foreAction Release 4.0 October 9, 2018
Creating Cases
Cases can be created in three ways:
- Directly from the homepage
- From the Case Work Application
- From any Contact or Organization in the database directly from their details page
Navigating to the Case Work Application
There are two main ways to navigate to foreAction’s Case Work application once you are logged in:
- Select Case Work from the top-most menu. You may do this at any point while you are logged in.
- Select one of the Case Work options from the Home screen.
The Dashboard
The main landing page of the Case Work application is the Dashboard. Here you will find a summary of all the Cases within your selected Case Office. Please note that the numbers on this page represent the entire Case Office, not only those Cases that are assigned to you.
The charts in the lower section of the dashboard can be filtered to remove any component by clicking on the component in the legend section. This is useful when there is a single component that is disproportionately larger than the others. By removing it, the other components’ relative values become clearer.
On the top right, there is a button to ‘Print’ the Dashboard with the following options:
- Include Totals – include a snapshot of the quick-filter buttons at the top of the Dashboard.
- Include Summary Table – include a summary of the basic details of all your Cases. For more detailed options see below. Note that this option will only be available if a quick-find option was chosen.
- Include Pin/Heat Maps – includes maps if you have Maps enabled.
- Include Graphs – include snapshots of all Dashboard graphs as they are displayed on the page.
Filtering the Dashboard
Click any of the eight filter buttons at the top of the dashboard to open a list of Cases that match the given criterion. For example, clicking the first (1) opens a list of all the Open Cases in your office.
For more advanced filtering: The last filter button ‘Custom Filter’ (3) is completely customizable, so if the premade ones don’t suit your needs you can make your own! You can also filter the entire dashboard’s results by clicking the filter button on the top-right of the dashboard (2).
From this list, you have the option to search cases, edit cases or print a report of all the cases from the list (4). You can minimize the list at any time by clicking the ‘x’ on the top right (5).
If you have the Map option enabled, you can click Map (1) to view your cases as a Pin Map. You can click the ‘Heat Map’ option on the top-right of the map (2) to switch to Heat Maps.
My Cases
This is where you’ll be able to search and manage all the Cases that have been assigned to you. To get to My Cases, select it from the left-hand menu. You can also find a link to it from the home page.
On the top right of the page, there is a button to ‘Print’ your cases with the following options:
- Include Totals – includes a snapshot of the quick-find boxes on the top left.
- Include Summary Table – includes a summary of the basic details of all your Cases. For more detailed options see below.
- Include Pin/Heat Maps – includes maps if you have Maps enabled.
- Include Graphs – includes the visual graph currently chosen on the top right.
Below the print option, there is a visual Summary depicting the status of all your Cases. There are four separate tabs to filter what you’d like the Summary to show.
Note: The visual summary graph shows all your Cases, regardless of the quick-filter button chosen.
At the bottom, you’ll see a list of the all the Cases you’ve filtered from the quick-find boxes above. From here, you can Search for specific Cases, choose which columns are shown in the list, download the list, do an Advanced Search, and Edit a Case.
- Editing a specific Case - If you click on one of the Cases from the list, you can see its details to theright of the list. To Edit the Case’s details, click on the Edit button on the top right or bottom right of the details box. See Section 2.4 for details on how to edit a Case.
- Showing specific columns - There is an icon directly to the right of the Search bar. Click on this button to reveal which columns to show in the Cases List.
- Downloading the list – Next to the column button there is an export icon. Clicking on this button shows several file types. Click one of these to download the Cases List.
- Advanced Search – Clicking this option takes you to the Find Option in the left-hand menu. See Section 2.3 for more details.
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Generate Case Summaries – This lets you download a PDF summarizing your Cases in a convenient format. Here’s an overview of the various options:
- Show empty fields – if you un-check this option your Case Summaries won’t include any fields that have been left blank.
- Notes and Case History – lets you choose whether to include secure and/or internal notes as well as whether to include Case History.
- Attachments – gives you the option to include a list of attachment information at the end of every Case Summary.
Creating a Case
To add a Case from within the Case Work application, use the following steps.
Step 1: Click on the Create icon in the left-hand menu. A form to add the new Case will appear.
Contact Type – Select the Contact Type for which the Case is being created.
Contact – Choose the Contact itself. Clicking the Contact field will cause a pop-up to appear.
- To Create a new Contact, click the ‘+’ button on the top-left. Note that you will be required to fill in all the information a regular Contact requires.
- To Search for an existing Contact, fill in the relevant search parameters, then click on the desired Contact from the results below.
Send Contact Email on create – If your Case Office Administrator has enabled it, you have the option to send the Contact an email once the Case is created. If the Contact does not have an email or has the option of Do Not Contact, you will get the following warning:
If you are a Case Office Administrator, see how to set this up.
Tags – Once you have added a Contact to the Case, you have the option to Tag them to ensure that you know what issues are important to them. This is key to creating better engagement with your Contacts over time. To do so, click the ‘+’ next to the Tags option, then click the desired Tag from the pop-up.
Note that not all Case Office staff can Create, Edit, or Delete Tags. Contact your Administrator to manage any Tags you may need.
Step 3: Next, provide the requested Information about the Case.
Category Categorization of the Case based on the options defined by your Domain Administrator or Office Administrator. Note that choosing the Category may change your Note at the bottom of the page if your Office Administrator overrode the Category’s Default Intake Template. Title & Description The Title and Description of the issue to be tracked. Status Open for active Cases, or Closed for Cases that have been resolved or shelved indefinitely.
If your Case Office Administrator has enabled it, you’ll have the option to send an Email to the Contact upon closing the Case. If you are a Case Office Administrator see how to set this up.
Coming Soon: Sub-Status (In Progress, With Staff, etc)
Priority
A priority level to for the Case – from 1 to 5 (1 being the most urgent).
Confidential
Confidential Cases can only be viewed by Office Administrators and Office Staff. They cannot be viewed by Office Basic users.
Follow-Up Date
Reminder for the date of next follow-up.
Next Step
Allows you to summarize your next required action.
Assigned To
Allows you to assign the Case to anyone in your Case Office. By default, the Case is assigned to the user that creates the Case.
Only visible to Assigned User(s)
By default, a Case is visible to all staff in the Case Office. If you choose to only make the Case visible to assigned users, it will only be visible to the users assigned to the Case and all Office Administrators.
Marked for Review
This is a flag that allows the Case to be included in a report of Cases that are Marked for Review. This can be very useful if the Office Manager wants to get a list of Contacts that would like to hear from them.
Opened Date
By default, this is set to today’s date, but you can override this if the Case needs to be tracked to a different date.
Location Description
This describes the location of the case. Clicking the icon next to the input field causes a map to pop out so you can search specific locations. You can center the location on either the contact's address or the Case’s location description. Alternatively, you can use the search box to find any address.
Step 4: Note
For the first note (when creating a new Case) it is possible to use a template to gather information through a pre-configured series of standardized questions. Global Intake Templates can be created and customized by Office Administrators. Information on how an Office Administrator can manage the Case Office’s IntakeTemplates. You also have the option to ignore the default Intake Template and select another Intake Template from the dropdown. These include all Global Intake Templates created by the Domain Administrator and Case Office Intake Templates created by the Office Administrator. You can also select ‘No Template’ if you do not want an Intake Template for your Note and want to write the Note from scratch.
Step 5: Attachments
Here you have the option to attach documents such as PDF, Word, Excel files, or email correspondence related to the Case. Simply click the ‘+’ icon in the upper left corner to locate and attach the desired files. You can also drag and drop a file from your File Explorer directly into the Attachments table to add it to the Case.
IMPORTANT: You must hit Save to complete creating the Case. Once you have provided all mandatory and any additional optional information, click Save and the new Case will be added to the foreAction database.
Finding Existing Cases
If you would like to locate Cases that are assigned to others (if you have permissions to do so), or simply have better control of the search criteria, this is the more advanced search function. To access this capability, select Find in the left-hand menu. Enter the criteria that you wish to use to search the CaseOffice’s Cases, then click the Search button. A list of Cases meeting these criteria will be shown in the table at the bottom of the page. The “quick find” buttons at the top are selectable and will create the appropriate filter, showing matching Cases in the table at the bottom of the page.
At the bottom of the page, you also have the option to export all the Cases from the Search result as a CSV file and bulk Reassign all Cases from one Office user to another.
Note that Office Administrators also have the option to bulk reassign Cases in the Office Administration tab.
You can also Generate a Report of all the Cases in your search results.
Updating a Case
Once you have successfully searched for and opened a Case, you can update most of the information that was specified when the Case was first created or subsequently updated. Specifically, you can:
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Associate the Case with a different Contact
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Specify a new Category
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Change the Title and Description
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Close an open Case or vice versa
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If your Case Office Administrator has enabled it, you may have the option to send an Email to the Contact upon closing the Case.
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Reset the priority
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Toggle whether the Case should be treated confidentially or not
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Set a new follow-up date
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Define next steps
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Reassign the Case to somebody else in the Case Office
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Change whether the Case is only visible to the assigned user(s)
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Choose whether the Case is Marked for Review
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Select a new Opened Date
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Change the Case Location
Case Notes
This is where you’ll see all the Case’s Notes. You also have the ability to create new Notes, edit existingNotes, and delete Notes that are no longer needed. Keep in mind that each Note only shows the first 10 lines of that Note. You can expand a note by clicking on it.
Special Note Types
1. A Note can optionally be set to: Internal and/or Secure.
Internal – By assigning this designation, you will be able to include private notes for your colleagues, that you can choose to exclude from any correspondence with the Contact who raised the Case. By selecting this option, when you print the Case, you can choose to exclude Internal Notes.
Secure – Click this option if there is any sensitive information in the Note. Selecting this option ensures that this Note is encrypted in the database. This additional level of security ensures that even if someone could access the database, the information would not be readable to them. Note: If you select the Secure option, the contents of the note will not be searchable in the “Find Case” advanced search page. Because the data is stored in encrypted form, any direct data queries looking for contents in a secure note will not be able to read the data.
Searching Notes within a Case
To search for a Specific Note on the Case you are viewing, click the search icon on the top-right and type in text from the Note you are searching.
By default, only the Last 5 Notes are shown. To see more options, click the dropdown next to the search icon on the top-right.
There are three types of Notes: Standard, Internal, and Secure. Use the checkboxes next to ‘Show’ to filter which Notes you’d like to see.
Creating / Editing Case Notes
To create a new Note, click the ‘+’ button next to New Note. Then write the Note, choose whether youwant to have the Note either be Internal, Secure, both, or neither. To cancel creating the note, click‘Discard’ on the top right of the New Note. To edit or delete an existing Note, click the ‘...’ on the right- hand side of a Note and click the desired option. To save any changes, save the Case by clicking the Save button at the bottom of page.
Case History
This tab shows all the history of the Case, from changed information to Note creation and deletion.
Once you have provided the updated information, click Save and the updated Case will be saved to the foreAction database.
Reporting On, Moving, or Deleting Cases
At the bottom-left of a Case’s details page, there is an ‘Options’ item. Here you’ll have the option either to Generate a PDF Report, Move the Case to another Case Office, or Delete the Case.
Generate Report
There are several options when creating a Case report as per the following:
Any attachments can be bundled together and will be added to a .zip file for the Case.
All reports generated in Case Work will be downloaded automatically through your browser.
Move to Another Case Office
Note that this option is only available to Office Administrators with access to more than one Case Office. If you select Move to another Case Office, you will be presented with the option to select another Case Office from the list of other Case Offices for which you have administration privileges.
Delete Case
If you choose to delete the Case, you will be presented with a dialog where you will be asked to confirm your intention to permanently remove the Case from the foreAction database.