Overview

The Crisisworks Fire Prevention Notice module provides a way to report and track Fire Prevention Infringements, both in the field and in the office.

If you have the FPN module enabled, but have never used it before please read this page first Getting started with Fire Prevention Notices

Contents

Quick Start

A typical day in the field

In typical use, Fire Prevention Officers will conduct area inspections, and upon finding fire hazards, they will use the Crisisworks Field Reporting App to log a new Fire Prevention Notice to the offending property, capturing photographic evidence and logging treatment options using a mobile tablet or smart phone.

Field officers will also be assigned follow-up inspections, to check whether properties that have previously received an infringement notice have remedied the hazard.

From the office, high risk properties can be added and proactive inspections scheduled. Also, new FPNs will be downloaded periodically to generate the notices/letters, and for processing in other Council systems. If a force clearing is required, Crisisworks can be used to track the tasks and costs of the sub-contractor.

To begin entering inspections via the mobile app:

1. On your tablet, download the Crisisworks 4 app. iOS users download it from the App Store, while Android users download it from the Google Play store and Windows 10 users can download the beta version from the Windows App Store.
2. Once downloaded, log in using your Crisisworks username and password and enter your Crisisworks Server (this is generally in the format of myorganisation.crisisworks.com).
3. Now, select which FPN event you want to work with from the Event Selector. For example “Fire Prevention 2015”. Select “Fire Prevention Notice” from the form list on the left-hand side. This will show you a list of all FPNs (Fire Prevention Notices) that have been assigned to you. If you do not have an FPN event created, you will need to create an event on using the web interface first.
4. Press the green + Fire Prevention Notice button to create a new inspection or select “Fire Prevention Notice” in the green menu in the first column.
5. You are now adding an assessment. In the Property section, press the “Select from map” button to find the property visually by showing you the closest properties to your current location (See the next two images below). Now enter in the assessment details, take some photos and press Save. You've just added your first assessment.

A few of tips:

• You can type the address or property ID in the search area for a text search.
• You are automatically assigned the FPN notice (you can change this).
• The status is automatically set to “Hazard exists” for new inspections from when in the field.
• Leave the Next action date blank to use the default for the module, usually 14 or 21 days from the time the data is exported later on. Only put a date here when you are allowing an extension of time.
• In the unlikely event a property is not showing on the map, Press “Mark current location” or “Annotate map” to put a point on the map of where you are, then complete the rest of the inspection.
  When you return to your office ask your GIS officer about this property and liaise with support@datalink.com.au to see why this property may not be in the property asset database. The property can be added later on via the web interface.

Tracking your Route

When driving and doing inspections it is important to remember where you have previously been so you know where to go or where not to go next time!

To track your route, go to the Settings screen via the menu icon in the top left-hand corner of the screen then select "Track my Route". Enter your route name and distance preference for each point before turning on the route tracking. You can then return to using your app as normal while the route is being tracked in the background while you complete your inspections.

Once done you can upload your route from this same screen by pressing the “Upload Route Data” button seen below. This will save your route as an Information record.

Press this to get to the menu from most screens.

Your route is then tracked as you move, and you can view and upload it to Crisisworks.

Note there is a short video approx. 60 seconds which shows how to use this feature at http://crisisworks.com/app/videos/

In the office with a web browser

1. Use the Crisisworks web interface (e.g. myorgansation.crisisworks.com) to access additional coordination and administration functions.
2. First, sign in and go on duty as an FPN Coordinator or Officer. Then, select the correct Fire Prevention event from the event selector.
3. Select Fire Prevention from the “Inspections” menu to access the module, which will show all of the inspections. You will see a list of counters similar to the Left Hand Side image.
4. The new notice(s) will be awaiting export/print. A  counter called "Notices to Print" appears showing how many inspections are ready to Print. Click this counter. The data grid will be updated to only display the Ready to Print items.
5. Select the items you want to print by ticking them individually or you can select all by clicking on the yellow tick in the heading.
6. Click either the "Export CSV for Mail Merge” or “Generate Merged Documents” buttons located at the bottom of the list. These two buttons export or generate the data and will progress their state by adding a printed date to these records. The records will now be found within the “Notices Sent” counter before they transition to “Compliance Inspection Required” in two to three weeks time. Notice that after downloading the file, the counter will now show '0' Notices To Print. This is normal, and it shows that printing is tracked within the system.

This concludes the Quick Start experience. For a detailed understanding of the system, please read on.

Concepts

System overview

Council systems should work together to implement a complete Fire Prevention Notice system. The following diagram shows the delineation of responsibilities between systems.

System responsibilities

Crisisworks

Crisisworks Cloud and Crisisworks Field Reporting smartphone app work together to provide a set of tools for field reporting and lifecycle management of Fire Prevention Notices.

Property Database

Council may provide geospatial property data to Crisisworks from time to time. This can either come from Council's own GIS system, or Vicmap data can be used.

Alternatively, Datalink can perform a regular import of Vicmap data from the VicMap Property Simplified 1 dataset periodically. Before the FPN season begins, this data is also refreshed. This can be done more often based based on request. 

Councils can also do their own asset imports as often as they like via the administration menu → settings → import data

Council CRM, DMS and Finance Systems

Councils have a varying number of systems that need to be made aware of the infringement notice, and this should be determined by each Council. Commonly, a Customer Relationship Management system will record the infringement, a Document Management System will record the generated letter, and Council's Finance system will record the debt.

Crisisworks integrates into this process by supplying a CSV file, which uses the Council-supplied Property ID as the key and which lists each infringement, its field observations, treatment requirements, key dates and current status of the infringement. This data can be downloaded from Crisisworks and manually uploaded into your Council system, or an automatic link can be established.

Manually mail merging outside of Council systems

If you wish to mail merge outside of Council systems, you can do this by providing the rate payer's details as part of the asset database import, and then construct an MS Word mail merge template to generate the infringement notices from within Crisisworks.

You'll need to ask your IT department to create the property dataset with the ratepayer information included, and then Datalink can map the import data as a periodic service after setting up the system.

Workflow

A workflow model applies to the selection of status fields for Fire Prevention Notices.

Workflow Overview

The workflow model allows the combination of two approaches when adding inspection reports.

1. The first approach is to do just-in-time hazard reporting using the mobile App, where you only report hazards you have identified.
2. Secondly, properties of high risk can be proactively added for an initial inspection, using a web browser.

A description of each status type follows.

Inspection states

This workflow state informs the user that an inspection is required at the property.

There are a few statuses used:

Special FPN Counters  -

 There are a few more counters based on states and dates

Security (Positions)

The Fire Prevention Notice module has four levels of access.

FPN Field Officer

This role provides access to the Crisisworks Field Reporting App, and provides the ability to have inspection reports assigned to the user.

FPN Coordinator

This role provides read/write access to the register via the web interface, along with the ability to manage property data, the coordinator can also change the assigned officer and they can see/edit all officers assigned records.

FPN Contractor

This allows contractors to log in to see FPN Tasks that have been assigned to them only.

Note - they can only see their own FPN tasks and cannot see any other contractor's records.

FPN Administrator

This allow provides a similar level of access as the FPN coordinator, however also allow records to bypass the workflow rules. This position also helps identify the staff that provide admin support such as generating letters.

Initial configuration

The initial set-up of the Fire Prevention Notice module involves the creation of the field survey form, the import of property data, and work to determine how to import data back into your Council business systems.  

NOTE: It is important to determine the correct property asset IDs that will be used in Crisisworks, which will match with your organisation's own asset codes. For example, some Victorian Councils use "parcel number" while some use "prop num" (property number).  Before importing your own asset data look at the asset via administration menu → assets and review the property data to see if it is correctly configured, look at the "Code" field, this is your own asset ID.

If this is not correct, contact Datalink support.

Define your inspection form

The inspection form is initially created by Datalink, customised to incorporate any treatment options and wording specific to your Council. This process typically takes a day.

An example form appears below.

Note: Treatment options can be configured to be grouped into categories, such as residential, commercial and farming, each with their own treatment options.

In addition to specifying your FPN form, you'll also need to tell Datalink the default time you require between inspections. The default is 2 weeks but this can be altered.

This Date is set relative to the Date you export or print merge the data, so if you entered a number of “Hazard Exists” properties throughout the week and export/print at the end of the week, all of the records processed in the batch will have the same Next Action Date..

This initial set-up of the form is included in the setup fee. However, if your needs change then don't worry, you can always ask Datalink to make changes to this form in future for a small hourly-rate service fee.

Upload your property data

Property data is a critical component of the system, as each Fire Prevention Notice is related to a property.

Crisisworks has a common address database that is shared across all functions of the system, and this can be populated from a number of sources, including Council's own GIS database, or state government databases such as Vicmap Property.                            

Multiple asset types can be configured for use in the same form, for FPNs both Property and Parcel data could added as part of the initial setup by Datalink.

To the import data: Goto the administration menu → settings → import data

• This screen has a link to your own site's import details, such as field name and field order.

Supported Formats

Crisisworks can support the following import formats:

• Council-supplied Comma-Separated Values (CSV)
• Council-supplied Keyhole Mark-up Language (KML)
• Council-supplied Shapefile (SHP)
• Council-supplied TAB file
• Datalink-supplied Vicmap

All geospatial references should be in Web Mercator format.

CSV

The specification for the CSV file is available from the Crisisworks support documentation at www.crisisworks.com/support. Note that CSV only allows the use of point data for properties.

KML

It is usual for systems to place additional data in the <description> element, and if this is the case, you will need to identify the reference number to use for the Property ID when you supply the file.

Before using KML formats, Datalink will need to perform a once-off service to create a mapping rule to read the <description> data.

SHP & TAB

Shape files can also be supplied, and like KML, an import rule specific to the file must be first set up by Datalink.

Vicmap

Datalink imports Vicmap property data a few times a year which removes the need for Councils to provide property data, and the default reference used is PR_PFI. Please check with your GIS officer before deciding on this option. This is only provided for councils that don't provide the combined rate payers and property data file.

Considerations when selecting your property data source

Please read the appendix on Property, Parcel and Address data to understand the considerations in the choice of data, and how it affects field reporting.

Upload your initial inspection data

If you have a list of properties that you would like to inspect, you can create them in the web browser one at a time or alternatively, you can perform a bulk import from a CSV file. The file only requires two columns of data which is the property ID and status (10 is for 1st inspection required, 20 is for Hazard exists)

The import items, go to Administration -> Settings -> Import Data. Here, you can choose to import FPN items from a csv site and upload the relevant file. 

When uploading a file for the first time, it is a good idea to select the "Test Only" option. This will output any errors that may be present in your data file without making any changes to Crisisworks. This allows you to address any errors before proceeding with the actual import.

Once imported, records can be assigned to officers in bulk (see section below).

Owner data for letter generation

If you intend to use the built-in Crisisworks letter generation system, you will need to import the owner details first. The file uploaded is for postal correspondence 

As of Oct 30th 2018, an improved and simplified approach has been introduced, prior to version 4.19 property owner details are imported together with the property asset data.

Here is a demonstration CSV file.

Bulk Actions

When working with many inspections and multiple inspectors it may be necessary to make changes to many records at the same time while still auditing each change made. This is done with the "Bulk Edit" button. Note that the bulk edit button only appears when at least one item is selected.

The image above shows the items that have been selected. If you wish to select every record in the filter this can be done by clicking on the yellow tick in the heading.

Note: bulk actions on more than a few items may be done in the background to allow you to get on with your work. These actions not only change the data but they also add audit history to each record. If this is the case you will get a message such as “Your items have been flagged for processing. We will send an email to maxwell@datalink.com.au when the operation has finished”

Filtering your lists

There are a few options that can be used to filter your lists, aside from using the left hand side counters.

1. You can filter any data grid (list) by clicking on the magnifying glass which will reveal the basic filter. The image below shows the fields that can be used in the basic filter.
2. You can do a geospatial query on its own or in combination with another parameter. The example image below will display items being selected within polygon that are also 1^st Inspection Required.
3. You can perform an Advanced Search for more complex parameters.
   
   

Set up your officers

Each Fire Prevention Notice can be assigned to an individual that has the position of FPN officer. Sometimes, inspections may be unassigned, and just like Crisisworks Requests, these are effectively the responsibility of the Coordinator. A Crisisworks Administrator can create users and make them an “FPN Officer at Council” by adding this position to their user record.

Note - before going out in the field for the first time they will need to log into the Web system first and update their user profile and go on-duty for the first time.

Set up your Coordinators

A Crisisworks Administrator can create users and make them an “FPN Coordinator at Council” by adding this position to their user record.

Set up your Contractors

FPN Contractors are the external users that will be cutting the grass or completing other FPN tasks to make the property comply with fire safety legislation.

This is a more involved step for your Crisisworks Administrator and may require the assistance of Datalink.

There are a three prerequisites that need to be set up in this order in Crisisworks before you can assign tasks to contractors or create the Contractor users. These are:

1. Create an Organisation such as “Jims Mowing”. 
2. Create a Resource.  When creating the resource, you must choose the Organisation you just created and make sure the resource is set to the “Fire Prevention” Category towards the bottom of the form.  The resource will have the costs and type of service they offer such as “Jims – Large block clearing” and “Jims – Branch removal”
3. Setup the Contractor position for the new Organisation. A Crisisworks Administrator (or Datalink) will need to do this. For example "FPN Contractor" at Jim’s Mowing. When setting up the new Contractor position, Administrators should choose the Security Policy " Fire Prevention Task Assigned-to-resource-only Access" to restrict access to tasks only assigned to them.

A Crisisworks Administrator can then create the Contractor user account. When creating the user, Administrators need to choose the Organisation just created (ie Jims Mowing). Administrators also need to choose the Position for this user. In the Position tab, a position should now appear called “FPN Contractor at Jim's Mowing”. 

After these prerequisites are completed you can then assign FPN tasks to the Contractors when the Fire Prevention notice is in the “Request Compulsory Clearing” State.

Use an event to track season each season

Crisisworks uses Events to track Fire Prevention Notices across seasons, and to keep this information separate from emergency events.

Plan your integration with other systems

In order to generate letters to property owners, you must work out which system you plan on using. You will then need to consider the best way to download data from Crisisworks to supply to that system.

Using the field reporting app

The Crisisworks Field Reporting App provides the field tool for reporting and following up Fire Prevention Notices.

Get to know the user interface

The mobile app is a native iOS and Android app that can be downloaded from the app store.

Once successfully authenticated, the dashboard view appears with data and forms based on your access permissions.

The following diagram explains the interface.

 After Pressing the down arrow next to the Event name, a green dropdown list displays a list of all configured form types for the current event. 

Select 'Fire Prevention Notice' from the list to add a new Fire Prevention Notice. Other types can also be added, making the field app versatile for many purposes.

When adding a new record, a form appears with form fields based on the type of record. Below is an example of a Fire Prevention Notice (note: your form may vary based on customisations made when the module was set up).

Drawing on the map

To draw on the map, tap "Draw on Map". You can select to add points, a polygon or a line. You can drop a point where you are standing without going into the map. Select clear annotations to remove them.

The map screen allows you to draw on the map, and also provides a way to auto-drop points as you drive or walk the affected area.

When you are finished, tap 'Save'.

For polygons, the total area inside the polygon on kilometres squared is displayed. If a line was drawn, the total length of the line in kilometres is displayed.

Note there is a short video approx. 60 seconds which shows how to use this feature at http://crisisworks.com/app/videos/

Selecting properties via the map

When selecting a property, you can search by name or property ID. However, the preferred option is normally to select the property visually from the map by pressing the “Select from map button”.

When the map appears, it will be centred on your current location. A few moments later, all nearby properties will be overlaid across the base map.

This system works both online and offline. If you are offline, the base tiles may not load, but the property cadastre (boundaries) will still appear allowing you to visualise and select the relevant property relative to where you are standing.

Tap the Compass button at located at the bottom left of the screen to turn on the compass. In this mode, the screen rotates to orientate the map in the direction that the device is facing.

Tap a property (blue polygon) to select it (polygon becomes green), and an information window appears. To use this address, tap Select, then tap Save to return to the form.

Configuring user accounts

Field officers must first have a Crisisworks user account with the FPN Officer enabled. A Crisisworks Administrator must do this. 

Setting up the mobile device

1. To set up the device, download the app. For iOS users (iPad and iPhone), search for “Crisisworks 4” in the App Store. For Android users, search for “Crisisworks 4” in the Google Play store.
2. Once installed, run the app and log in, using your Crisisworks username and password. This only needs to be done once, and the device is then registered to that user.
3. After pressing “Sign In”, the device will register with the server, and take the user to the Dashboard page, ready for use.
4. If you require offline assets to be downloaded into the device, for use when you don't have an internet connection, select Settings after pressing the  icon,
   Then select “Download” the offline Asset Database.

You will need to do this whenever the assets are updated on Crisisworks Cloud.

Reporting a new infringement

To report a new infringement, follow these steps.

1. a) Select “+ Fire Prevention Notice” after selecting the Fire Prevention Notice from the left-hand side list of available forms with the counters on them.
   b) or select “Fire Prevention Notice” from the down green arrow icon next to the Event name on the top left of your screen. (this is available without selecting any of the forms or counters.
2. Select the property. If you are standing next to the property, you can tap the “select from map” and select to see the properties closest to your current location. The property should be where your current location is and identified by a blue dot.  There are 2 other ways to identify the property.
   1. You can enter a partial address to look up the property by a known address, or
   2. entering the Council's property identifier, if known.
3. Evaluate the hazard and fill out the form
4. Take one or more photos of the risk. To do this, tap Add Photo to launch the camera. Photos are stored against the record and are not added to the device's photo roll.
5. Press “Save Fire Prevention Notice” to save the record.

The record and all associated photos are automatically uploaded to Crisisworks immediately if connected to the internet, otherwise, they will be saved until the internet is available.

Updating existing infringements on the mobile device

1. To update an existing infringement, you must first locate it. The easiest way to do this is to select it from the map or from one of the lists (via the counters).
   
   a) the lists (or datagrid) can be filtered via the different counters located on the left-hand side of the datagrid. These counters represent the different workflow states, or officers and other logical groupings to help you find the records.
   
   b) when you select the map icon while viewing a list it will only show you the items in this category on the map. Such as “1^st inspection required”
2. When you have located the infringement you wish to update, click Edit to edit the record.
3. You can make changes to the record, update its status, and add new photos. Press Save when completed.

The changes are uploaded to Crisisworks automatically. All changes are version controlled and time stamped with a full history within Crisisworks.

Handling duplicate reports

You can prevent issuing more than one notice for the same property if you always use the “Select from map” feature to select the property.

While driving, keep the display on the map view. The map will update as you drive. This way you will see existing open FPN records as you approach them. Tap the map icon to view, then edit the existing record, or press the new button in the top right-hand corner of the map to add a new one.

Handling missing property records

There are some cases where a property may not exist in the property database. Your GIS officer can better advise on your Council's specific circumstances, but here are some general examples.

1. Vicmap reports that approximately 97% of properties are included in their database, and they base their data on Council data - this means you may find some unidentifiable properties due to data inaccuracy.
2. Sometimes properties are non-contiguous, and the registered address may be on another parcel of land. This can confuse asset databases, if you are using data that relies on address point data rather than property polygon data.
3. Sometimes land is not private land. It may be a parcel without an address, it may be crown land, or it may be other special use land.

In cases like this, you can add a point marker at your current location or draw on the map. If it is a vacant property you could choose to walk the perimeter of the property and have the lines drawn for you automatically and fill out the rest of the form normally.

When back in the office, you can resolve the problem in a number of ways:

1. You can view the map, use your Council GIS system or consult your GIS officer to determine the property, based on the location recorded against the inspection. Its coordinates are saved with the record (where you dropped the pin or drew on the map)
2. If you find the property, you can edit the Fire Prevention Notice record and enter in the correct property, either by entering in the PROPNUM, or its address.
3. If for some reason the property doesn't exist in Council systems, you will need to find the best approach with your GIS officer or with Datalink.

Tracking your route

A very useful feature of the Crisisworks Field Reporting App is the ability to track your route as you perform field surveys. This is shown with images earlier in the overview section of this Manual

To use this feature:

1. When you begin your shift, select "Track Route" from the menu via the top left-hand corner. 
2. You will need to give it a name before turning on tracking, keep in mind that the date and time will be appended to the end of the name you provide when you upload it later.
3. You can return to the event and keep doing your work. The phone will track your movements every 10 metres (you can change the accuracy level) while you conduct your field surveys. This will continue even if the Crisisworks App is in the background, beware that this feature does drain your device’s battery more quickly. An in-car charger is recommended.
4. When you have finished, return to the Track route screen and upload your route data.
5. The route is uploaded to Crisisworks as an Information activity in the currently-selected event. You can view the route from the information register in the app or web browser.
6. To view the track, locate the activity on the Crisisworks website – click on the route counter when in the information register. The route(s) can be viewed on the map.

A note on route recording: Each recording contains the date and time of the route start and end, along with each point along your travel. Each point is accurate within the accuracy limits of the GPS, which is usually < 2 metres for iPads and iPhones. It is possible that a few data points could be placed in error. This can be edited in the web browser at a later time.

Understanding offline mode

The Crisisworks Field Reporting App supports being used without network coverage. The following applies for offline mode:

1. The GPS will still work with full accuracy.
2. The system will not be able to send or receive updates from the Crisisworks server, and rather than send changes immediately, it will store user activity in the Pending area with an “unsaved” counter until the connection is re-established.
3. The system will use the Offline Asset Database for geocoding. This database must be downloaded by the user prior to going offline.
4. The map view will only display map tiles if they were previously viewed while online. In practice this means two things: first, it doesn't matter if you don't see a base map tile - all GPS use will still record accurate positions; and second, if you need to use the base map, you will need to pan and zoom around the area you plan on going to before you go there, to pre-load the images into the device.
5. If you would like to save records for use in the field when offline you can mark them as favourites. To do this, while viewing a list of records, press the star at the end of the record's row or you can select the “Save All” button at the bottom of the page. A favourites area will now appear at the bottom of the counters list on the left-hand side for you to easily find these records later.
6. Periodic user position updates will not be able to be sent to the server while offline.
7. The counters are not available offline.
8. All other functionality works identically to when the device is online.

Managing your Fire Prevention Notices

Management of Fire Prevention Notices is handled from the Crisisworks Cloud web interface.

Starting your season

When starting each season, you need to create an Event. e.g. "Fire Prevention Notice 2015-2016".

Only Crisisworks Coordinators can set up events. To set up an event for Fire Prevention:

1. Select the "Events" drop-down list at the top right of the system and chose “+ event”.
2. Add an Event titled “Fire Prevention Notice 2015-2016”
3. Choose the Fire prevention notice template
4. Click next, then save.

Be sure to select this Event each time you work on fire prevention activity.

Using the Dashboard to monitor activity

Crisisworks places all recent activity on the Dashboard, so you can monitor activity from the office.

Adding a property to inspect from the web browser

The workflow model allows for proactive inspections to be arranged for individually reported high-risk properties.

To add these properties, use the Crisisworks Cloud web interface.

1. Log in and select the correct Event
2. Click on the Fire Prevention Notices counter or select “Fire Prevention Notices” from the inspection menu.
3. Click + Fire Prevention Notice to add a new notice
4. Select the property. You can do this in these ways:
   1. Enter a partial address, and the system will show you matching names. Select the correct address, and a point is dropped onto the map.
   2. Enter a property identifier (e.g. PROPNUM) and the matching property is returned.
   3. Click the Geolocate button on the map, and then click on the map where the property is located. A list of properties nearest to that point is returned, and the first result will typically be the property.
5. Notice the status Initial Inspection Required
6. Assign the record to an FPN officer.
7. Click Save.
8. If you have many notices to assign at once, you can perform a bulk action after applying a filter (This is shown with images earlier in the overview section of this Manual).

Adding a list of properties to inspect from the web browser before the season begins

The workflow model allows for proactive inspections to be arranged for high-risk properties based on previous years, or vacant blocks.

To add these properties, use the Crisisworks Cloud web interface.

1. Log in and select the correct Event
2. Click on the Fire Prevention Notices counter or select “Fire Prevention Notices” from the inspection menu.
3. Select the “Import” button at the bottom of the screen which will take you to the screen you see below.
4. Select a file with a list of the Property IDs in it. Comma separated values file (.csv) with a single column with the heading 'assetCode'.
5. Press “Import”
6. The process will take a while, it could take 15- 30 minutes depending on the number of records.
   You can return to this screen to see how it went and to get a list of any property IDs that had errors. In this example below the errors were caused by property IDs that did not match the current property IDs in the system.

Assigning Fire Prevention Notices to users

Fire Prevention Notices that are reported from the field are automatically assigned to the user that created them.

This default assignment can be modified by FPN Coordinators.

1. Find the Fire Prevention Notice and click Edit.
2. Select the new team, and/or the new user you wish to assign the case to. You can also select "unassigned", in which case it becomes the responsibility of the FPN Coordinator.

By assigning a Fire Prevention Notice, that user and his or her team can easily view their open cases from their Apps, using a special counter on the device labelled as the name of the person. Note that unlike Crisisworks Requests, assigning a notice does not prevent other users from accessing or editing the record.

If a bulk assignment is required see the Bulk Action Section above.

Querying the register

The Fire Prevention Notice register manages the list of all FPNs, and it can be queried in a number of ways. Existing users of Crisisworks will find these approaches immediately familiar.

Query by counter

The workflow counters at the top can be clicked, to generate a filtered list of all cases matching that counter. This is the primary way of viewing the list.

Query by filter

The filter on the side of the datagrid allows for users to filter by any combination of the following fields:

Editing a Fire Prevention Notice

Records can be edited by finding them in the datagrid (see querying above), and clicking Edit.

When editing, all values can be changed, and an audit of prior values is kept.

The status field only shows a subset of possible status values, depending on the current status of the record. It follows the workflow model.

Creating infringement letters

The system allows you to print your own letters or export a merge file:

• “Export CSV Mail Merge” – Contains all of the data in a Comma Separated Value (CSV) file.
• “Generate Merge Documents” - this will merge the data in Crisisworks with a pre-prepared template. As of August 2018 the template can either be in Word or HTML which will output to PDF.
  • The rate payer data must be supplied to Datalink with the property data for this feature to work.

Both are tracked in the “Notices to Print” counter.

You can access this file manually, or automatically.

Manual

The manual approach is the easiest to get started quickly. When a letter is required, the Notices to Print counter at the top of the register will track it. Click this to filter for all letters that require printing. Click Export for Mail Merge at the bottom of the datagrid to export the list.

After exporting the list, the Notices To Print counter will now show 0 records. This is normal, and indicates that system tracks whether or not the letters have been generated.

These exports may be processed in the background, a message like the one above will be displayed when this occurs.

It will result in an email with a link similar to the example below.

Automatic

To automatically access this file, consult the Crisisworks API. The API allows your IT team to write a small program to automatically check and download the data at regular intervals.

This is the most convenient but requires some technical set-up by your IT team.

Configuring the letter Templates

There are two types of letters that can be generated - Word or PDF (coming in September 2018)

• The PDF option is created from basic HTML content with tokens inside which will be replaced with the data from the FPN record.
• The Word option is a standard Microsoft Word document containing your letterhead, signatures etc with tokens inside which will be replaced with the data from the record

You will find the Merge Template section inside Administration > Settings. Click on the Merge Templates link on the left hand side (see screenshot below).

Your site will automatically have one Sample FPN HTML template added.  You can either edit this template and modify it to use as your own HTML template or you can use these settings to create your own Mail Merge Template.

Click on either the Sample FPN HTML Template or the New Mail Merge Template button.

On the left and side you will see a link to view Available Tokens for the Fire Prevention Notice module. These tokens can be used in either your Word document or inside the HTML which will be replaced with the FPN Notice data when you generate a merge from the Fire Prevention Notices.

PDF Template

Editing the Sample FPN HTML Template

Click on the Sample FPN HTML Template then click the Edit button to view the settings.

You can edit the name and description. Keep the option of HTML/PDF selected for the type of template you would like to create. 

As this template already has HTML added you do not need to click on the Load Sample HTML checkbox for this template (this is for brand new templates).  Click on the Next button.

Below is a table explaining the fields you can edit on the next page. 

Creating a new HTML Merge Template

To create a new HTML template click on the New Mail Merge Template blue button.

Enter a name for your template and an optional description. Then choose the HTML/PDF option. You have the option of loading some sample HTML in the next page which you can edit or alternatively you can create your HTML template from scratch.

As we know most people do not know HTML, you can use this online tool to generate HTML from some normal letter content. Visit https://html-online.com/editor/. Simply enter your content in the left-hand side and the HTML will be generated on the right-hand side. You will still need to enter the tokens into the HTML so that the item's details will be entered into the letters. Once you have generated the HTML, you can then click the Clean button to clean up the code and then copy and paste it into your template.

Note: Please ensure the content you enter is inside the <article> tags. There should be a tag called <article> at the top of the Letter Contents box and a closing </article> tag at the bottom. This will ensure the template options will work.

Click the Next button.

If you would like your company letterhead to appear on the merged letters, you can upload it by clicking on the blue Select File button. Your letterhead must be a PDF file.

If you have chosen to load the sample HTML you will see some HTML inside the letter contents area. This content is a mixture of HTML and tokens that will be replaced with the item's information.  The sample HTML will display the following information:

• Page Heading
• Property Rate Payer name and address information
• Item Id and Asset friendly address
• Asset code
• Assignee signature & text (this will appear if the user the item is assigned to, has uploaded a signature file and text into their user profile)
• Any item photos which will appear on a separate page under the heading Evidence if they exist.

You can modify the template options or leave them as the default settings.

Once you have finished entering the information for your template, click the green Save button.

It is a good idea to Preview your template before merging. Click the Preview button to download one letter to see how it looks. If you need to make further modifications, you can click on the Edit button to make changes.

View Detailed documentation  for HTML merge letter templates

Basic HTML Tag examples

Below are some basic HTML tags that you can use in the letter content area:

<p> </p> - paragraph spacing. If you start a <p> tag, enter the paragraph content after it and then close the p tag </p>

<br /> - produces a line break in text (carriage-return).

<strong> </strong> - this is used to bold the content. For example, if you have a page heading you want to appear in bold text you would enter <strong>Page Heading</strong>

<ul><li> - this creates bullet point list in your text. To create a bullet point list, follow the example below:

If you want a numbered list, do the same as above but replace the <ul> tags with <ol> - these stand for unordered list and ordered list. See example below for a numbered list

<hr /> - this stands for horizontal line. We have set a rule that whenever the <hr /> tag is used, it will force a new page. So if you want a page break in your content, enter a <hr /> tag.

&nbsp; - stands for non-breaking spaces. You can use these if you need to enter spaces in your content

HTML Template examples

Sample HTML with accompanying CSS is available at the bottom of the Detailed documentation for HTML merge letter templates.

Word Template 

The letter template is a standard Microsoft Word document containing your letterhead, signatures etc with variables inside which will be replaced with the data from the record, this is a sample snippet of a merge file. (It does not support images or signatures from the user preferences file, use the HTML feature for these)

A Crisisworks Administrator can add them into the system via the internal settings area

Once in the template area select “New Mail Merge Template”.  As per the next image below.

And upload you template file, Datalink can help by providing you with a sample merge file if needed.

If you have created Microsoft Word templates before you will already know how to do this, if not there is a good chance someone in your organisation has done it before. The main thing you need are the field names/tokens to use inside your merge file, like <<this>>

Appendices

File format

The export file contains the following fields. Note the “custom report fields” will be different for each organisation,