Send a daily service-request report to your team

A daily report is useful when it answers a question the team acts on. For a service desk, that might be how many enquiries arrived in the previous reporting period. Start with one clear measure, a known recipient and a file somebody will open.

The schedule and the report have separate settings. The schedule decides when work runs. The report decides which records and dates are included. Sending a file every morning does not automatically make its contents “yesterday's requests.”

Prepare and review the report

You need access to the source table and permission to create reports or exports. Managing schedules in Automations requires automation-management access. Delivery also needs a working channel and a destination your team controls.

Open Data, select the service-request table and open Reports. Use New report to define the measure and filters, then Save report when it represents the question correctly. Compare its count with known test records. Remove customer details that the report does not need.

Use Send… on the report to request PDF, Excel or CSV. Open Exports, wait for the file to become ready and download it. Check its title, reporting range and contents before setting up recurring delivery.

Choose the reporting period deliberately

Relative periods move as the report runs; fixed dates remain fixed. The current report presets, including yesterday, use UTC boundaries. The schedule's default timezone is Africa/Dar_es_Salaam. A report sent at 08:00 Tanzania time with yesterday therefore covers the previous UTC calendar day, not the previous midnight-to-midnight Tanzania day.

Label that period honestly. If you require a different business-day cutoff, have the report configuration reviewed before distributing it. Changing the schedule's send time alone does not change the report's date boundaries.

Create the daily schedule

1. Open Automations and select On a rhythm, then New schedule.
2. In Called, enter “Daily service-request count.” Under Does, select Send a report.
3. Set Every to 1, choose days and set at to 08:00. After saving, read the schedule's sentence and next-run time to verify its timezone. The current form does not provide a separate timezone picker.
4. Configure Details with the export and delivery information. For reports, leave the separate To field empty; the recipient belongs inside deliver in Details.
5. Under If a run is missed, choose Run once, then carry on for one catch-up report. Clear Switched on while checking the setup, then select Save.

The current schedule editor accepts structured JSON in Details. This compact example counts the table's records created during the previous UTC day:

{
  "export": {
    "kind": "table_report",
    "table_id": "01953b60-4ce0-7000-8000-000000000003",
    "format": "pdf",
    "title": "Requests received yesterday (UTC)",
    "definition": {
      "metrics": [{"fn": "count"}],
      "date_range": {"relative": "yesterday"},
      "chart": "number"
    }
  },
  "deliver": {"via": "email", "to": "operations@example.com"}
}

Replace the illustrative table UUID with the ID from your table's address and replace the recipient with your team mailbox. This example contains its own report definition. To schedule an existing saved report instead, use its verified saved_report_id in place of definition; obtain the ID through your authorized report tooling. Do not substitute the report's display name.

Test the file and the delivery

Select Run now on the saved schedule. This executes real work and can send to the configured recipient; use a controlled mailbox for the first test. It does not move the normal schedule forward. Open Exports and inspect the new file and delivery result.

A schedule result saying “Export queued” confirms acceptance, not that an attachment reached the recipient. Check the ready file and the receiving mailbox. Once both are correct, switch the schedule on and confirm the next morning's result.

Email delivers an attachment. SMS delivers a link. WhatsApp document delivery needs an existing usable WhatsApp conversation and can be affected by the channel's reply rules. Use via: none when you want files retained in Exports without outbound delivery.

Keep recurring reports useful

If the count is wrong, inspect report filters, the selected table and UTC range before changing the timer. If generation fails, read the export error. If the file is ready but delivery fails, check the recipient and channel. Expired or deleted export links no longer work; create a fresh export when current data is needed.

Avoid repeated Run now clicks while a file is pending. Use Switch off before making a change you do not want sent automatically, then run one controlled test. Review recipients when team responsibilities change. The recurring-work guide explains the surrounding schedule controls.