How to Set up Procedures, Recurring Task Templates, and Schedules

Building Admins and Managers can configure these from Maintenance Setup. Three pieces work together:

• Procedures — the standardized steps (SOPs) engineers follow to complete a task.
• Task Templates — the program that defines a task’s settings, such as its category and status.
• Schedules — link a Procedure and Task Template to a piece of equipment and set how often the task repeats.

Please note: We recommend building your Equipment Library first. Please read our How-To steps on Equipment Libraries.

Click the links below to navigate directly to the section:

• Procedures Overview
  • Creating a New Procedure
• Recurring Task Templates
  • Task Categories
  • Creating a New Task Template 
  • Schedules
  • Equipment

Procedures Overview

Procedures are a set of steps that can be attached to one or multiple task templates. You can manage procedures all in one area, and changes made will automatically apply to all task templates using that procedure. Procedures act as standardized operating procedures (SOPs) — attaching checklists this way ensures compliance, safety standards, and uniform execution across engineering staff.

After setting up your equipment library, setting up Procedures is the recommended next step. 

-> Creating a New Procedure

1. From Maintenance Setup, select Procedure ->New Procedure
2. Enter a Procedure Name (required).
3. Add a Description covering the purpose of the task, any prerequisites before starting, and the tools or materials needed.
4. Build out your Task Steps using Add Step. Choose from three step types:
   • Instruction Step — simple text describing a to-do; does not require action from the user.
   • Check-Box Step — requires the user to check a box confirming they performed that step.
   • Text-Input Step — requires the user to enter text, such as a gauge reading.
5. Set the Interval and Timing:
   • Recurrence Interval — the default cadence, in days, this procedure uses when added to a schedule.
   • Open Date — the default buffer, in days, for how far in advance a task opens prior to its due date.
6. Enter Labor Hours — the estimated time, in hours and minutes, to complete the task.
7. Save the procedure. Once created, it can be attached to one or more task templates, and any future edits automatically apply everywhere it’s used.
8.  Set the Default Assignment — use the dropdown to choose a default assignee for this task schedule. Work Groups — use the dropdown to choose a default Work Group for this task schedule.

Recurring Task Templates

Recurring Task Templates are how Cove automates routine maintenance work instead of you creating and tracking each task by hand. You define the work once, and Cove generates individual tasks automatically on the cadence you set. We recommend first making Task Categories.

Task Categories

Task Categories let you group related Task Templates together — for example, by trade (HVAC, Plumbing, Electrical) or by compliance type. Categories are managed from the Task Categories tab within Recurring Task Setup, where you can create, rename, or delete them.

Once a Task Category is created, you can add it to a Task Template. It appears as a column in the All Task Templates table, so you can filter or sort by category to find the templates you’re looking for more easily.

Creating a New Task Template

1. Navigate to Maintenance Setup > Recurring Task Setup > + New Task Template.
2. Enter a Task Name (required).
3. Select a Task Category if you’ve already created one. This is optional. See above Task Categories. 
4. Set the Template Status: keep it as Draft while you’re still building it out, set it to Active once all details are complete and you’re ready to schedule the task, or set it to Paused to temporarily stop it from generating tasks.
5. Toggle Use Auto Task Skipping if you want Cove to automatically skip the more frequent schedule when multiple schedules share the same due date 
6. Add Attachments if needed — upload diagrams or instructional content (up to 35 MB) for engineers to reference while completing the task. This is optional.
7. Click Save.

Each recurring task has Schedules, Equipment, and Task Projection, as pictured below here:

• Schedules: Schedules determine when each procedure should be performed within the task template. You can add multiple schedules to task templates with an option to assign different procedures or team members on each.
• Equipment: Create an equipment library to manage your equipment and associate pieces of equipment with work orders, tasks, and inspections. Categories help keep your equipment organized and can include custom fields to capture structured details specific to each equipment type. To learn more about equipment libraries, check out our article here. 
• Task Projection: Within each recurring task template, the task projection tab shows a calendar view of upcoming tasks for that recurring task

Schedules

Schedules can be configured such that they skip weekends or exclude months where maintenance does not need to be performed. Recurring schedules can run on calendar intervals (daily, weekly, monthly, quarterly, or annual) or be triggered by operational events, automating routine servicing across the portfolio.

Creating a New Schedule

1. Navigate to Maintenance Setup > Recurring Task Setup, then select + Add Schedule.
2. Enter a Name for the schedule so it’s easy to identify (e.g., “Inspections for HVAC - Roof”).
3. Select the Procedure this schedule will run (required).
4. Set the Recurrence Interval (required) — how often, in days, the task repeats.

5. Set the Next Task Due Date (required) — when the next occurrence of this task is due

   

6. Set the Open Date (required) — how many days before the due date the task should open under Open Tasks. If a default assignee is set, they’ll get a notification when the task opens. Toggle Set a specific open time if you want the task to open at a particular time of day, in local building time, instead of defaulting to the due date’s time. Applies automatically to every future task — The configured specific open time carries through to each task the schedule generates going forward, shown in local building time. See exactly what’s next — A live preview shows exactly when the next task will open and when it’s due, updating instantly as the schedule settings change

   

7. Toggle Has Seasonal Schedule? if certain months should be skipped (e.g., equipment that’s only serviced part of the year), then select the Excluded Months when the schedule should not run.

   

8. Click Save.

Equipment

Add equipment by searching and adding one or multiple pieces of equipment for this task. First select the Equipment Category and then select which piece(s) of equipment is associated with this task.