When a Process is in progress, if needed, you can stop the Process.
It can be used if the Process is in Progress due to a blocking Task or a Delay and needs to be stopped. This can also be used, for example, if you have made a mistake with what the filter includes or if you want to check a Template used in the Process.
Note: If an Active Process is already running, setting its Status to "Draft" does not automatically Stop the Process. You will need to Stop the Process as described below.
This article contains the following sections:
- Where a Process can be Stopped from
- Stopping a Process that is in Progress from the Process Details
- Stopping a Process that is Sending Bulk Emails
Where a Process can be Stopped from
- A Process can be stopped from the Automation - Process - Details tab when editing a Process using the Cancel All Pending Executions button.
This stops all instances of the Process. If it is running for multiple Clients, Documents, Jobs or Tasks all instances are stopped. Refer below to Stopping a Process that is in Progress from the Process Details.
A Process can also be stopped from the following screens. When stopping a Process from these, if it is running for multiple Clients, Documents, Jobs or Tasks these are displayed individually so there may be more than one Process that you need to stop.
- From the Automation - Process - History tab when editing a Process. Refer to Stopping a Process that is in Progress in Process History and Activity.
- From the Automation - History tab. Refer to Stopping a Process that is in Progress in Automation History.
- From the Client workspace for the relevant client in the Process History Checklist. If the Process is running for more than one client you will need to display the workspace for each that you want to stop. Refer to Stopping a Process that is in Progress in Client Process History Checklist.
- If the Status of the blocking Task is set to "Rejected" the Process will stop.
Stopping a Process that is in Progress from the Process Details
From the Automation - Process - Details tab when editing a Process that is currently in Progress, the Cancel All Pending Executions button is shown.
Note: The button only displays when the Process being edited is in Progress.
- From the Automation - Processes, open the relevant Process.
- Click the Cancel All Pending Executions button.
If the Process is running for multiple Clients, Documents, Jobs or Tasks all instances of the Process are stopped. - When stopped from the Process - Details, the Status of the Process is automatically set to "Draft".
When a Process has been stopped, from any of the History tabs, the Status displays as "Stopped". When a process is "Stopped", you can still display the information for any of the steps and use the links to see any documents or Tasks that were created.
Note: It will depend on what the Process does and the timing of when you click Cancel All Pending Executions whether or not some steps of some of the data will have already been processed. Refer also to Stopping a Process that is Sending Bulk Emails.
When a Process has been stopped, selecting it in a History tab gives you the option to Retry or Run again.
Refer to Process History and Activity and Automation History.
- Retry will run the process from where it was stopped.
- Run again will re-run the whole process from the beginning. Where the process was run, for example for a specific client, this will rerun it for that client.
- Activity Link can be used to copy a link to the History entry, for example, to send for support purposes.
Stopping a Process that is Sending Bulk Emails
Specifically in the case of stopping a Process that is sending bulk emails, depending on when the Cancel All Pending Executions button is clicked, this may still send some emails. What may still be sent is determined by the following factors:
- When sending bulk emails with a Process step using "Send Immediate", there is a built-in throttle of sending a maximum of 20 emails simultaneously per minute.
- There is a deliberate initial delay before the execution of large batches of email starts. This delay is: 60 seconds for more than 1000 executions,
20 seconds for more than 100 executions,
10 seconds for more than 10 executions. - If the Cancel All Pending Executions button is clicked before these delays have elapsed, then nothing will execute.
- If Cancel All Pending Executions is clicked on a large email blast that is partly run some emails will be sent.
For example, if 50 out of 1000 emails have already sent, you can expect more than 40 additional emails will be sent as these are already “in flight”, but further executions will be stopped.
Therefore, in this example, 90 out of the 1000 emails would be sent. This estimate in this example of 40 additional emails being sent is likely to be a worst case scenario as if there are other processes running at the time as not all of the 20 emails that are sent simultaneously would be in the process of being sent.