Activity due dates and reminders

A due date tells participants when an activity needs to be done. Due dates are optional, set one activity at a time, and always interpreted in the participant's own time zone. For any activity with a due date, Dscout can also send automated reminders as the deadline approaches.

Tip: Build all of your activities first and map out the start and end dates for your research. It's much easier to pick sensible per-activity due dates once you can see the whole study laid out.

Set a due date for an activity

Due dates are set while you build the study, on the Questions tab of the Setup page.

Note: A due date is a target, not a cutoff. Participants can still submit entries after it passes—the activity just shows as due in their app. If someone misses a deadline and you don't want to offer an extension, you'll need to close them yourself.

To set a due date for an activity:

On the Setup page, open the Questions tab and select the activity.

Toggle on Set due date. Date and time fields are displayed.

Choose a date and time.

Click Done.

Note: Due dates are set in participant local time. If the due date is Mon, Jan 1 at 11:59 PM, a participant in New York and a participant in San Francisco each have until 11:59 PM in their own time zone before the activity shows as due.

You can only add a due date to an activity before it opens to participants. Once an activity is open, the due date is locked in for everyone who already has it. For information on what you can change after opening an activity, see Override a due date.

Enable due date reminders

For any activity with a due date, Dscout can remind participants as the deadline approaches. Reminders are set per activity and are off by default.

To enable reminders for an activity:

On the Setup page, open the Questions tab and select the activity.

Make sure the activity already has a due date. Reminders require one.

Toggle on Send due date reminders.

Click Done.

When reminders are sent

Reminders go out at 8 PM in the participant's local time, starting two days before the due date. Each one names the activity, the study, and the due date and time, formatted like "Tue, Jul 18, 2PM". Reminders are sent in the study's language.

Note: Reminders are push notifications to the Dscout mobile app, so a participant who has notifications turned off for Dscout won't see them. Reminders also only send from a launched study—a study in test mode doesn't send any.

When reminders stop

A participant who has accepted your study keeps receiving reminders for an activity until any one of these is true:

The participant submits the required number of entries for that activity.
You close the participant.
The participant completes the study.
The due date passes.

View a participant's due date

Because due dates can differ from one participant to the next, they're visible per participant on the Manage page. There are three ways to find them:

Hover the entry count for an activity in the Manage table. The tooltip reads "Due date, time."
Expand the participant's sidebar and open the Due Dates section to see their due date for every activity.
Filter by due dates in the left sidebar to find everyone who shares a due date. This is the quickest way to line up a bulk action—messaging everyone with a deadline tomorrow, or opening the next activity for everyone who just finished.

If you haven't set any due dates, these areas read "No Due Dates" and point you back to Setup.

Override a due date

When an activity opens for a participant, they get their own copy of its due date. That's what makes overrides possible—and it's also what limits them.

Note: Once an activity is open for a participant, their due date for it can't be changed. Because Activity 1 opens for everyone the moment you launch, the Activity 1 due date is fixed at launch.

What you can override depends on how you've set Activity availability:

Automatic studies open each activity on their own as participants finish the previous one, so there's no moment for you to step in. Every due date comes from Setup.
Manual studies let you choose when to open each activity after Activity 1, and that's where you can set a different due date for the participants you're opening it to.

For more information, see Manual vs. automatic diary studies.

To override a due date when opening an activity:

On the Manage page, select the participants you want to open the activity to.

Click Open activities.

Select the activities you want to open using the checkboxes to the left of each.

Under Optional: Override due dates below, set a new date and time for the desired activity. Leave it as-is to use the due date from Setup.

Click Open.

A few things worth knowing before you do this:

Due dates won't change for participants who already have the activity open. Opening an activity for a mixed group only sets due dates for the people it's newly opening for.
A date in the past is rejected. The modal flags it with "This due date is in the past."
You can only open a published activity, and activities have to be published and opened in sequence. If you try to open one that isn't ready, the modal tells you to publish it in Setup first.
If you've selected multiple participants who have different due dates for that activity, the modal says so rather than guessing which one to show you.