Comments let your team and your external parties discuss a submittal in the place the submittal lives, instead of in a separate email chain. History records every action taken on the item. This article covers both, including how to keep internal commentary hidden from people outside your company.
Adding a comment
Open a submittal item from the Submittals log and add your comment to the item.
You can also comment directly on a document attached to the submittal, which is useful when your point is about a specific sheet or detail rather than the submittal as a whole.
When choosing a Submittal Item name, go to Comments and at the bottom of the screen is a dialog box to type into before posting the Comment.
The comment is added directly to a document.
Tagging someone in a comment
Tag a person in your comment to notify them. The list of people you can tag comes from the project's Team Members tab, so anyone not on the project team cannot be tagged.
Tagging sends that person a notification, which is the reliable way to get a specific person's attention on an item rather than hoping they notice the comment.
Keeping a comment internal
Some discussion should not be visible to the architect, engineer, or subcontractor on the other side of the submittal. Marking a comment confidential keeps it inside your company.
Start a comment on the item.
Mark the comment as confidential before posting it.
Post the comment.
A confidential comment is not visible to anyone outside your company.
External submitters and reviewers do not see it in the RedTeam Portal. Only your internal team can read it.
A comment that is not marked confidential is visible to the external parties on the item.
If you are unsure whether something should be seen outside your company, mark it confidential.
The option to mark a comment confidential is only available to internal users. External parties commenting from the portal cannot mark their comments confidential.
Seeing which items have new comments
The Submittals log shows an unread comment count on each item, so you can scan for activity without opening items one by one.
When you cannot comment
Commenting is unavailable on a closed submittal. Once an item has been closed, its discussion is part of the completed record and no further comments can be added.
If you need to raise something on a closed item, comment on a related open item or handle it outside the submittal.
Item history
Every submittal item keeps a history of the actions taken on it — what happened, who did it, and when. Nothing in the history is editable, which is what makes it useful as a record.
History is where you look when you need to establish what actually happened on a submittal. For example, if a workflow step was skipped, the history shows that it was skipped, who skipped it, and the reason they gave at the time. See updating an item's workflow.
Who can comment and who can see what
Viewer access is read only. A Viewer can read comments and history but cannot post.
Coordinator and above can post comments.
External submitters and reviewers can take part in the discussion on items they are assigned to, but never see comments marked confidential.