Project communication

IDOS provides customizable communication templates for every stage of a project — phase updates, procurement notifications, and invoice messages. Communications are sent transactionally in the firm’s name and their delivery state is visible. The client portal persists the current truth even when an individual email fails.

Templates

The firm creates and edits templates for phase communication, procurement updates, and invoice notifications. Templates use the firm’s branding and are applied per-project or per-event. When a communication is triggered — a phase transition, a purchase order update, an invoice being sent — the corresponding template is populated with the project’s data and delivered.

Transactional delivery

Every outbound communication is sent transactionally with bounded retry. The outbox logs each attempt and shows sent, failed, or retrying. A failed email does not silently disappear — the firm can see it failed and take action. After all retries are exhausted, the communication is marked as failed in the outbox. The client can still access the same information through the portal.

Client portal

Each project has a read-only client portal accessible through a token link — no account or login. The portal shows every communication sent, project updates, visible purchase order and invoice status, and any documents shared. The portal is the authoritative, persistent source of project truth: even when an email delivery fails, the content the email would have carried is already present in the portal.

Visible order updates

Purchase orders that are marked client-visible display their status updates in the portal. The client can see when an item is ordered, shipped, partially delivered, or delayed — without asking the designer. Non-client-visible orders remain internal to the firm.

Project close and check-in

When a project is complete, the firm can close it with a final check-in communication. The close triggers any configured downstream actions — for example, draft creation for the portfolio module on Studio plans. Closed projects are archived in the dashboard and remain accessible for reference.