Signposting and External Referrals
Location in standard build: Record a Contact screen > "Options" section > Signposting and External Referrals
As part of your work with people, you may want to give them details about other organisations. This might be so that a client can engage with that organisation to have services provided, or it might just be a simple signpost (giving out the contact details of a local library, for example). You can record the fact that you have signposted someone directly from the "Record a Contact" screen, using the "Signposting and External Referrals" link in the "Options" section.
Clicking this link brings up a lookup box, as shown. The options in the lookup is the list of Organisations you have set up on your system.
To enter something in this box, click the yellow icon to the right of the box. This will display a window with the Organisations in; put a tick in the box of the one you want to log the signpost to.
Three things happen automatically;
- the window closes
- the box populates itself with the name of the organisation in question and adds another row
- the system fills in some text in the "Details of Contact" text box, as shown.
Then you click "Continue" at the bottom of the screen, this external referral will be recorded, and will appear in the External Referrals Report. Note that this process hasn't actually done the signposting itself, i.e. the system hasn't emailed the other organisation, or anything along those lines. It is assumed that you have given the client the relevant information.
Adding Organisations
If you click the yellow icon and find that the Organisation you want to log a signpost to is not on your system, you can add it at this point by clicking the "Add a new record" link at the top of the lookup page.
If this link is not shown, this is because your system administrators have removed the facility to create Organisations from this page.
Clicking the link will allow you to enter details of the organisation.
A reason not to add Organisations in this way
The data entry screen to add a new Organisation only gives you the ability to enter basic data about the Organisation. Your system may require more information, particularly if the Organisation in question is also a Referrer - they should have the "is this a Referrer" field set to "Yes", but this field is not available from this data entry screen.
The best options are:
- be proactive about adding the Organisations that you work with to the system. Add them by viewing the Organisations list (Organisations and People > Organisations in the standard build), clicking "Create new", then filling in the required data.
- on occasions when you do need to add Organisations in the middle of recording a contact, remember to go back to the newly-created record for that Organisation and fill in full details.
Signpost and External Referral Types
If they are set up on your system, you will also be able to add the "Type Of Referral".
Signpost and External Referral Types are a way of categorising the external referrals that you log. They are sometimes used for:
- differentiating between managed referrals and simple signposts
- differentiating between signposts to voluntary organisations, council departments, businesses
- etc.
If they are set up and used, the Signpost and External Referral Types will be shown on the External Referrals Report.
Rob Kay - manual author (talk) 13:24, 25 August 2015 (BST)
