Exporting Incidents to NFIRS
When can incidents be exported?
In order to export incidents to NFIRS, incidents must be both #1 completed for your department, and then #2 processed for NFIRS. Only incidents that have been marked "NFIRS ready" can be exported.
Remember, exporting to your state or territory (which in turn shares to the FEMA USFA National Fire Incident Reporting System) is effectively final. Only do this once you are certain that the reports are correct.
NOTE: Some states or territories determine how and when you should export your incidents, e.g. maybe your previous month of NFIRS reports is due on the 15th of the month.
NOTE: Once an NFIRS export file is prepared by Responserack it cannot be tracked, especially if your state requires you to download the file and upload it to eNFIRS. Responserack cannot know if you achieved that.
IN THIS ARTICLE
Ready for NFIRS export
Ensure all your incidents are ready for NFIRS export prior to performing an export so a batch of incidents is grouped logically.
NOTE: Any incidents with important NFIRS validation issues cannot be marked as NFIRS ready, so cannot be exported. This is because incident reports with important validations will fail to be imported to NFIRS.
Creating an export
Creating an export is taking a snapshot of those incident reports from Responserack, such that no further edits within Responserack will effect those reports. An export is a capture for the historical record.
What is an export? What has occurred?
An export is prepared (bundled) and stored for action and review. Incidents within the bundle are marked as "exported" and will not be exported again.
NOTE: These have NOT been sent to the state or territory. Yet, see 'Actions'.
Actions on the Export
Based upon how your state or territory requires NFIRS to be submit there are two actions:
- Download - download the export file to your local machine, so it can be uploaded to eNFIRS.
- Email - sent to your state or territory representative. Your department can be copied (CC'ed) on this email.
NOTE: Once an export file has been downloaded to your local machine Responserack cannot know if you upload it to eNFIRS or not. Please be careful to perform this step so there are no gaps. Perhaps create a working folder / directory to store these file and upload them to eNFIRS as soon as you download them.
Can I resend or redownload an export?
Yes, merely press the "email" or "download" button next to the export and the action will be redone.
Undoing an export
If for some abnormal reason an export must be undone (e.g. if an month's export had been prematurely created) then each incident within that export has its "exported" marker removed.
