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please associate an epic as a parent to your story when creating a story

Saqib Barlas_ay1aki

We have made no changes to our JIRA project , but now when we create story , we get this error :

please associate an epic as a parent to your story

If we do associate an epic , it still brings up the same message. This does not happen on creating tasks , only stories and doesn't happen on any other JIRA projects in our estate.

This was working fine over a week ago. I have also checked the mandatory fields for the story and the PARENT field is not mandatory (greyed out ad non mandatory)

Also , if I try and just import a simple story via CSV :

summary,desc
Test, test desc

I get this error :

2025-07-25 15:05:57,517 INFO - Only new items will be imported
2025-07-25 15:05:57,895 INFO - Importing work item: [externalId='autoid--5155576474699886810', summary='Test']
2025-07-25 15:05:58,057 ERROR - Error importing work item [externalId='autoid--5155576474699886810', summary='Test']: Unable to create issue: Test

Accepted answers

Shawn Doyle - ReleaseTEAM

Hi @Saqib Barlas

You have something in the workflow that isn't configured quite right. In the Story workflow at the create transition look at what validators exist, it's likely there. Do you have Scriptrunner? Look to see what behaviors are set. If not that look at what addons you have that may be acting as a validator.

It's not unlikely that the way you had these setup worked fine and one of the many changes Atlassian has rolled out broke it. The only recourse (well the only practical one) is to troubleshoot what is prompting the epic link message and fix it.

Maria Rusnakova

Hi @Saqib Barlas

could you check validator on the workflow used for Stories?

As Shawn already mentioned, there is probably a validator on the Create transition, it's possible that it was created in the past for Epic link.

We already had similar situation in one of our projects and although it didn't cause problems when Epic link was replaced by Parent field, after some updates it caused the same problem as you have now.

Trudy P Claspill

Hello @Saqib Barlas

Can you provide screen images showing:

- the screen with the error message when you are trying to create a story

- the Create transition from the workflow for the Story issue type in that project, showing the Validators/Rules section for the transition.

Lastly, what type of project does this concern? Get the project type information by clicking on the ... button next to the project name in the navigation panel.

Screenshot 2025-07-25 at 8.22.08 AM.png

All comments

Shawn Doyle - ReleaseTEAM

Hi @Saqib Barlas

Saqib Barlas_ay1aki

Hi Shawn,

No the workflow is simple with no script runner , nothing on there to restrict this . It's strange that only our project is affected .

Has there been a Rollout that could have affected this?

Maria Rusnakova

Hi @Saqib Barlas

could you check validator on the workflow used for Stories?

As Shawn already mentioned, there is probably a validator on the Create transition, it's possible that it was created in the past for Epic link.

Trudy P Claspill

Hello @Saqib Barlas

Can you provide screen images showing:

- the screen with the error message when you are trying to create a story

- the Create transition from the workflow for the Story issue type in that project, showing the Validators/Rules section for the transition.

Lastly, what type of project does this concern? Get the project type information by clicking on the ... button next to the project name in the navigation panel.

Screenshot 2025-07-25 at 8.22.08 AM.png

Saqib Barlas_ay1aki

Ok , found this issue, many thanks for pointing me in the right direction , for some reason we had a validator in the create transition for the required field of Parent not to be empty, just as you mentioned! I have no idea of who put it there and when,

It also looks like the licence for JMWE has expired and that could have caused the issue to have suddenly surfaced. I have removed the validator and now I can create stories .

See bellow for what was on the workflow : Screenshot 2025-07-28 075945.png

Saqib Barlas_ay1aki

Hi @Trudy P Claspill , thanks for this , ours is a Software project - Company-Managed . See error message : Screenshot 2025-07-28 080413.png
Screenshot 2025-07-28 080309.png

However, the issue was the transition on the workflow , @Maria Rusnakova 's answer and my reply to it explains it. Thank you so much for reaching out , you were correct in me checking the workflow OPEN validator

Saqib Barlas_ay1aki

Actually when I checked it was the validator on the open workflow - I checked and it was the restriction. I have removed it and now it works.

Maria Rusnakova

Hi @Saqib Barlas

happy to help

If you don't plan to prolong the JMWE licence, I recommend checking other workflow transitions and removing or updating all JMWE validators, conditions and post-functions to prevent similar issues.

If you don't remember where this add-on was used, the fastest way to find all of them will be to navigate to Jira Admin settings -> Apps -> Jira Misc workflow extensions -> JMWE workflow extension.

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