Job Templates are the easiest way to get up and running in Tidyflow, especially for recurring work like bookkeeping, payroll, or tax filings. They help you standardise how work is set up across clients and reduce the need to repeat the same steps every time.
This article explains:
- What Job Templates are used for
- How to create and deploy them
- How dates are generated from templates
- When to use a template versus a one-off job
What are Job Templates?
Job Templates define the structure and timing logic for recurring work.
They are designed to help you:
- Reuse the same subtasks and client requests
- Assign assignees and dependencies once
- Apply consistent workflows across clients
- Automatically generate jobs with the correct dates
Job Templates are best suited for work that repeats on a regular schedule. They are not intended to store fixed, one-off dates.
Creating and managing Job Templates
You can add Job Templates in a few different ways:
- Import from the template library
- Create a blank template and build your own
- Create a template from an existing job
Within a template, you can:
- Add subtasks and client requests
- Set assignees and dependencies
- Add service types, estimated hours, tags, and descriptions
- Configure repeat settings, including dates and job naming
Once a template has been deployed to a client, it can still be edited per client. Templates don’t need to be final before being used.
Deploying Job Templates
Templates can be deployed in several ways:
- From the Job Templates screen (can be added in Bulk)
- From the Clients page (can be added in Bulk)
- From the Jobs screen using the
+icon - From the Add Job button
How Job Templates handle dates
Dates behave differently in Job Templates compared to individual jobs. This is intentional and helps keep recurring work consistent over time.
Why templates don’t show date fields
When you open a Job Template, you won’t see the same date fields that appear on a normal job, such as start date or due date.
That’s because templates don’t store fixed dates.
Templates generate dates. They don’t store fixed dates.
Instead of saving specific dates, Job Templates use repeat rules to calculate dates when a job is created.
In the repeat settings on a template, you can define:
- The due date rule
- An optional start date offset
- An optional internal due date offset
When a job is created from the template, Tidyflow automatically sets:
- The start date
- The due date
- The internal due date
based on those repeat rules and the current date.
Example: how dates are calculated
If today is the 8th of the month and a template is set to:
- Due on the 10th
- Start 9 days before
- Internal due date 2 days before
Then:
- The job will be created with a due date of the 10th of the current month
- The start date and internal due date will be calculated automatically
If the same template is deployed after the due date has already passed, Tidyflow will create the job for the next applicable period instead.
This means you don’t need to manually update templates as time passes.
Creating templates from existing jobs
You can create a Job Template directly from an existing job. This is useful if you’ve already set up a job the way you like and want to reuse it going forward.
To create a template from a job:
- Open the job you want to turn into a template
- Click the options menu (three dots) in the top-right of the job panel
- Select Create template
This will create a new Job Template using the structure of that job, including:
- Subtasks and client requests
- Assignees and dependencies
- Service types, tags, and descriptions
Once the template is created, you can edit it like any other Job Template and deploy it to other clients.
How dates are handled when creating a template from a job
When a template is created from an existing job, Tidyflow uses the job’s current dates to help configure the repeat settings on the template.
The template itself does not store fixed dates. Instead, those dates are converted into repeat rules, so future jobs created from the template will have dates generated automatically.
This makes it easy to turn one-off or manually created work into a recurring workflow.
If anything here doesn’t match your workflow, or if you’re unsure which approach makes sense for your firm, just let us know and we’re happy to help.