How does your agency use First Due for inspections, invoicing, and permitting?
We use First Due as our full records management system for conducting inspections, noting fire code violations and operational permits, issuing written notices of violations, and billing and permitting. It has been easy to send invoices electronically to customers. After we complete the initial inspection, we now have instant records of what violations were noted, when they were corrected, and what uses are generally occurring in that building through the operational permits that we have inspected for and issued to the business. With First Due, we're able to email an invoice for the permits directly to the customer. The customer receives an itemized invoice and can see exactly what they are being charged for.
Being paperless provides us with some benefits. There is no paperwork to lose or misplace. Re-inspections are automatically scheduled and show up daily, so we are reminded to return and reinspect to ensure violations have been corrected. Environmentally, it's better than printing out a piece of paper, putting it in an envelope, putting a stamp on it, and sending it out. First Due saves us a lot of personnel time, as well as cutting down on our administrative and mailing costs. I have talked to people from other Prevention Divisions/Bureaus, and many are still doing all of this by hand.