Starting a certificate

Three routes lead to a new certificate, and all three end in the same wizard.

Where to start from

The New menu

New, at the top right of every page. Its Certificates column lists every purpose by family, and Browse all purposes opens the full catalogue.

The dashboard

Visa net worth certificate, under Quick start, opens the wizard straight away.

A client's page

Clients→pick one→Certificates→New certificate. The client is already chosen for you, as it is with New on any of the client's pages.

Choosing the purpose

If you arrive without having picked one, OptiVida shows Choose a certificate purpose: a rail of families, with a search box and a filter by source above it, and inside each family the purposes it can serve. You choose what the certificate is for rather than which wizard to open. Arriving from a client, the page says who it is for at the top right, with a cross to clear it.

Net Worth & Financial Position comes first and holds five purposes — a visa, bank finance, a bank guarantee, a student or education loan, and general purpose. The visa certificate follows the ICAI Handbook's Annexure III(ii); the other four keep its structure, addressed to the bank or a named addressee. The tender certificate sits under Turnover & Income, because it is about an entity's financial statements over several years rather than a person's assets on a date.

Every purpose says where its wording comes from: ICAI format when it is reproduced from the ICAI Handbook, Based on ICAI GST Guide for the GST certificates, and Built on ICAI Guidance Note when the Handbook names the purpose but drafts no certificate for it. A card carries it as a badge. The GST purposes are a list rather than cards, and carry it in the Handbook note beside each. The purpose you picked is repeated at the top of the wizard, with that note, so you can tell at a glance what you are about to issue.

Every purpose can be started. See What you can issue for where each comes from.

Choosing the client

The first step of the wizard has Select Existing Clients. Choosing one fills in the name, address and identifying particulars, so the certificate carries the same details as everything else you have issued for them.

You can also type an individual in by hand — useful for a one-off you do not expect to work for again. Nothing forces you to create a client record first.

The steps

Six, listed down the left:

1. Basic Details
2. Financial Assets
3. Market Assets
4. Physical & Other
5. Liabilities
6. Review & Issue

Each step has a line under its name saying how far it has got: Complete, Not started, 2 of 6 required, a count of the items entered, or what needs fixing. In a narrow window the list folds into a bar above the form, Step 2 of 6, whose menu lists every step.

You can jump between them freely, from the list or with Back and Next in the bar along the foot of the page. Next does not check the step you are leaving; anything required and missing is named when you submit. If the client has no shares, skip Market Assets entirely — an empty section prints nothing.

Below the list, Net worth so far adds up what you have entered as you go.

Leaving and coming back

Two things keep your work, and they do different jobs.

Unsaved changes, in this browser

Whatever you type is kept in this browser as you go, with the step you were on. Leave the wizard — Certificates above the title, another page, a reload — and open the same certificate again, and it is there. A certificate you had not saved yet comes back when you start that type again.

Save draft, on your account

At the foot of every step, and beside the title. Saves the certificate to your account, and says when. Only a saved draft appears under Drafts to resume on your dashboard, and only a saved draft can be picked up on another computer.

When your changes come back, the wizard says so, with a Start over button that discards them and returns the form to how it opened.

Drafts cost nothing, so there is no reason to rush one to completion. Submitting the certificate clears the kept changes. If the certificate cannot be issued when you submit, what you entered is saved as a draft instead, nothing is charged, and the wizard carries on with that draft.