Change or retire a certification
Editing a certification changes the rules, and the rules are what every date is worked out from. Some fields move dates already on record at the next nightly run; others only shape what happens next. This guide covers which of the two each field does.
Edit the rules
Open Manage certifications, use the row's Actions → Edit, and change what you need.
| Change | Effect on people already tracked |
|---|---|
| Validity period | Reaches the certificates already issued. Every window is the completion date plus this number, so the nightly rebuild works them out again and the expiry dates of the people holding them move with it. To see how many before it happens, run Recalculate and read the preview. |
| Completion timeframe | Reaches the deadlines already on record: they are worked out again at the next nightly run. Set it to 0 and there is no completion deadline at all, so nobody is Overdue. |
| Expiration warning | Changes when a status turns to Expiring, from the next nightly run. It does not change when the warning email goes out. |
| Hard deadline | Reaches the deadlines already on record, at the next nightly run. It caps the completion due date and never the expiration date. |
| Manager emails | Applies to the next notice sent. |
| Notices this certification sends | Applies from the next matching event. Anything already queued is still sent. |
| Day lists (warnings, overdue, expired) | Applies at the next nightly run of the relevant task. |
The rule of thumb: nothing LOOP shows is typed in, so a number you correct is a number every figure derived from it is worked out from again. Only the day lists behave differently: they say when an email goes out and nothing else, so changing one moves no date and no status.
You do not have to wait for the night. Recalculate stored dates does the same work now, with a preview first that counts what would move.
The hard deadline is the next occurrence of that day and month
With a hard deadline of 31/03, somebody enrolled in February is due by 31 March of that year, and somebody enrolled in April is due by 31 March of the next one. The deadline is the first occurrence of that day and month on or after the enrolment, and the due date is whichever comes first between it and the rolling completion timeframe.
The day must exist in every year, so 29/02 is refused. Use 28/02 or 01/03.
Deactivate rather than delete
Clearing Active retires a certification without losing it. The certification leaves automated processing: no new notices are queued for it, and it drops out of the Home dashboard summary and the monthly manager report. Everything stays readable and exportable.
Statuses are not frozen by deactivating. They follow the dates on record, so they go on changing as certificates reach their expiry and people are enrolled and unenrolled — an inactive certification keeps showing what is actually the case. Notices already queued when you deactivate are still sent.
Use this for a programme that is over but whose record you still need, which is usually the right choice for a compliance programme.
A recalculation skips inactive certifications unless you name one explicitly in the scope selector.
Delete, and what deletion takes with it
Actions → Delete is irreversible. It removes:
- the certification's editions;
- its links to the notices, and its record of notices sent;
- the compliance status of everybody tracked against it, and any notice still queued for them.
Two things are not removed:
- the certification history — every certificate ever issued under it stays on the History page;
- the record of the deletion itself, in the site log (Site administration → Reports → Logs).
The wording of the notices is shared by the whole site and is not deleted: only the link between this certification and each notice.
Deletion is slow on a large certification
Each person's status row is removed individually, on the same path the nightly expiry uses, so a person leaves the population the same way however they leave it. That keeps the deletion slow on a large certification, and the certificates stay complete per person. On a certification with thousands of enrolments the page takes a while.