Document assignments

An assignment answers the question a document list cannot: whose is this, and who is meant to act on it?

Assigning

Set the assignment while uploading, or afterwards from the document’s row in Documents. You can assign to:

• A client — this is their document. It appears in their portal and they are told about it.
• A colleague — this is their work to do.

The person assigned gets a notification, subject to their own preferences.

Why it matters more than it looks

Three things follow from an assignment that do not follow from simply uploading a file:

1. A client can see the document at all. Until it is assigned to them, it does not exist as far as their account is concerned. This is the one that catches firms out.
2. The document shows up in the assignee’s own list, so they find it without being told where to look.
3. The firm can filter by assignment, which turns the document list into a work list.

An unassigned document is filed but not owed by anyone, and those are the ones that sit untouched until somebody notices in April.

Reassigning

Change the assignment the same way. The new assignee is notified; the document does not move folders and nothing about its history changes.

Assignment, sharing and roles

These three are separate and it is worth keeping them apart:

• Role decides what kind of thing somebody can do at all.
• Assignment decides which particular documents a client can reach, and whose job a document is.

There is no third mechanism. Assigning a document to a client is what makes it visible to them — it is not merely a label. Assigning to a colleague does not change who else can reach it, because your firm’s Attorneys and admins already could. See Access control and permissions.