Before you get started, it’s highly recommended (but not required) that you have a separate Work Request module for this feature. This allows for the most configurability and the ideal experience.
Open the Service Request portal and select “Settings” in the top left corner to get started:
First, you need to set your geographic starting area. This allows users to start in the correct area when they open the SRP. Set your center and your zoom level. You can also use the search address function to find a central point.
Module: This is where you select your work request module you’d like to tie to the SRP. You do not have to have a separate module for this, but it is recommended. It’s also recommended that you set the module to require approval. To do this:
- Go to User Type settings
- Select Community Member
- Find your Module for SRP
Check the box for “requires approval”
Request Types: You can select which request types you’d like to show publicly for people to select. Select any combination, or all.
Additional information field: You need to select a specific custom field for this. For most organizations, this is a “Description” field. The field must be a text field on the request details section. (Check out Form Builder in the Admin Settings to modify your custom fields).
Photos field: You need to select a specific custom field for this. For most organizations, this is an “Attachments” field. The field must be an attachment field on the request details section. Check out Form Builder in the Admin Settings to modify your custom fields).
Permitted user types: This allows you to specify which user types can access and submit through the portal. If you want to allow for Community Members and anonymous users (people without an account initially are anonymous users), please select those user types. This is highly recommended and required if you intend to embed this publicly.
Requester user: Select a user to “host” the requests that come through the portal. This can be an Admin, or you can create a specific SRP user to host all of your requests. This user is replaced with a “Community User” if an anonymous user creates an account when submitted a request through the portal.
Allow following requests: Checking this box allows users to view the portal and follow requests that other people have submitted. This is recommended to be turned on so that your organization will get less duplicate requests, and allows people to stay updated on requests they have interest in.
- In order for this to work, you’ll need to:
- User Type Settings > Find Community Member and edit
- Find your Module Request Access settings and ensure this user type has “Read” permissions set to Any
- Also find the “Follower access mode” and set it to Can follow
- Then navigate to the Module Request Notification section and set these permissions:
Embedding and sharing the portal
You can share the portal link for people to access it directly. To do so, copy the URL and remove the “/wrapper” from the end of the URL.
Embedding is a bit different. You’ll need permission/access to your website’s content management system (CMS), which is different from FMX. You will be able to copy-paste the embed code into your CMS to format and embed the portal within your website to make it easy for users to access and submit, view, and follow requests.
Setup is now complete!
Community Alerts
These allow admins in the organization to proactively communicate issues in the areas to the public to prevent additional submissions or duplicate requests. You can create 2 types of alerts:
- Banner alerts: These appear at the top of the portal and are for wide-spread issues or announcements, such as snow plow timing, area outages, etc.
- Pin alerts; These appear as individual pins on the map, similar to other requests. These are for specific area issues, such as traffic light outages, water main breaks, etc.
Community alerts have a set timeframe, so that you can set them to appear and disappear automatically. You can also update the alerts if you resolve the issue early or need more time and need to extend your announcement.
Submitting Requests:
Start by clicking “Create new request” in the top right corner. This will allow you to drag and drop the pin in the position of the issue, or you can type an address in the top left corner. When you’ve placed the pin in the correct location, click “Confirm and continue.”
From here, you can fill out the Request name, the request type, and any additional information or photos to help provide enough detail to address the issue.
When your request is submitted, initially it will only be visible to the requesting user and the organization to approve the request. Once the request is approved, other visitors will be able to see the request in the portal, which allows them to follow the request if they’d like.