Getting Started as a Receiver on GroundControl

As a receiver, you're able to directly review your suppliers' inspection reports. What this means is that, when a supplier completes a report and submits it for your review, you will be granted read-only access to the report to verify that it's up to par.

You can also provide comments and add attachments to help support your feedback.

As the number of reports on our platform grows, you'll also be able to use our SPC dashboards for a deeper analysis of your parts.

When you receive your welcome email, you will also receive a set of instructions to set your password. Follow the instructions and you'll be able to access GroundControl right away.

If you ever need additional user accounts to access GroundControl, feel free to email

[email protected]. For a supplier, please provide the company name, user's full name and email, and specify the receiver/customer name they should submit under.

Once you've been notified that you have a report to review, navigate to the "Parts" tab on the left panel in order to see the current submitted reports from your suppliers.

You can filter this list by: Supplier, Inspection Type, Part Number, PO Number, Status, and more.

Simply click on any row to view the report.

Once you've been notified that you have a report to review, navigate to the "Parts" tab on the left panel in order to see the current submitted reports from your supplier.

Click on a row to open it. The Forms are all read-only. You can use the left navigation tabs to view each form, attachments, and characteristic. Take some time to review the report and identify any changes that need to be made.

Open the Review tab to take action. Here you can mark a report as Accepted or Rejected. Regardless of the option you pick, you can still opt to leave comments and upload attachments to help guide your suppliers in the right direction.

Once you have submitted your decision, the supplier will be notified of their Approval/Rejection. If approved, the report will "lock", stopping either party from making further edits. If rejected, the report once again can be edited by the supplier, to eventually restart the review cycle.

As more and more parts are added to our platform, you'll have the ability to access some valuable analytics.

To identify trends, compare revisions, or perform sample-level checks, navigate to the SPC module.

The SPC module pulls data from two places: your supplier submissions and imported Excel data.

Use the filter sidebar to narrow by supplier, part, PO, status, date, revision, and metadata, and you can clear any active filters with the "Clear all" button in the top bar.

On the Overview tab of the SPC module, you can see your dashboard of widgets that highlight key metrics. You can find your pass rate, throughput, alerts, Cpk heatmaps, trends, supplier comparisons, and more.

At any time you can add/remove/reset widgets. Your layouts are saved to your profile. The "Alerts" panel is a very useful widget that highlights top issues, such as out-of-spec parts, and low Cpk.

You can also export all your data in a CSV file with the "Export" button in the top right. Keep in mind that the Export tool will respect all active filters.

We find that the best practice here is to start by applying filters (part, supplier, date) to focus the widgets that are filter-aware.

This tab will generate key process insights for you within each report. Simply choose a report to see an AI summary, key findings, and recommendations. These insights highlight characteristics with issues with charts to break down the issues to the per-part level.

The Analysis panel houses control charts, histograms, box plots, capability stats, subgrouping, comparison mode, and saved analyses.

You can filter your data by each characteristic and understand your production at any level of granularity.

Feel free to save any analysis configuration so you can easily access it again later.

You can also export all your data in a CSV file with the "Export" button in the top right. Keep in mind that the Export tool will respect all active filters.

In the "Compare" tab, you can pick a characteristic, then choose two or more revisions for a valuable side-by-side comparative look at your production.

In Overlay mode you shows multiple revisions on one chart plus histograms/box plots.

- Pairwise mode: shows deltas (mean, stdev, Cpk/Ppk, sample count).

- Needs shared characteristic numbers and at least 2 revisions; otherwise you’ll see guidance.

- Table of samples for filtered inspections; click a row to open sample detail.

- Bulk actions: edit metadata, delete samples, copy selections.

- Sample detail: shows results; click a characteristic to open SPC modal with spec limits and control points.

- Metadata keys are case-insensitive; internal fields (templateId, templateName) stay hidden.

- Upload Excel via `Review → Import` (choose template, existing or new inspection, optional auto-revision mapping).

- Common errors: missing required metadata fields, no characteristics, or missing revision mapping for auto mode.

- Supplier FAIR submissions flow into SPC automatically after submission (per AST-764).

Exports

- Use Export in Overview or Report to download CSV with applied filters and metadata.

Limits and tips

- No spec or fewer than 2 numeric points → no Cpk; charts will still show values.

- Normalization works when size/dim table or chosen metadata exists; otherwise charts use raw values.

- For rejected reports, use filters to keep them separate from approved data when analyzing trends.