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Working with Checklists

A checklist is a template you build once and run on as many projects as you like — a fixed set of things to look at, photograph, and answer on site. Instead of your rep remembering what the office needs, the checklist asks for it: photos of every elevation, whether the gutters have guards, how many downspouts, what condition the flashing is in. Because every run works from the same template, every visit asks the same questions in the same order — which is what makes two inspections of the same roof, a year apart, actually comparable. Internal views of a run always show the whole structure; a report shared outside your company is trimmed to what was actually captured. The answers aren’t only a record of the visit. Everything filled in on a checklist run feeds the project’s AI context, so XBuild builds the scope from what your rep actually saw — and stops asking you questions that were already answered on site. Running a checklist covers that half of the story. This article covers the full builder, which lives in Settings on the web app. Checklists appears there once the feature is enabled for your company — if you don’t see it, contact XBuild Support. Your reps can also build a quick checklist from the mobile app without opening Settings; see step 8.

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How A Checklist Is Put Together

Four levels, outside in:
  • Checklist — the template itself. It has a name, a type, and optionally the trades it covers.
  • Sections — the groups the work is divided into: “Roof”, “Elevations”, “Interior”.
  • Steps — one thing to do inside a section: “Photograph the north slope”, “Inspect the gutter line”. A step is the unit your crew checks off.
  • Questions — what a step asks. A step can have no questions (just take photos), one, or several.
One thing to understand before you build: when someone starts a checklist on a project, XBuild takes a copy of the template as it stands at that moment. Edit the template later and runs already underway keep the version they started with — see step 7.

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1. Create A Checklist

  1. Navigate to Settings → Checklists.
  2. Click Create a checklist. A new draft opens in the builder.
  3. Type a name over Untitled checklist.
  4. Pick a Checklist type — Inspection, Pre-build, Production, Completion, or Recurring. The type marks which phase of the job the checklist belongs to. It doesn’t change how the checklist behaves on site, but it labels the run everywhere it appears, and it tells the AI which phase the answers came from.
  5. Click Add trades to tag the checklist with the trades it covers. Optional, and you can pick more than one.
Builder edits aren’t saved as you type. If you navigate away mid-build, XBuild asks whether to Save and leave or Discard changes. On a draft, saving keeps it a draft. On a published checklist, Save and leave does the same thing as Save — your edits go live.

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2. Add Sections And Steps

  1. Click Add Section and give the section a title.
  2. Click New step. The Edit step drawer opens right away.
  3. Fill in the Step title — this is what the crew reads on site, so write it as an instruction: “Photograph all four elevations”, not “Elevations”.
  4. Add Notes / instructions if the step needs explaining. These show under the title on the run and on shared reports, so they’re the right place for “Take photos from left to right” or “Measure at the drip edge.”
  5. Click Save in the drawer.
That Save is the one to watch: nothing about a step lands on the template until you press it, and Cancel on a step you’ve only just created deletes it rather than leaving you an empty one. To reopen a step later, click its row. Sections and steps stay in the order you create them — there’s no dragging or reordering in the builder, so build them in the order you want the crew to work. Tip: Sections do real work on the photos your crew takes. Every photo attached to a step is tagged with both the section title and the step title, so the project album ends up sorted by where the photo was taken without anyone tagging anything by hand.

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3. Require Photos On A Step

Some steps exist purely to get evidence in the file. Turn on Photos required? in the step editor and the crew can’t check that step off until they’ve attached at least one photo. With the toggle on, set Minimum photos to say how many the step ought to have. Be clear on what that does and doesn’t do: check-off needs one photo whatever the minimum says, and a shortfall never holds up the finish. The crew doesn’t see the number on their step card either — it surfaces on your internal report, where a short step reads Photos: 2 of 4 required. Treat the minimum as a standard you audit after the fact, not a gate that enforces itself on site. Leave the toggle off for steps where a photo is welcome but not the point, like a yes/no question about permit posting.

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4. Make A Step Required

Required step is the stronger control, and it’s the one to reach for when a step must not be missed. Turn it on and two things become true on every run:
  • The step can’t be skipped, and neither can the section holding it.
  • The checklist can’t be finished while the step is still open.
Everything else on a checklist is guidance the crew can work around. A required step is not. Use it for the handful of things you’d send someone back to site for — the address photo, the roof overview, the signed authorization — and leave the rest optional so a checklist that hits a locked gate can still be finished honestly.

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5. Add Questions To A Step

Click Add question in the step editor and pick a type. The question’s own wording goes in the input showing Question… — that’s what your crew reads, so write the whole question there. Five types:
  • Yes / No / N/A — the workhorse. “Gutter guards installed?” All three answers do work: No tells XBuild the thing is confirmed absent, N/A that it doesn’t apply here. Either way it stops the AI asking about it.
  • Rating 1–5 — condition scoring, with N/A alongside the numbers. “Shingle condition.”
  • Text — anything that needs words: a condition note, a homeowner’s account of when the leak started.
  • Multiple choice — a fixed list you define. Click Add option for each choice, and check Allow selecting multiple when more than one answer can be true at once. A multiple-choice question with no options can’t be saved.
  • Count — a number, with Min and Max (0 and 10 to begin with). “Downspouts”, “Skylights”, “Roof penetrations.” Counts flow straight into estimate quantities, so use this instead of a text question wherever you’re asking how many.
A step with questions can’t be checked off until they’re all answered, so put only what you need on each step. Zero is a real answer to a Count question — recording “0 skylights” is how you tell XBuild there are none — as long as you leave Min at 0, since an answer below the minimum is refused.

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6. Publish It For The Field

A draft never reaches a project. Click Publish to release it — published checklists are the only ones that appear when someone adds a checklist to a project. Drafts stay visible to anyone who opens Settings → Checklists; they just can’t be run. The builder wants at least one step before it will publish, so Publish stays disabled on a draft that has sections with nothing inside them. Published checklists live under Published in the Checklists list and drafts under Drafts, each row summarizing itself — 4 sections · 13 steps · Roofing, Gutters · Published.

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7. Edit, Archive, And Restore

Open a published checklist and the builder works the same way, with one difference: the release button now reads Save, and saving pushes your edits live for the next run immediately. Runs already in progress are never disturbed. They keep the copy of the checklist they started with, so a rep halfway through an inspection doesn’t watch steps appear or vanish underneath them. Your edits apply to runs started after you save. To take a checklist out of circulation:
  • On a draft, click Delete. Drafts have never been run, so nothing depends on them.
  • On a published checklist, click Archive. It disappears from the pickers and moves to the Archived group, where Unarchive brings it back anytime. Runs already started keep their own copy and carry on working.
Archiving is the safe choice for a checklist you’ve retired — a project that had it assigned but never started shows a warning row rather than losing the reference silently.

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8. Checklists Your Reps Build

The builder in Settings is the full authoring surface, but it isn’t the only way a checklist gets made. From the mobile app, a rep starting an inspection can create a quick checklist on the spot — a name and a flat list of step titles — and it publishes immediately so they can begin. Those land under Published here alongside yours, with no sections, questions, or photo requirements until someone adds them. Worth checking the list periodically: a rep-built checklist is a good signal about what the field actually needs, and it’s usually worth rebuilding properly or folding into a template you already have.

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9. Troubleshooting Common Issues

  • My checklist doesn’t show up when I try to add it to a project. Only published checklists appear in the picker. Open it in Settings → Checklists and check whether it’s still under Drafts — if so, click Publish. Archived checklists are excluded too; unarchive it to bring it back. And a checklist with a run already in progress on that project won’t be offered, because a second run can’t start until the first is finished or removed.
  • The Publish button is greyed out. The builder wants at least one step. A checklist with sections but nothing inside them can’t be published.
  • I edited a step and the change didn’t stick. The Edit step drawer has its own Save, separate from the template’s. Closing the drawer, or clicking Cancel, discards what you typed — and on a step you’d only just added, it removes the step as well.
  • I edited a published checklist but the run on my project still shows the old version. That’s by design. A run holds the copy of the checklist it started with, so in-flight inspections stay stable. Your edits apply to the next run started, or start a fresh run to pick them up.
  • I can’t save — it says someone else edited this checklist. Two people had it open and the other save landed first. Reload the page and reapply your changes; XBuild refuses rather than overwriting work it can’t see.
  • I can’t reorder my sections or steps. There’s no reordering in the builder. They run in the order they were created, so the only fix is to delete and re-add from the point you want changed.
  • I can’t find Checklists in Settings. It appears once the feature is enabled for your company. Contact XBuild Support if you believe it should be there.
  • My crew can’t check a step off. Two gates do that. A step with questions needs all of them answered, and a step with Photos required? on needs at least one photo. The step names what’s missing.
  • A step came back with fewer photos than I asked for. Minimum photos is an audit standard, not a gate — one photo satisfies check-off and a shortfall doesn’t block the finish. Your internal report is where you’ll see it, as Photos: 2 of 4 required on the short step.
  • Someone skipped a step I needed. Turn on Required step in the step editor. Skipping is then refused on the step and on its whole section, and the checklist can’t be finished while the step is open. This applies to runs started after you save — a run already underway keeps its old copy.
  • I deleted a section and lost its steps. Deleting a section takes its steps with it, which the confirmation says before it happens. There’s no undo, so rebuild the section from scratch.
  • Can I delete a checklist that’s been run? No, and that’s deliberate — deleting it would strip the record from every project that ran it. Archive it instead: it leaves the pickers, and finished runs keep their answers and photos.
  • A checklist I don’t recognize is under Published. A rep may have created it from the mobile app, where a quick checklist publishes as soon as it’s made. See step 8.
For further assistance, contact XBuild Support at support@x.build.