Schedule rules and violations (conflicts)

Overview

The Skedulo contains scheduling rules that help ensure that work is scheduled in a way that is valid and complies with any business requirements or constraints. These rules can protect against scheduling jobs in ways that are physically impossible to achieve, for example, allocating a resource to two different jobs that are scheduled at the same time in different regions. They can also help enforce business rules or compliance requirements, for example, allocating resources with the required qualifications for jobs or alerting schedulers when a resource is being scheduled to work for more hours than legally or contractually allowed.

Rule violations (conflicts) can be created during the initial scheduling process, but since schedules are fluid and reflect the unpredictable nature of business demands in the real world, they can also arise as conditions change. Resource circumstances can also change frequently, which contributes to a schedule that was originally valid to become invalid. Examples of changes that can cause a schedule to become invalid include the following:

  • Resources become unavailable due to illness after the schedule has already been created.

  • An allocated resource is added to the job account’s exclusion list.

  • A job that requires a valid first aid certificate could be assigned to a resource who has failed to renew their qualification in time and therefore no longer has a valid skill tag.

As things rapidly change, our rule violation management capabilities helps to focus schedulers on the impacts of such changes so that they can respond in an equally rapid matter.

How the rules work

The Rules service works by monitoring changes to specific fields in the Skedulo objects that are relevant to the rules. It then checks if the new or changed values violate any of the rules and raises a violation record if any violations are found. There are multiple rules that come standard with Skedulo, and custom rules can be added to highlight organization-specific scheduling scenarios that need to be avoided.

Rule violation records are available in a dedicated console in the web app for as long as the violation exists. They are also highlighted in various scheduling views. When a change is made that resolves the rule violation, the rules service removes it from the console and scheduling views.

The Rules service supports standard and custom rules, so the single service can be queried to return violation records for both types of rules.

Where to find rule violation records

All violation records can be found in the Rule conflicts console in the web app by navigating to Manage > Rule Conflicts in the navigation menu. Speak to your Customer Service Representative to get access to this view.

Violations are also shown throughout the web app to make it easy to identify where changes may be needed, and include work record cards, and swimlane, map, and grid views of schedules.

For more information about rule violation records in the web app, see the corresponding user guide article.

Types of schedule rules

Standard schedule rules

Skedulo has various standard rules that help schedulers create schedules that adhere to common sense and best practices. The table below describes these standard rules.

Rule Violation conditions
Job time constraints A job is scheduled outside of any time constraints that have been defined for it.
Account exclusion A resource on the account’s exclusion list has been allocated a job.
Account inclusion A resource that is not on the account’s inclusion list has been allocated to a job.
Job dependency A job dependency constraint between two jobs has been violated.
Missing tag A resource without the required non-optional tags has been allocated to a job.
Missing optional tag A resource without the required optional tags has been allocated to a job.
Work overlap There is an overlap between records of work (job allocation or activity) for a given resource.
Resource unavailable Work allocated to a resource is fully or partially outside of their availability.
Location inclusion A resource that is not on the location’s inclusion list has been allocated to a job.
Location exclusion. A resource on the location’s exclusion list has been allocated a job.
Job over-allocated. The number of resources allocated to a job exceeds its resource requirements.
Work allocated to inactive resource. Work is allocated to a resource with status of “Inactive“.
Insufficient travel time There is insufficient time for a resource to travel from the location of one work item to the location of the next item. This rule applies to travel violations between work item records only, i.e., not for travel time violations with availability or maximum travel times. For more information on how this rule works, see the Insufficient travel time documentation.

Custom schedule rules

The most common scheduling mistakes are catered for by the standard scheduling rules, however, custom rules can be developed and integrated with Skedulo to account for specific scenarios and requirements. For more information, see Integrating with the Rules service and Implement custom schedule rules.