FYI Training: File and Find Client Records 2026

FYI training starts with one complete client-file exercise: file an email, save a document and assign its review. Your trainee must find both records again under the correct client, with access limited to the people your practice authorises.

Prepare the Staff Member’s FYI Access

Give the trainee their own approved FYI and Microsoft sign-in before they handle a client record. FYI requires Microsoft 365 with email hosted in Microsoft Exchange Online. Its Microsoft prerequisites distinguish web-only Office access from desktop editing.

Have your Microsoft administrator confirm the licence and supported Office arrangement for this exercise. The trainee then follows FYI’s Before you begin guidance to confirm sign-in and access to the FYI Drawer in Outlook and Office.

Prepare these items before starting:

• An isolated fictional client record approved for training, with no real client information.
• A fictional email and a small editable Word document containing invented business details.
• The practice’s approved filing destination and permission to file there.
• A colleague who will act as reviewer, using their own staff account.
• An administrator-approved ordinary staff account without access to the training destination, for the access check.

For this example, call the destination Cabinet Training and use the Categories Year: 2026 and Work Type: Onboarding. These are fictional filing choices. Use your practice’s actual approved options, including a Job when required.

The trainee’s job is to file, retrieve and hand over records. Your FYI administrator owns shared Cabinet access, client security and practice-wide filing defaults. Have the administrator resolve missing access before proceeding. Keep this exercise separate from the wider choice of document management for accountants.

File One Client Email Correctly

File the fictional email from Outlook’s FYI Drawer, then open the saved record in FYI. Follow FYI’s first-email filing instructions in the practice’s approved Outlook arrangement.

1. Select the fictional email in Outlook and open the FYI add-in. Sign in with the Microsoft account attached to that mailbox if prompted.
2. Read the Filing Status at the top of the Drawer. Not Filed and Draft Filed need filing attention. For Filed, inspect the existing details before making changes.
3. Expand Filing and select the fictional Client. Read the full client name back to the trainer before continuing.
4. Select the approved Cabinet and Categories. Recheck these fields after changing the Client or Cabinet because defaults can change.
5. Click Create when the unfiled email has the intended details. Confirm that the status becomes Filed and Outlook displays its Filed in FYI label.
6. Use the Drawer’s Open icon to open the email in FYI. Preview it and compare its client and filing details with the exercise sheet.

Sending an email does not prove it has reached the right client record. FYI’s email overview distinguishes Filed from Draft Filed, which remains in the user’s In Tray. Attachments can also need separate filing attention.

A wrong-client selection stops the exercise before review or sharing. Before clicking Create, correct the Client and recheck the remaining fields. For an already-filed mistake, notify the trainer and follow the practice’s authorised refiling procedure. FYI documents Bulk Update for email refiling, including changing the Client and Cabinet. Do not delete and recreate the record to hide the mistake.

Save a Document Your Colleague Can Find

Upload one fictional document to the same approved training destination, then retrieve its saved version independently.

1. Give the Word file a useful name, such as Training client - onboarding review notes 2026. Put an invented action in its contents: request the missing business activity details.
2. Open the fictional client’s Documents tab in FYI. Drag that one file onto the Documents list to display Import.
3. Inspect the Client field and select the approved Cabinet and Categories. A client’s Documents tab supplies that client, while a client-group tab does not select an individual client automatically.
4. Check the displayed file name and click Create. Locate the imported record in the client’s Documents list.

FYI’s drag-and-drop instructions explain how the destination supplies filing defaults. Keep this first exercise to one file so an incorrect destination cannot affect several records.

Select the record and use Edit in the practice’s configured Office arrangement. Add a second invented action: confirm the entity’s trading activity before the first job. FYI opens Office documents in its configured desktop or online editing arrangement.

Save your changes and close the document. From the FYI Documents list, select it and choose I am finished editing in the Drawer. FYI’s finish-editing guidance explains how this synchronises changes and unlocks the record.

Now leave My Recent and retrieve the document from the client’s Documents tab. Apply the exercise’s Cabinet and Category filters, then select the record and open Preview. Both invented actions must appear. Check that the editing indicator has cleared before assigning review.

A personal download or an open working copy is separate from the record your colleague will review. Hand over the saved FYI record. If its preview lacks your changes, resolve the editing or synchronisation problem before creating another copy.

Hand the Client Record to a Reviewer

Attach the review task to the filed document so the reviewer receives its context.

1. Select the saved document in FYI and open its Drawer.
2. Choose Add Task at the top, or expand Tasks and use Add Task there. FYI requires a filed client-associated record for this action.
3. Enter Review training onboarding notes as the task name. Select the actual colleague acting as reviewer in Assignee.
4. Set the agreed Due Date. Enter the action in the task’s Editor: review both outstanding information requests and record whether the client record is ready for the first job.
5. Check the inherited Client and any practice-required task fields, then click Create.

FYI’s document-task instructions describe the attached record and assignee notification. The Task Drawer guidance explains Assignee, Due Date and the document preview.

For a real accepted onboarding record, identify who owns its filing before handing it over. Tax Genie collects client details through guided forms and checks answers with rules and AI. In this exercise, the assigned staff member takes the accepted record into the practice’s approved filing steps and attaches the FYI review task. Use your accounting onboarding checklist to assign that responsibility.

Have the reviewer open the task through their own account. They must reach the correct document, see both saved actions and identify what must happen before the deadline. The administrator then checks that the ordinary staff account excluded from the training destination cannot open the record. Restrict this check to ordinary staff accounts: administrator access has separate powers. A task notification alone does not prove the filing permissions are correct.

Fix the First Filing Problems

Start each filing problem with the saved record’s status and destination. FYI’s missing-record guidance covers filters, In Tray items and access restrictions.

Symptom	Check first	Next action
Email missing from the client record	Read Filing Status in Outlook and compare the selected Client	Complete filing for Not Filed or Draft Filed items. Escalate an incorrect existing destination through the approved refiling route
Document missing from the list	Check the Client, selected view and Cabinet or Category filters	Clear unintended filters and refresh the list. Inspect the approved destination before importing again
Preview contains old wording	Confirm that editing finished and synchronisation completed	Save and close the working document, then finish editing through the documented route. Escalate a remaining lock
Reviewer cannot open the record	Check their client and Cabinet access with the administrator	Ask the administrator to review the intended access. Keep shared permissions unchanged during training

Before escalation, record the affected FYI record link or reference, expected client and filing destination, filing or editing status and the exact error. State which account encountered the problem and what you already checked. Keep this information in the practice’s approved support channel. Do not move confidential records into a personal folder to bypass an access refusal.

Assign the next exercise from FYI’s Building your foundations materials. Repeat Filing Emails from Outlook after a filing error, or Uploading Documents and Creating Documents after an import or saved-version error. Open Learn from those materials in the practice’s signed-in FYI session.

Finish training by repeating the failed task on fictional records. The trainee passes when the reviewer can retrieve the intended saved record and act on its task, while the administrator confirms that excluded staff access remains blocked.