Creating an Audit

Simplifya's Audits module gives you the ability to create and assign audits comprised of simple yes-or-no questions pertaining to all of your state's cannabis regulations that apply to the license types your business holds.

Before getting started, you may want to read this article to get a better understanding of the self-audit process.

To start creating audits, navigate to the Audits module. In the Audits module, click the "Create Self-Audit" button, which will open a modal asking if you'd like to create a brand new self-audit, or create an audit using a template you've already created.
Note: if you have not created a template yet, the "Create New Audit From Template" button will be grayed out and unclickable.

If you click the "Create New Audit" button, you'll be creating an audit that includes all questions that pertain to the selected license types you hold at the location you're auditing. As you conduct your audit, you can "mute" (hide) questions that don't apply to your business, add risk levels to questions, and re-order the questions on your audit. When you complete your audit, you can then save it as a template to use later (the "Create New Audit From Template" button).

Learn more about Audit Templates here: Creating and Editing Audit Templates

After clicking the "Create New Audit" button, you'll be taken to the "Create New Audit" form (pictured below) where you'll be asked some simple questions about the audit you want to create:

Fields on the "Create New Audit" form

The audit created will be determined by how you fill out the fields on the "Create New Audit" form: 

Audit Details

• Which location do you want to audit?
  Select the location you want to audit.
  
• What licenses will this audit cover?
  This dropdown is a list of the license types held at the location you selected. Select the license type(s) you want to audit. Your audit can cover multiple license types.
  
• Would you like to do a full or category audit?
  Select a Full or Category audit. 
  Learn the difference between a "Full" audit and a "Category" audit here.
• "New" questions only checkbox
  Check this box to create an audit comprised only of questions that have been added within the past 30 days. This is a great way to check yourself against recent changes in the regs. 
• What regulations will this audit cover?
  Select the jurisdiction(s) for which regulations you want to audit for, "Federal", "State", and/or "Local." Your audit can cover multiple sets of regulations.
  Note: "Federal" regulations only pertain to COVID-19 regulations.

Assignment Details

• Who is going to conduct this audit?
  This dropdown is a list of the users at the location you selected. Select the user(s) you'd like to conduct this audit.
  
• When should this audit be finalized by?
  Select the date that the audit audit should be finalized by. The assignee(s) can conduct the audit at any time.
  Note: This date is only for helping with scheduling and does not prevent assignees from conducting the audit.
• Leave comments for the auditor
  This is an optional field. Enter any notes, directions, or messages you'd like the auditor(s) to see prior to conducting the audit.
  

After filling out these fields, you're able to click the "Create Audit" button and create your audit. You can also click the "View Optional Configurations" button to adjust your optional configurations.

Optional Configurations

• Email Notifications and Scheduling:
  • Who should receive email notifications for this audit?
    This configuration allows you to send email notifications when the audit has been assigned, completed, and finalized to the Audit Assignee(s) and/or the Manager(s) of the audited location. You can also customize these notifications to include people not on your company's Simplifya account such as investors or other stakeholders.

  • Would you like to schedule this audit on a recurring basis?
    This configuration allows you to set up weekly, monthly, or quarterly recurring audits using the same configurations you've entered on this audit.
• Additional Configurations:
  • Allow assignees(s) to mute questions while conducting audit
    Some questions in the audit may not apply to your business. This will allow the auditor(s) to not answer those questions.
    
  • Allow assignee(s) to see compliance status while audit is “In Review”
    The compliance status of each question is revealed after the audit has been finalized. This will allow the auditor(s) to see the compliance status of each answer before finalizing the audit.
    Answers cannot be changed after the audit has been finalized. If you're conducting the audit yourself, you may want to identify and fix non-compliant issues before finalizing the audit. If you are assigning the audit to another person, you may not want to reveal the compliance status until the audit is finalized so as not to compromise the integrity of the audit answers.
  • Make this a Training Audit
    Training Audits are ideal for training new employees. There is no Review stage for Training Audits and non-compliant answers do not generate Action Items.
  • Require Action Items to be generated
    The default setting is to allow the assigned Auditor(s) to decide whether or not they want to generate Action Items (remediation tasks for the areas of non-compliance) when they're finalizing the audit. Enabling this setting will require Action Items to be generated when the audit is finalized.
    
  • "Lock" Audit after Due Date has passed
    If the audit hasn't been finalized by the due date, the assignee(s) will no longer have the ability to work on it.
    

After Creating the Audit ("Create Audit" button has been clicked):

• the audit can now be found on the table of audits in the Audits module on. There will be a "Start" button where the assigned auditor(s) can start the audit. When the "Start" button is clicked, the system will generate the audit with the applicable questions at that time.
• the assigned auditor(s) will be notified that they've been assigned an audit.
• the audit can be edited to change the assigned auditor(s), the "Finalize By" date, and some optional configurations.

Permissions

Only Managers and Administrators on the account can assign an audit. The following permissions apply:

• Administrators: Can create and assign audits for any location on the account.
• Managers: Can create and assign audits for any location on the account they belong to.

Next: Conducting an audit