A User Input View — UIV for short — is a configurable, multi-stage form that captures data into one of your datastores and then routes the resulting record through a sequence of approval stages, with email notifications to the requester at every step. UIVs are how ActiveManage handles almost any workflow that boils down to "someone submits something, one or more people then approve or decline it".
If you've ever needed a form for purchase requests, leave applications, support tickets, change approvals, expense claims, document sign-offs, or onboarding checklists, a UIV is the building block to start with. The platform handles the form rendering, the data validation, the email sending, the timeouts and reminders, and the audit trail — you just configure the stages and templates.
What a UIV gives you
The full feature set is broad. At a minimum every UIV gives you:
- A public-facing form rendered automatically against any datastore, with field validation, optional reCAPTCHA, and configurable security levels.
- A unique reference number for every submission, with an optional prefix you choose (e.g.
PR-1234,LEAVE/2026-001,TICKET-789). - One or more stages after submission, each assignable to a different person or group, with its own visible field set and approve/decline/request-more-information actions.
- Automatic emails to the requester at every stage transition — confirmation, progress updates, completion, decline, cancellation, and more-information requests.
- Per-stage timeouts that automatically escalate or decline stuck requests, plus per-stage email reminders for authorisers (and for requesters when more info is requested back from them).
- A configurable success action when the form is submitted, and a separate Process Complete action for when the entire workflow finishes successfully.
Three real-world examples
To make this concrete, here are three very different UIVs and how they'd be configured:
Example 1: Purchase Request
A two-stage workflow. Requester fills in supplier, items, total cost, and reason. Stage 2 is manager approval (line manager signs off if cost < £1,000). Stage 3 is finance approval (CFO signs off if cost ≥ £1,000). Approved requests trigger a Process Complete Action that creates an order in the orders datastore.
Example 2: Leave Application
Single-stage workflow. Requester picks dates, leave type, and submits. Stage 2 is manager approval. Approved requests trigger a Process Complete Action that adds the dates to the team calendar. The Stage 2 has a 3-day timeout that auto-approves if the manager doesn't respond — a soft-default that fits team cultures comfortable with delegation.
Example 3: Customer Support Ticket
Open-ended workflow. Customer (security level 1, anonymous) submits a ticket. Stage 2 routes to triage. Stage 3 routes to whichever specialist team triage picked. Stage 4 is resolution confirmation by the requester themselves — they get a final "is this resolved?" email and click Yes/No. Tickets that loop back from stage 4 reset to stage 3.
The three security levels
Every UIV has a Security Level slider (1–3) that controls who can submit the form:
- Level 1 — Anyone can complete the form, even if they aren't logged in. Use for public-facing forms like "contact us", "report a problem", or anonymous tipping lines.
- Level 2 — Anyone who is logged in can complete the form. Use for self-service forms inside a customer portal where you want a paper trail tied to the user account but don't need fine-grained permissions.
- Level 3 — Only people who are logged in and have permission to write to the underlying datastore can complete the form. Use for internal-staff forms where access is governed by security groups.
Note: Level 1 forms are the only ones that work for anonymous public submissions. If you need to reduce spam on a Level 1 form, configure reCAPTCHA — the platform supports v2 Checkbox, v2 Invisible, and v3 modes. You'll need a reCAPTCHA account configured in Site Settings.
Where UIVs live in the admin panel
UIVs are managed under Architect Panel → Forms → User Input Views. From there you can create a new view, edit an existing one, configure its stages, manage its email templates, and preview the rendered form. The remaining articles in this section walk through each piece in detail.