> ## Documentation Index
> Fetch the complete documentation index at: https://docs.useunderflow.com/llms.txt
> Use this file to discover all available pages before exploring further.

# How Underflow organizes work

> Understand submissions, lifecycle status, handling mode, and underwriting programs.

## The operating record

Underflow stores each submission in a file. It usually begins with an inbound email and accumulates everything that follows: parties, application answers, correspondence, quotes, policy records, documents, invoices, and activity.

The file does not split when a submission becomes a policy. Binding changes its state and adds policy records to the same history.

## Who sent the business

The producer who submits an account is its counterparty and producer of record, and the agency behind them is the commercial counterparty. Correspondence on the file goes to that producer.

In normal Aurora intake, an insured who writes in without a broker is referred to one and Aurora is instructed not to open a file. This is an operating rule in Aurora's workflow, not a hard database constraint. A producer of record is never displaced without a broker-of-record letter. See [Intake and clearance](https://docs.useunderflow.com/underwriting/intake.md) for how a second producer on the same account is handled.

## The application

The application is the file's record of what is known about the risk, organized by the sections the program asks for. Each answer keeps its source and, where someone answered it, who did. When two sources disagree, the file shows both values and asks for the one that is right rather than silently keeping either. A second file for the same insured starts from what the desk already knows: answers carried over from an expiring policy or a prior application show that source, and the file asks to confirm them before it relies on them. See [Collection](https://docs.useunderflow.com/underwriting/collection.md).

## Status

| Status | Meaning |
| - | - |
| Received | The business has arrived |
| In clearance | Duplicate, counterparty, and completeness checks are open |
| Awaiting info | The file is waiting on missing information |
| Ready for UW | The file has enough information to underwrite |
| In UW | Underwriting is active |
| Quoted | At least one quote option exists |
| Proposed | The quote is with the agency |
| Bound | Coverage is in force; binder generation follows |
| Issued | Issuance is recorded; declarations generation follows |
| Declined | The submission was declined |
| Dead | The opportunity was lost, withdrawn, or abandoned |

The current workbench has no operator action that moves a Bound policy to Issued. See [Bind and policy paper](https://docs.useunderflow.com/underwriting/bind-and-issue.md) for the present boundary.

Status answers where the file is in its lifecycle. Handling mode answers the separate question of who owns the next move.

## Handling mode

Every file is either **Auto** or **Manual**.

* In **Auto**, Aurora can drive the next step under the configured approval rules.
* In **Manual**, a person has taken over. Mail continues to land on the file, but Aurora takes no file turns until it is handed back.

Taking over a thread switches its file to Manual. Handing it back switches the file to Auto and wakes Aurora to review what arrived while it was manual. Handling is per file, so one exception does not slow the rest of the book.

## Programs

A program is the underwriting box for a product. It holds appetite and guidelines, rating rules, capacity, the forms schedule, and the carrier. Quotes are rated against a program, and binders resolve their terms and forms from it.

Programs draw the boundary that [Aurora](https://docs.useunderflow.com/platform/aurora.md) automates within. Work inside the box moves automatically or with approval. Work outside it is referred or declined.


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