Working with no signal

Field work happens in basements, plant rooms and rural verges. A phone that had signal at the start of the day works the whole day without it: your work is already on the phone, and everything you do waits there until it can be sent.

Getting ready while you have signal

While the app has signal, it saves the coming days onto the phone by itself:

• your shifts, jobs and routes from today to seven days ahead, with their details, documents and authorisations;
• the files on today's and tomorrow's jobs and shifts, such as drawings and PDFs (up to 250 MB in all; videos only on Wi-Fi);
• the forms you can fill in, and the vehicles, sites and equipment you can pick;
• your recent chat conversations, your time, and your own documents.

Today shows how ready the phone is, under the header: "Ready for no signal · 07:12". Tap it to see what is saved, or Update now to fetch it again. If it says "Ready for no signal, except 1 file", a file was too large, or a video is waiting for Wi-Fi.

It updates when you open the app, when you come back to it, when the connection returns and when you pull Today down. Opening the app with signal before you set off is enough.

Opening the app with no signal

The app opens with no signal, even after you closed it or the phone did, straight into your day. Screens showing saved work say so: "No signal. Showing your saved copy from 07:12. Pull down to refresh when you have signal." Each job, shift and route you open shows the same note with its own time.

The saved copy is what Maliru told the phone last. It can't show anything the office changed since, so pull down to refresh once you're back in coverage.

Some limits:

• Saved work stays readable for 48 hours after the phone last reached Maliru. After that the app asks you to connect once first: "No signal, and this phone hasn't reached Maliru for 2 days." Anything waiting to send still sends.
• Saved work and files are deleted when you sign out.
• A browser keeps no saved copy. This is for the installed app.
• Records that were never downloaded, such as older jobs or other people's work, need a connection.

Doing the work with no signal

Carry on as normal. Each of these is saved on the phone and sent when there is signal, at the time you did it:

• Clocking in and out, breaks and switching job. Today shows you clocked in, with Waiting to send.
• Confirming or rejecting a shift or a route.
• Moving a route's status, and ticking off the jobs on a route.
• Job updates, and comments on updates.
• Reporting an issue, with its photos.
• Leave requests.
• Chat messages (text; photos and GIFs need signal).
• Forms and their photos and signatures. Answers also save as a draft as you go, for 14 days.
• Photos and files from Capture › Photo or file, fuel fills, expenses and bills.
• Binder confirmations and induction steps you can do on the phone.
• A lone worker Alarm. It goes ahead of everything else in the queue.

When something is saved this way you'll see "Saved on this device. It will send when you are back online." The office can't see it until it sends.

The time you did it is the time Maliru records. The office also sees when it arrived. If your phone's clock was more than five minutes out, a clock-in or clock-out goes to a manager to check.

Checking what is waiting

When anything is queued, a banner says how many captures are "saved on this device", with Review and Send now. Today also shows "2 captures waiting to send" under Needs your attention.

Review opens Saved on this device, listing each capture:

• Waiting to send · saved 07:40 — it will go on its own.
• Needs attention · {reason} — Maliru refused it, and says why. It stays on the phone, and later captures still send.
• Another workspace or sign-in · sends from there — captured while you were signed into another company or account. Switch back to send it.

Something done offline can be refused when it arrives, because the office changed things meanwhile. For example, a shift you confirmed was cancelled, or somebody else changed a route after you did (their change stands). It stays under Needs attention with the reason and isn't sent again until you choose Send now from its Options, so nothing you did disappears, or arrives twice, without you knowing.

A refused form can be put right: tap it, or choose Open and fix from its Options. It opens again as a draft with your answers and the photos held on the phone. Fix what the reason says and submit it again. See My report didn't send.

Send now tries straight away. A capture's Options button has Send now for that one item, and Discard — "Discard this capture?" — which deletes its answers and photos from the phone. Only do that for something you no longer need; it never reached Maliru.

When sending happens

Maliru sends what is waiting when the phone gets a connection while the app is open, and when you open or return to the app. On Android it also sends with the app closed, once a connection returns. On iPhone, a closed app sends only when iOS allows it, so open the app once you're back in coverage.

Every capture carries its own reference, so a retry after a dropped connection is never filed twice. A capture whose saved file has gone missing from the phone won't send — "The saved file is missing from this device. Capture it again." — rather than arriving without it.

What still needs a connection

• Signing in for the first time, or after signing out (it needs a code by text).
• Starting a lone worker session, and checking in. A check-in that only reached your phone wouldn't stop the alarm, so the app tells you it needs signal. Your Get help alarm works without it.
• Quizzes, checking in to an induction session, and amending a form you've already submitted.
• Chat photos and GIFs.
• Records that were never downloaded to the phone.
• Me › Pay and Me › Deductions, which are never saved on the phone. Agreeing to or disputing a deduction, and raising a pay query, need signal too.

A queued photo doesn't count towards a job's required evidence until it has uploaded.

Don't uninstall the app or clear its data while anything is queued. Drafts and queued files live on that device, and clearing it removes them.

These protections cover anyone signed in to Maliru. Someone completing a shared pack from a link needs a connection; their progress saves to Maliru rather than to the phone.

If something hasn't arrived, see My report didn't send.