I just learned something new today about working with checkbox variables/questions in ServiceNow. Even though I’m probably one of the last people to figure this out, I’ll post it here so at least I can find the solution again when I need it!
ServiceNow allows you to set up variables or questions for use in data collection when working with Service Catalog or in Surveys. One of these variable types is the checkbox variable. The way that these variables works has always bothered me. The problem I’ve always had with them is that the system wants to group them all together and gives them a generic label of ‘Options’ when they are presented on the screen like this…

There are a couple of things I don’t like about this arrangement. First, the ‘Options’ label just looks bad. I’d really like to change that name to something else. Secondly, just because they follow each other in order doesn’t mean that I want to have all of those checkboxes grouped under a single question when presented on the screen. They might be asking completely different things. Well, it only took me 3 years but I’ve got a solution now that requires nothing more than a little bit of care in the arrangement of a few variables on your catalog item or survey. 🙂

The secret to this solution is simply to add a ‘Label’ variable immediately before the checkbox variables that you want to group on the form. The label groups any checkbox variables that follow it and it also overrides the generic ‘Options’ label that is shown normally. You can control this grouping by arranging the ‘Order’ values of your variables or questions as shown here…

An ordering as shown above in a catalog item would produce the following result…

If you have multiple groups of checkbox variables that you want to display immediately after one another you would need to set up 2 label variables, each followed by the checkbox variables that should be grouped underneath.

This concept works in exactly the same way with Survey questions.