# Check Ownership Source: https://userguide.qualytics.io/data-quality-checks/checks/deep-dive/ownership/ ## Overview Every quality check in Qualytics has a single **owner**: the user responsible for the check. Ownership is recorded directly on the check, shown as the **Owner** field in the UI and as the `owner` object on every API read. Ownership is the answer to a basic question that comes up in any data quality program: *who is responsible for this rule?* With that answer in place, the platform supports three workflows: - **Filtering by responsibility.** The check list has an **Owned** subtab that scopes the list to the current user, plus a per-user **Owner** filter for inspecting any teammate's checks. - **In-app notifications.** When a teammate edits a check you own, you receive an **Ownership** notification linking back to the check. - **Audit trail.** Every change to the owner is recorded in the check's **Timeline**, alongside property edits and status transitions. ## Why this matters A check without a clear owner is hard to maintain. Whoever opens it later cannot tell whether someone else is already responsible for it, who to ask about its intent, or whether tweaking it would step on another team member's work. Ownership turns that ambiguity into a concrete attribution and gives teammates a way to coordinate before making conflicting edits. Ownership also flags which checks are still managed by the platform. **AI Managed** checks start out owned by the `Qualytics` user. When a user edits one of its assertion properties (`properties`, `coverage`, `filter`, or `fields`), the owner changes to the editor and the platform stops managing the check. An Author can also explicitly transfer ownership without editing any assertion property; in that case the new owner is attributed but the check remains AI Managed until an assertion edit converts it to Authored. ## The Owner Field The **Owner** field on a quality check identifies a single user who is responsible for the check. Every check has exactly one owner at any time. The field appears in the **Summary** section of the check's Overview tab, in the Edit Check form, in the Bulk Edit Checks modal, and in the filter panel of every check list. Changes to it are recorded in the check's **Timeline**. Ownership is independent of the **last editor** of the check: editing a property does not automatically transfer ownership unless one of the specific transfer rules described below applies. ## Defaults at creation time Who owns a check when it is created depends on how the check came into existence: - **AI Managed (inferred) checks** are owned by the `Qualytics` user. The user is rendered with the literal label `Qualytics` in every owner dropdown and filter, and is pinned at the top of the list. - **Authored checks** default to the user who creates them. If the **Owner** dropdown in the Edit Check form is left unchanged, the current user is recorded as the owner on save. Authored checks can also be created with an explicit owner: any user with at least the **Drafter** team permission on the target container's datastore can be selected. The owner is always a single user. Setting "no owner" is not possible for Authored checks; for AI Managed checks, the owner stays `Qualytics` until one of the transfer rules below applies. ## Transferring ownership Ownership can change in four ways. One is a choice the user makes; the other three happen automatically when certain edits are saved. ### Explicit transfer (Edit form or Bulk Update) A user with the **Author** team permission on the datastore can open an existing check, choose a different user from the **Owner** dropdown, and save. On a check that is still in **Draft**, the **Drafter** permission is enough. The new owner must have at least the **Drafter** permission on the same datastore, and users without that permission are not selectable. The same dropdown is available in the Bulk Edit Checks modal, which applies the chosen owner to every selected check in one save. > **Warning: Transfer away from Qualytics is one-way in the UI** > > The `Qualytics` user is never selectable in the **Owner** dropdown, so once an AI Managed check's ownership moves to a regular user it cannot be handed back. While the check is still owned by `Qualytics`, the dropdown shows the warning **"Once transferred, ownership cannot be returned to Qualytics"**, so the one-way step is clear before you take it. ### Implicit transfer (editing an AI Managed check) When an AI Managed check is still owned by `Qualytics` and a user edits any part of what the check actually tests (its rule properties, coverage, filter, or fields), ownership transfers to the editor on save. The same edit converts the check from AI Managed to Authored, so future Profile runs no longer replace it. Editing organizational fields only (description, tags, additional metadata, status, anomaly message field) does **not** transfer ownership and does **not** convert the check. ### Drafter activation transfer When a check is moved from **Draft** to **Active**, the platform verifies that the current owner has at least the **Author** permission required to manage an Active check. If the current owner does not have the **Author** permission, ownership is transferred to the user who activates the check. This prevents an Active check from being owned by a user who cannot edit it. ### Deactivated owner handoff (Bulk Edit Checks) Leaving the owner as it is, which is what an edit that changes anything else does, is not a transfer, so the current owner is never rechecked. Editing a check whose owner has since been deactivated, or who has lost access to the datastore, saves normally and leaves that owner in place. The Bulk Edit Checks modal is the exception. When it saves without setting an owner, any selected check whose owner has been deactivated is handed to the user making the edit, because a deactivated user cannot be picked as an owner. The handoff goes through the same validation as an explicit transfer, so it requires the **Drafter** permission on the datastore like any other transfer. A deactivated **Default Anomaly Assignee** is left alone by either kind of edit. Clearing it still works, and transferring a check to a deactivated user is still refused. ## Permissions Who can see the owner, be picked as an owner, and change it is listed under [Ownership](https://userguide.qualytics.io/data-quality-checks/checks/deep-dive/permissions/#ownership) in Check Permissions. ## Notifications Whenever a check is updated, the platform creates an **Ownership** in-app notification for the user currently listed as owner, **unless** the updater is the owner. The notification has the form: > *{updater name}* updated a check you own > > `#{check id}` • *{rule title}* Clicking the notification opens the affected check. A few specifics: - **Self-edits do not notify.** Editing your own check does not generate a notification. - **Nobody is notified about checks owned by `Qualytics`.** The notification is addressed to the `Qualytics` account rather than to a person, so updates on AI Managed checks are effectively silent until ownership is transferred to a regular user. Updates Qualytics itself makes during a Profile run are self-edits, so they notify no one either. - **Implicit and Drafter transfers do not notify.** When ownership changes as part of the same save that produced the notification trigger, the new owner does not receive a notification for that save. The next update by someone else does. See [Ownership Notifications](https://userguide.qualytics.io/using-the-platform/web-app/top-right-menu/notifications/deep-dive/ownership-notification/) for more details. ## Timeline tracking Every change to the owner is recorded in the check's **Timeline** section, alongside edits to the check's rule properties, coverage, filter, fields, description, tags, status, importance, default anomaly assignee, anomaly message field, and additional metadata. The check's creation appears as the first entry, and a conversion between AI Managed and Authored is recorded as well. When one save changes several of these, the Timeline groups them into a single entry you can expand. The Timeline also carries comments and replies, so the record of what changed and the discussion about it sit together. For an ownership change, the entry shows: - **Who** made the change. - **When** the change happened. - **The previous owner and the new owner.** - **A co-author**, when the save came from somewhere other than a plain manual edit. A small badge sits on the person's avatar for that entry. A save made after applying an AgentQ proposal carries the AgentQ mark, and hovering it names the assistant that contributed. Only the save that carried the applied proposal is marked; a later manual edit on the same check shows no badge. The same spot credits a flow run or an operation when one of those made the change, with a link to that run. Implicit transfers (from `Qualytics` to a regular user) and Drafter activation transfers are surfaced explicitly, so it is clear when ownership moved automatically. ## Owner, Default Anomaly Assignee, and Assignees Three related concepts are easy to mix up. Here is how they differ: | Concept | Lives on | Cardinality | What it does | | --- | --- | --- | --- | | **Owner** | Quality check | One user | The person responsible for the check itself. Used for filtering checks by owner and for ownership notifications. | | **Default Anomaly Assignee** | Quality check | One user | The user that anomalies produced by the check are auto-assigned to at creation time. | | **Assignees** | Anomaly | Many users | The users actually responsible for resolving the anomaly. Editable per anomaly. | The chain reads: a check has one owner and one default assignee; when the check produces an anomaly, that default seeds the anomaly's assignees list, which can then be expanded or narrowed independently. See [Anomaly Assignees](https://userguide.qualytics.io/anomalies/deep-dive/triage/assignees/) for the assignee side of the chain. ## Filtering by owner You can narrow any check list to a specific owner in two ways: - **The Owner filter.** A dropdown in the filter panel that lists every user with at least the **Drafter** permission on the datastore, with the `Qualytics` entry pinned at the top. Selecting one user narrows the list to checks owned by that user. Available on every per-datastore check tab and on the global checks explorer. - **The Owned subtab.** A one-click shortcut to "checks I own", available under both the **Active** and **Draft** parent tabs of every check list. Selecting it sets the owner filter to your user automatically. Both work alongside the other check filters (rule type, status, tags, coverage, etc.), so you can layer them. For example, combine "owned by me" with status `Active` to narrow the list to your live checks. For scenarios that show ownership in use, see [Ownership](https://userguide.qualytics.io/data-quality-checks/checks/deep-dive/examples/#ownership) in Check Examples. ## See Also - **Check Importance** How much a check's failures matter, and how its tags raise or lower it. [Check Importance](https://userguide.qualytics.io/data-quality-checks/checks/deep-dive/importance/) - **Impact Metrics** Numbers measured over a check's failed records that show how big a failure is. [Impact Metrics](https://userguide.qualytics.io/data-quality-checks/checks/deep-dive/impact-metrics/) - **Dry Run** What a Dry Run evaluates and how to read its results, anomalies, and source records. [Dry Run](https://userguide.qualytics.io/data-quality-checks/checks/deep-dive/dry-run/) - **Check Views** The check lists, the check page, and the side panel: how to reach each one, what it shows, and what you can do there. [Check Views](https://userguide.qualytics.io/data-quality-checks/checks/deep-dive/check-details/check-views/) - **Check Anomalies** The anomalies a check has produced, and how to triage them from the check's page. [Check Anomalies](https://userguide.qualytics.io/data-quality-checks/checks/deep-dive/check-details/anomalies/) - **Check Timeline** The change log of a check, its past versions, and the comments your team leaves on it. [Check Timeline](https://userguide.qualytics.io/data-quality-checks/checks/deep-dive/check-details/timeline/) - **Check Examples** Scenarios that show ownership and AI Managed checks in practice. [Check Examples](https://userguide.qualytics.io/data-quality-checks/checks/deep-dive/examples/) - **Check Permissions** Which team permissions can view, create, edit, archive, and delete checks, change owners, and edit AI Managed checks. [Check Permissions](https://userguide.qualytics.io/data-quality-checks/checks/deep-dive/permissions/) - **How a Check Works** What a check is made of, who creates it, how AI Managed checks are generated, how a Scan evaluates it, and how its status changes. [How a Check Works](https://userguide.qualytics.io/data-quality-checks/checks/deep-dive/how-it-works/) - **Authored Checks** What an Authored check is, who governs it, and how it differs from an AI Managed check. [Authored Checks](https://userguide.qualytics.io/data-quality-checks/checks/deep-dive/authored-checks/) - **AI Managed Checks** What an AI Managed check is, which edits convert it to Authored, and how to go back. [AI Managed Checks](https://userguide.qualytics.io/data-quality-checks/checks/deep-dive/ai-managed-checks/) *Last updated: November 10, 2026.*