# Working with External Collaborators (QMS)

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[QualityOne Vaults](/en/lr/78610/) allow you to efficiently manage temporary, short-term access to your Vault for external collaborators by eliminating manual Vault account creation, activation, and inactivation. External collaborators with temporary access may respond to your organization's requests using an external license from a dedicated pool of external licenses. You can request responses from recognized external contacts, collaborate with those individuals in Vault, and finish with minimal or no need to manage user account provisioning for those external collaborators.

When you request collaboration from external contacts on [supported object records](/en/lr/76844/#target-objects), Vault automates the provisioning of _External Collaborator_ accounts for those contacts and invites them to collaborate by sending specialized email notifications. Vault automatically inactivates external user accounts when external contacts respond to all requests assigned to them, freeing up external licenses for other new external contacts with collaboration requests to utilize for activation.

Depending on your [Admin's configuration](/en/lr/76844/), object, field, and section labels may appear differently than the labels mentioned in this article.

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      <p><strong>Note</strong>: This feature enables external users to collaborate on QMS objects only. See <a href="/en/lr/679759/">Working with External Collaborators for Document Review &amp; Approval</a> for more details about External Collaboration for document review and approval.</p>
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## About External Collaborators {#about}

You can identify a collaborator from an external organization by assigning a _Person_ in the _External Collaborator_ field on a supported object record. The _External Collaborator_ field may be constrained to only _Persons_ within the _Organization_ involved in the record (for example, the organization in the _Supplier_ field on a _SCAR_ record).

### Contact Lists {#contact-list}

If configured by your Admin, you can define _Persons_ related to an _Organization_ record, creating a contact list for external collaborators. You can define contact lists by populating the _Organization_ field present on _Person_ records in your Vault.

## About User Account Provisioning Automation {#user-acc-provision}

When you identify one (1) or more _Persons_ as _External Collaborators_ on supported object records (by selecting the _Person_ in the _External Collaborator_ field) Vault automatically activates or inactivates these users (_Persons_) from your Vault at specific lifecycle states configured by your Admin. When collaboration begins, Vault can automatically detect if the _Person_ identified in the request's _External Collaborator_ field has a user account in your Vault and:

* If the _Person_ does not have a user account, Vault creates an _External User_ licensed user.
* If the _Person_ already has a user account, Vault reactivates the existing user in Vault and allows the person to access the assigned supplier-related record according to the _Person_ assigned in the _External Collaborators_ field of the record.

When the collaboration in your Vault is complete, Vault automatically inactivates that user account either through an entry action configured by your Admin or when you remove or replace the _Person_ in the _External Collaborator_ field.

## How to Replace External Collaborators {#replace-ec}

If configured by your Admin, you can run the _Reassign External Collaborator_ action to reassign a task on a record to a different external contact. When you run this action, Vault does the following: 

* Removes the previous external contact from the _External Collaborator_ field, revokes their access to the record, and inactivates their user account if they have no remaining active External Collaborator assignments on other object records or documents in your Vault.
* Activates the newly assigned external collaborator’s account, adds the external user to the _External Collaborator_ field on the record, grants the appropriate level of access to the record, and sends a _Welcome_ or _Welcome Back_ email and any workflow tasks assigned to the external collaborator.
    * When the new external contact is assigned to the record successfully, Vault cancels all tasks associated with the record that were assigned to the previous external contact.

[1]: #about