Vertec Phone App: operation and use

You can find out how to install the Vertec Phone App in the article Vertec Phone App: installation and configuration.

Click on the Vertec icon to start the application.

You can open the main menu at the top left. It contains the following items:

The Services and absences menu item is shown by default when you start the Vertec Phone App. The current day is highlighted, shown by a bright circle, In this menu item, you can enter services, presence times and absences. You can call up the various tabs in the navigation bar below:

You can manage the date selection in the upper area. By clicking on the calendar icon (1), the view jumps to the current day. Below the date, you can select the desired day of the week (2). The entire upper area can be swiped on both sides, which moves the week (3).

The services view is divided into two sections.
    
On the left, the presence time (grayed out) and on the right, the tracked services (different color per service) are shown in the form of bars. Below this is the total of the tracked times for the current day (1). The dark gray line in the diagram shows the standard hours for the respective day (2). A random info icon indicates an absence for that day. By clicking on the info icon, you can navigate directly to the absence.

On the right, the tracked services are listed, including phase, activity code and text. In addition, the timer can be started, paused or completed via a button. First, you need to activate this setting under System settings > Project/Case tab > Show timer for services entry.

With the + button, you can enter a new service:

The new service is listed at the top of the list.

Like with the services view, the presence time view contains a bar chart, as well as a list of the tracked presence times. In contrast to the services, the left bar (presence time) is dark gray and the right column (services) is faded:

The fields From, To and a delete button are available.    
–    Punch in creates a new presence time entry and inserts the current time into the From field.    
–    Punch out enters the current time in the To field and closes the entry with the resulting duration.
Note: The presence time tab is only shown if activated under System settings > Project/Case > Show presence time list for services entry. Optionally, you can show or hide a Punch in/Punch out button under System settings > Project/Case tab > Show Punch in/Punch out for time tracker.

Absences are listed per day and include the reason, duration and description of the absence. Inactive or non-released absences are marked accordingly.    
By clicking on an individual absence, it is opened in the detail view. New absences are entered with the + button. In the detail view, the following fields can be filled in:

You can enter expenses in the separate menu item Expenses. The structure of the date view or week day view is the same as for services. The tracked expenses are listed grouped by date and show project, amount, type and text.
By clicking on the individual entries, they can be opened in the detail view and the + button opens a new expense entry. In addition to project, phase, type, text, date, quantity/amount (incl. selection of currency), you can activate or deactivate the options Gross and Reimburse and select a VAT type. With the touch of a button, you can upload a receipt. For this, you can take a photo directly or load an existing photo from the gallery. Using icons, you can open the receipt or delete it.

Automatic recognition of expense receipts

With the licensed Purchases module, you can read and automatically enter information from expense receipts.

First, you must activate the setting under System settings > Project/Case section >  Use receipt recognition (additional contract terms). As soon as a receipt has been selected or photographed, the automatic receipt recognition function is triggered, which is why loading takes a little longer than usual. You can also send the receipt to the Vertec Phone App via the "Send to" function. This creates a new expense, saves the document to it, and triggers automatic receipt recognition.

When the automatic receipt recognition is completed, the receipt is shown and the values are entered. If different VAT rates are calculated, an additional expense is created for each VAT rate. The receipt is shown only on the original expense. Subsequent receipts can be found in the list of the corresponding day (see sorting in the expense list below).

If not all data could be reliably detected, a relevant message appears. In this case, you must check the expense entry and enter the missing values manually or else restart receipt recognition in a full-featured app.

After loading in the Phone App, the expense entry with the receipt also appears directly in the full-featured apps since a push from the Phone App to the full-featured apps takes place.

Sorting in the expense list

The expenses are dated by receipt recognition to the day that is noted on the posting. This would remove expense documents loaded today from the expense list directly because they are sorted on the day they are dated. Therefore, the expense list has been modified to show not only expenses with the selected date, but also expenses loaded on that day.

PDFs can also be saved directly with the “Send to” function in Vertec. The Phone App creates an expense entry and opens directly in the expense view with the attached PDF.

In the Addresses menu item, you can search for address entries. You can view and edit the relevant activities, opportunities (if activated), projects and contacts in the relevant tabs (2).

In the search (1), you can look for Account, Contact or All. Under the search, the managed addresses are listed by default. You can adjust this via the system setting (see below). 

The search result replaces the list of managed addresses. Clicking on the entry found opens it in the detail view. Below the display of account or contact person, you can open the possible contact types or communication channels (3) via the arrow. You can select these directly from this view and thus trigger or copy them (4). You can see additional address information (manager and remarks) below the communication channels.

Activities and opportunities can be edited; projects and contacts can only be shown.

    
System setting for address search

When searching for addresses, the user’s managed addresses are shown by default. You can adjust this under System settings > CRM / Activities > Show managed addresses in Phone App. If the checkbox is deactivated, the list remains empty before searching.

    
Opportunities

This list shows all open and thus active opportunities. Unlike the full-featured apps, the order is as follows:
    
1.    Probability descending    
2.    Planned completion, earliest date on top
3.    Creation date, most recent on top

You can click on an opportunity to open it in the individual view. Via the link (see arrow), you can navigate directly to the project.

The + button opens a new opportunity, where you can define the following fields: Status, Probability, Planned clos-ing, Description, Amount, Currency, Contact, Seller and Project.    

Projects & contacts

These tabs only appear if you have searched for an account. All the projects of the relevant customer are shown as well as all the contacts in alphabetical order for which the logged-in user has read permission.

In the Projects menu item, the user’s own projects are shown, if available. Like for addresses, in addition to the project search via magnifying glass, you can click on an individual project to open it, and then click on a drop-down header, which shows the project details.

In the lower navigation bar, you can see three tabs that show the activities, opportunities and addresses assigned to a project.

    
Activities tab

Shows all objects assigned to the project.

  
Opportunities tab

Shows all opportunities assigned to the project.

Addresses tab

Lists the addresses assigned to the project. Clicking on an address opens it as a single view. In addition to the available communication channels, the address details are shown.

Activities

In the Activities menu item, you can manage open tasks and activities.

The Tasks tab shows all activities that have not yet been completed and for which the logged-in user is responsible. The list is sorted by appointment date and shows the title, type, project and contact for each task.   

In the Activities tab in the list, activities with attached documents receive a suitable icon. 

Clicking on each task opens its detail view and, if available, a preview of the document is shown (only for internal document storage). The document can be opened or deleted.

The icons indicate attached documents:

	By clicking on the preview icon, the document is shown directly.
	The attachment icon indicates an activity of the type email with attachment (see below).
	Only on Android devices. The “External link” icon is shown if a document is stored but cannot be previewed. Clicking on the icon opens the document with an alternative application. Note: If the document is opened and edited in another application, the changes are not saved in Vertec.

For activities without a document, you can upload any file from the file browser via the Add document button. With the + button, you can track new tasks and activities.

Email activity type

The content of emails is displayed on the relevant activities, including links and images. If an attachment is attached, the attachment icon is shown, both in the list and in the detail view.    
Click on the arrow below the icon to open the attachments. Click on the file to show it or save it as an activity itself.

Sending files to the Phone App

By defining the setting under System settings > General tab > Document storage > Internal, you can send files to the Vertec Phone App. Via the Send to function, the Phone App opens with the following options:
–    Save as expense   
–    Save as activity

Depending on the selection, an expense or activity is created with the name of the file as the title and the document as the attachment. The Send to function also works with PDF files.

Note: With iOS, this function is only available for files from the "Files" app.

New LinkedIn communication channel

With the new LinkedIn (L) communication channel, you can save the LinkedIn profiles of people and companies via the LinkedIn profile name or LinkedIn URL.

Clicking on the saved entry opens the profile directly in LinkedIn, if the user is logged in there. Otherwise, LinkedIn opens with the request that the user should log in there first.

In the Vertec Phone App, you can open saved LinkedIn entries, but you cannot enter new ones.

Settings

In the Settings menu item, you can enter the service address manually or by scanning the Phone App QR code in the Vertec App Portal.