, weeks, months, or years after the previous work order is closed, per property, location, and equipment combination. This option is typically ideal for interval-based preventive maintenance that depends on real completion timing (HVAC, filter changes, equipment service, etc.).

Note: If you ever need to review a profile’s generation mode in the future, you can quickly identify which generation mode a profile uses in the Scheduling Type column on the Inspection Profiles page.

After selecting the generation mode, set the frequency. When setting the frequency please note:

The Weekdays only checkbox is available for Monday - Friday schedules and excludes Saturday/Sunday generation.
Duration (Min) is optional and can be used to estimate completion time for the inspection.

If you are using the Closure-Based generation mode, the next step is to set the Lead Time. Lead Time determines how many days before the next scheduled start date the system will generate the next work order. The default value is 0 days, meaning the next work order will be generated on its scheduled start date according to the profile frequency, provided the previous work order has already been closed. For example, a Lead Time of 2 days will generate the next work order two days before its scheduled start date, as long as the previous work order has been closed. Setting a Lead Time can provide maintenance staff with additional time to review, plan, and prepare for upcoming work before the scheduled start date.

Inspection Tasks

To begin creating a multi-point or other inspection, click + Create Task.

Enter a name, description, and code if needed for the inspection task. Click the green check to add the task.

Continue to add tasks as needed.

Attachments

To add an attachment, drag and drop a file into the upload area or select Browse to choose a file from your device. During upload, the system displays a progress indicator for each file. Once the upload is complete, a green checkmark confirms the file was successfully added.

After files are uploaded, they will appear in the Files section below the upload area. The Files list displays the file name and upload date, along with actions that allow users to manage attachments directly from the profile.

Users can:

Preview a file by selecting the Open icon. The file will open in a new browser tab.
Rename a file by selecting the Edit icon.
Delete a file by selecting the Delete icon.

The system enforces the same attachment requirements used for work orders, including supported file types, file size limits, and maximum attachment counts.

Note: For standard Recurring Work Order profiles, any files attached to the profile are automatically copied to every work order generated from that profile, including both Fixed Schedule and Closure-Based recurring work orders. The copied attachments will appear in the generated work order's Attachments section alongside any other work order files.

For inspection profiles, attachments can be added and managed on the profile; however, attachments are currently stored on the profile only and are not copied to generated inspections. A notification banner will appear on the profile to indicate this limitation until a future system enhancement is released.

If you’re finished with creating your inspection profile, scroll down and press Save Profile. This button is located towards the bottom right of the page.

Step 2: Viewing & Scheduling RWOs

Scheduling can be automated (triggered nightly) or manual. By default, Works will create RWOs as they are due based on a set frequency of recurrence schedule as outlined below.
For Closure-Based RWOs, each profile will display a status badge that clearly indicates its current state. Profiles will show either Pending Close (Figure A) when the most recent work order is still open, or Next Generation: [Date] ([Work Order Number] (Figure B) when the most recent work order has been closed and the next work order has been generated.
Figure A:
Figure B:
However, if you would like to manually schedule RWOs in order to create several months of RWOs in advance so that you may make minor adjustments to the individual RWOs, check the Pause (pause automated RWO creation) option in the Scheduling section of the inspection profile. A paused RWO profile conveys that the profile is manually scheduled.

Please note that RWOs are auto-generated nightly for Works.

From the navigation bar at the top, go to Work Orders > Recurring > Schedule/Create Recurring Work Orders.

First, select an inspection profile from the drop-down list to choose an RWO.

Next, fill out the highlighted fields. You may select on optional start time if you would like the RWOs to show on the calendar at a specific time.

At Select Properties, the properties identified in the profile will already be selected. You can remove any properties you do not want to generate work orders for at this time. If you want to add additional properties, that should be done on the Inspection Profile prior to scheduling.

Next, select a starting/ending date range in the Effective Dates section. We recommend to create RWOs for only one year at a time in case the inspection process changes.

Click Create to schedule.

Next, you will see a list of the newly created work orders. These may only be undone at the time of creation. RWO’s may be individually deleted later, however this current screen is your golden opportunity to remove multiple new work orders if you notice any mistakes or decide to refine the profile to include more details. This option is scheduled to be phased out in a future release.

When adjustments need to be made to an existing RWO profile, it is recommended to delete associated future work orders that have been scheduled out (using the View/Edit option, shown in the screenshot above) then modify the profile to include any additional updates. If you choose to delete these work orders, you will have to re-schedule any/all future work orders to include those updates. If such rescheduling is required, be sure to select future dates when scheduling the RWO to avoid duplicating previously created work orders.

For additional assistance, please reach out to Facilitron Support at (800) 272-2962, or email us at support@facilitron.com.