Prevent Overwriting of "Handler" Column

Hello,

We have a smartsheet for our support team to claim requests submitted. As of now, when a form is submitted- every member of the support team receives an alert. From there, one of them must enter the sheet and elect themselves to handle the request (dropdown field with their names).

We've run in to an issue where multiple people are claiming the same request multiple times, and not seeing that it is already claimed.

Those involved must be able to have access to the sheet.

I'm not sure the best way to "claim" the rows so that other sheet members cannot change who has claimed it.

Thank you😀

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Accepted answers

Genevieve P.

Hi @Jess Bowles

I see you marked my response as not answering your question. If you don't want to use a filter or a Report, what about creating an Automation that Locks the row once a value has been input? It would prevent another user from adding their name, but it would also prevent you current user from making any additional changes to the row.

Cheers,

Genevieve

All comments

Genevieve P.

Hi @Jess Bowles

What I would do in this instance is have some sort of Conditional Formatting set up based on if the Assigned To field is blank or not. Once there's a name in the field, change up how the row looks (italicized, or pale grey, or a coloured background...etc).

Then I would set a Filter on the Sheet so that you can quickly see what rows are blank. If you make this a Shared filter, you can provide the direct URL to the Sheet with a Filter applied within the Alert (the URL contains the filter ID). That way if your users access the sheet by clicking that URL, even if it's days later, the first view they see is the Filtered one which will only show unassigned rows.

Another alternative would be to create a Report from this sheet with the Filter applied so it only surfaces un-claimed rows. Then provide the Report URL in the Alert so they assign themselves from there, and any future user accessing the Report won't see those rows anymore.

Cheers,

Genevieve

Genevieve P.

Hi @Jess Bowles

Cheers,

Genevieve

Jess Bowles

Genevieve, thank you for your help. At this point, I don't think there is any way of doing it. Our sheet users have to be able to edit the row after they claim it. The best solution we have right now is just having them claim the row in the comments on the sheet.

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