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Properties — Workflow

Overview

Properties have a simple catalog lifecycle: they are created active and can be deactivated when no longer in use. The meaningful workflow in this module lives at the contract and service level — both follow a recurring automatic requisition cycle that generates purchase requisitions in Procurement on a configurable payment schedule.

Note

For SARA's standard record lifecycle (ACTV ↔ INAC), see: Workflows & Pipelines

Roles involved

  • Administrator — Creates and manages properties, contracts, and services. Configures automatic requisition settings.
  • Procurement — Receives the auto-generated requisitions and processes them through the standard purchasing workflow.
  • Finance / Projects — Budget nodes and department items used as cost allocation targets on contracts and services.

Property lifecycle

Properties follow the standard catalog lifecycle.

stateDiagram-v2
    [*] --> ACTV : Created
    ACTV --> INAC : Deactivated
    INAC --> ACTV : Reactivated
  • Only ACTV properties show Edit, Contracts, and Services actions in the row menu.
  • INAC properties can be reactivated at any time. Their contracts and services are preserved but do not generate requisitions while the property is inactive.

Info

For status badge behavior, see: Status

Contract and service lifecycle

Contracts and services each have their own ACTV / INAC status, independent of the property. A property can have multiple contracts or services over time; older ones are deactivated rather than deleted.

Automatic requisition cycle

The most important behavior in this module is the automatic requisition generation for contracts and services. When enabled on a contract or service, SARA automatically creates a purchase requisition each payment cycle without manual intervention.

How it works

Cycle steps

  1. A contract or service is saved with Automatic requisition enabled and a Next payment date set.
  2. On each cron run, SARA checks for contracts and services whose next payment date has passed and whose automatic requisition flag is active.
  3. For each match, SARA creates a new requisition in Procurement (type: Regular, category: Service, status: Pending) charged to the configured project or department.
  4. The next payment date on the contract or service advances by one frequency period (monthly → +1 month, bimonthly → +2 months, annually → +1 year).
  5. The cycle repeats on the next cron run.

Payment date initialization

When saving a new contract or service, if the entered payment date is already in the past:

  • SARA automatically advances it forward by the configured frequency until it lands on a future date.
  • This prevents generating multiple overdue requisitions for a contract registered late.

Exception — Generate now: If the user checks Generate requisition now on save, SARA immediately generates all overdue requisitions (from the original date up to today) before advancing the date. Use this option when a contract existed before it was registered in SARA and the outstanding requisitions need to be created immediately.

Requisition content

Each auto-generated requisition contains:

  • One line item of type Service with quantity 1.
  • Description referencing the contract ID and property name (for contracts) or service name (for services).
  • Cost allocated to the project budget node or department item configured on the contract/service.
  • Created on behalf of the user who originally registered the contract or service.

The generated requisition then follows the standard Procurement workflow (approval, PO creation, etc.). See: Requisitions.

Frequency options

Option Advance per cycle
Monthly +1 month
Bimonthly +2 months
Annually +1 year

Connections

  • Requisitions — Auto-generated requisitions appear in the standard Procurement queue.
  • Purchase Orders — Requisitions from this module follow the same PO workflow as any other.
  • Logistics — Properties of type "Rent" can be selected as accommodations in logistics stay records.
  • Budget Administration — Project budget nodes and department items used for cost allocation must exist before they can be selected on contracts/services.