Reporting permissions determine both who can access a report and which data appears in the report. Understanding the difference helps you share reports confidently while ensuring that employees see only the information they're authorized to access.
Two layers of reporting permissions
Reporting uses two independent permission layers:
- Report access determines who can find, run, download, and manage a report.
- Data access determines which records are returned when the report runs.
These permission layers work together but are managed separately.
Report access
Report access controls who can access a report. When you create or edit a report, you choose whether it's:
- Personal
- Shared with specific users
- Shared with one or more security roles.
Sharing a report gives other users access to the report definition. It doesn't grant access to additional business data.
Data access
Data access determines which records appear in a report.
Reports always respect the user's existing security permissions in Applaud. If a user can't access a record elsewhere in the product, that record is automatically excluded from the report results.
Because data access is evaluated each time a report runs, two users can run the same shared report and receive different results.
How report results differ
The records returned by a report depend on each user's access to the underlying business data.
For example:
| User role | Report results |
| Case Administrator | Can view all cases. |
| Case Manager | Can view cases assigned to their team, along with unassigned cases. |
| Employee | Can view only cases they raised or that were raised on their behalf. |
Although each user runs the same report, the results differ because reporting applies each user's security permissions before generating the report.
Best practices
When creating and sharing reports:
- Share reports with security roles whenever possible to simplify administration.
- Remember that sharing a report doesn't grant access to additional business data.
- Verify that users have permission to access the underlying report data before troubleshooting missing records.
- Consider each user's security permissions when comparing report results between users.