Create a watchlist

Watchlists are used to flag visitors during pre-registration or sign-in, allowing you to automatically deny them permission to sign in or notify relevant personnel of their arrival.

Create watchlist

1. From the left sidebar in VisitorOS, select Manage.
2. Select Watchlist.
   
3. In the upper-right corner, select New List.
4. In Name, enter a name for the watchlist.
5. In Priority, enter a number to set the order in which this watchlist is checked. Watchlists with lower numbers are checked first.
6. Under "List Type", select one of the following:
   • To approve matching visitors, select Permit.
   • To deny matching visitors, select Denied.
7. Under "Use Watchlist", select when to run checks.
   • Select At Time of Sign-In to run checks when a visitor signs in on site.
   • If you site has pre-registration, select During Pre-Registration to run checks after pre-registrations are submitted.
8. Under "Assign to Sites", choose which sites to add the watchlist to.
   • Select All Sites to assign the watchlist to every site.
   • To assign the watchlist to specific sites, use the drop-down menu to select one or more sites.
9. Under "Visitor Types", use the drop-down menu to select which visitor types the watchlist applies to.
10. If you have a third-party integration with watchlists, under "Watchlist Source", select the name of the integration. Otherwise, leave "Custom Member List" selected.

11. If "Watchlist Source" is set to "Custom Member List", you can configure the following settings:

    • Under Matching Rules, select the fields used to match visitors. A visitor is flagged only when the selected fields match a watchlist member.
    • If you want users on your platform to specify why they are adding members to the watchlist, turn on and configure Reason for Inclusion. For more information, see set up reason for inclusion.

    

12. Under Change Visitor's status to, select what happens when a visitor matches the watchlist.
    • To automatically approve matching visitors, select Approve.
    • To automatically deny matching visitors, select Denied.
    • To not have their status change, select Do not change.
13. Optionally, to automatically tag visitors who are matched against the watchlist, under "Assign tags", enter the keywords you want to use as tags.
14. If you do not want visitors checked in other watchlists after a match is found, turn on Stop Processing Other Watchlists When Match Found.

15. Turn on Send SMS Notification to Host to notify the host when a visitor matches the watchlist.

    Note:

    To send SMS notifications, the host must have a phone number in "Mobile Number (for SMS Notifications)" in the address book. To learn how to check, see Edit host details.

16. To email users when a visitor matches the watchlist, turn on Send Email Notification. Configure the following settings and select Apply.
    • In Email Address, enter one or more email addresses separated by commas.
    • To notify users by role, turn on Notify Users, then select one or more roles.
    • To email the host, turn on Notify Host.
17. Select Save.

Set up reasons for inclusion

If "Watchlist Source" is set to "Custom Member List", you can create a list of suggested reasons that users can select from when adding a member to your watchlist.

1. In the watchlist you are editing, turn on Reason for Inclusion.
2. To require a reason when adding a person to the watchlist, turn on Mandatory.
3. In New reason, enter a reason.
4. Select Add.
5. Repeat steps 3 and 4 to add more reasons.
6. Once all reasons are added, select Apply.
7. Make any other changes to the watchlist and select Save.

Next steps

• Add members to a watchlist