The VPN Application form below allows members of a team to gain access to a company’s Virtual Private Network, enabling them to work off-site and yet still have access to the company network. In many organizations, this process is achieved by fax, phone calls, paper forms and email and can take considerable amounts of time.
This WorkFlow form maps the whole process onto a single form with built-in approvals, escalations and a defined audit trail. This form can dramatically reduce the time taken to complete this process and in this case the applicant was able to gain access to the VPN the day after their application was made.
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| Stage 1 – The Application
This form is accessed by the applicant from the company Intranet. The applicant completes the form, explaining why they are applying for VPN access.
Information such as the applicant's contact details can be piped in from the company’s Active Directory or LDAP ensuring that the information entered is always correct.
Once the form is completed, the applicant clicks on the ‘Submit’ button and the form is automatically routed to their manager for approval.
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Stage 2 - Manager Approval
The manager receives an email stating that a VPN application has been made and a link in the email takes the manager directly to the completed form.
The manager can clearly see by whom, why and when the application was made, and will either approve or reject it. Note here that fields previously hidden from the applicant ie. 'Approved' and 'Rejected' are now shown to the manager.
If rejected, the form is returned to the applicant for additional information. If approved, the form gets automatically routed to the IT department to create a new VPN account.
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Stage 3 - VPN Account Setup by IT
Once the VPN account has been set-up, IT access the form either by the email or from the WorkFlow Tracker and mark the form as ‘Complete’ along with a setup date. These fields were previously hidden from both the applicant and the manager.
Note that another new read-only 'Manager approved' field appears which has previously been hidden. The date in this field was automatically generated when the manager hit the 'Submit' button in Stage 2 and shows IT staff when the application was approved.
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Stage 4 - IT Department Completes Form
At this point, IT staff can add into the comments section of the form information on how the applicant can access their VPN account, along with any other instructions.
On submitting the form, emails are sent to the applicant and manager indicating that the application has been successful, along with account access instructions.
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| Stage 5 - Applicant Checks Status of Application
At any point, the applicant can check the status of their application by logging onto the WorkFlow Tracker and viewing their forms by clicking on the 'Forms' tab.
Here we can see that the form is still at the 'approve' stage and requires the manager to approve the application before the form gets forwarded to the IT department.
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